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<\/a>By Giovanni \u201cBlame Girl\u201d Neal<\/a><\/div>\nR3 Contributor \u00a0 \u00a0<\/div>\n
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Religious institutions of the United States literally have the freest speech in the country. \u00a0Over the past year,\u00a0we\u2019ve\u00a0seen a church that\u00a0wouldn\u2019t\u00a0allow interracial couples to attend their congregation.\u00a0 Likewise, we have heard about a church that refused to perform a marriage ceremony for a black couple.\u00a0 In our country we have a church whose URL address is godhatesfags.com; and the very same church protests our soldier\u2019s funerals.\u00a0 Religious institutions can even undermine education and science with their own creationism museums.\u00a0 However, they are prohibited in one area, and that is in political speech.<\/div>\n
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So why can\u2019t religious institutions address our political campaigns? \u00a0The difference between a church and an individual is that churches have the protection of free speech and pay no taxes.\u00a0 This prohibition lies in the 501(c)(3) status.\u00a0 The law is that \u201cin exchange for the receipt of tax-exempt status, Internal Revenue Code (\u201cI.R.C.\u201d) \u00a7 501(c)(3) absolutely<\/b> prohibits churches and other tax-exempt organizations from campaigning for or against a candidate for public office.\u201d<\/div>\n
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It is not just churches that cannot endorse a candidate, but any organization seeking tax-exempt status.\u00a0 They give up their political speech in exchange for money.\u00a0 But if you look at corporations and unions, they too have restrictions on their free speech.\u00a0 Corporations may not directly contribute to a candidate from their treasury funds or a business account.\u00a0 However, there is always a loophole.\u00a0 Both corporations and churches have the option to form a 501(c)(4) PAC and they can circumvent the restriction on their political speech and support a candidate.\u00a0 Even though they cannot directly support candidates in politics, they can indirectly show their support.<\/div>\n
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The 1954 law, pushed by Sen. Lyndon B. Johnson, could be seen as unconstitutional by many.\u00a0 But does it really hurt religious freedom?\u00a0 Perhaps if the IRS enforced it, it could be seen as a violation of free speech.\u00a0 This past Sunday, one thousand churches broke the law to participate in what is known as \u201cPulpit Freedom Sunday.\u201d\u00a0 They endorsed a candidate from the churches platform, from \u2018God\u2019s\u2019 platform. \u00a0These \u2018tax-evaders\u2019 will more than likely never be brought to justice.<\/div>\n
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Though Pulpit Freedom Sunday is in its fifth year, yet churches have a long history of political involvement.\u00a0 Black Churches have a history of heavily influencing politics since the Civil Rights Movement, yet never had the threat of I.R.C. \u00a7 501(c)(3) being enforced.\u00a0 In fact a church\u2019s 501(c)(3) status\u00a0wasn\u2019t\u00a0actually revoked until the 1990\u2019s when The Church at Pierce Creek in Binghamton, NY took out ads in the Washington Times and USA Today criticizing Bill Clinton\u2019s stance on abortion and homosexuality. \u00a0An appellate court upheld the law then, saying it violated neither the Establishment Clause nor the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. \u00a0It was upheld on the grounds that for such burden to be unconstitutional, it must put \u201csubstantial pressure<\/b> on an adherent to modify his behavior and to violate his beliefs\u201d. \u00a0Yet we still have Pulpit Freedom Sundays of which videos of the political sermons are mailed to the IRS, yet the IRS\u00a0doesn\u2019t\u00a0dare enforce the law.\u00a0 If the IRS would enforce the rule, that would give churches yet another opportunity to pursue litigation and have the rule thrown out as unconstitutional.\u00a0 <\/div>\n
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The law was created by LBJ to prevent the church from shaping public policy.\u00a0 There is a danger in blindly taking a leader\u2019s free speech as absolute, even more so when it\u2019s a religious leader\u2019s speech. \u00a0However, if churches can spew rhetoric that rivals Al Qaeda and allow marriages to occur according to pre-Civil war standards, then\u00a0doesn\u2019t\u00a0that indirectly shape public policy? <\/div>\n
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On one hand I think churches should be able to be as free as they\u2019d like with their speech, but on the other hand I wonder what it would be like to see churches like Westborough Baptist, among others prosecuted for tax evasion.\u00a0\u00a0<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pulpits, Politics and PACS<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"By Giovanni "Blame Girl" NealR3 Contributor Religious institutions of the United States literally have the freest speech in the country.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2012\/10\/pulpits-politics-and-pacs.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pulpits, Politics and PACS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Giovanni "Blame Girl" NealR3 Contributor Religious institutions of the United States literally have the freest speech in the country.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2012\/10\/pulpits-politics-and-pacs.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Rhetoric Race and Religion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-10-08T21:41:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.production.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/files\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/-s_R0DENLjHs\/T1gX9xhjAwI\/AAAAAAAAAdA\/jpWfvLybDNs\/s200\/giovanni+neal.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Andre E. 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By Giovanni \u201cBlame Girl\u201d Neal R3 Contributor \u00a0 \u00a0 Religious institutions of the United States literally have the freest speech in the country. \u00a0Over the past year,\u00a0we\u2019ve\u00a0seen a church that\u00a0wouldn\u2019t\u00a0allow interracial couples to attend their congregation.\u00a0 Likewise, we have heard about a church that refused to perform a marriage ceremony for a black couple.\u00a0 In […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2251,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n