The IRS and the Church

Brendan Miniter writes in the Wall Street Journal regarding an IRS investigation currently underway in Ohio involving two churches accused of engaging in politics in violation of IRS regulations:

Earlier this year, 31 Ohio pastors called down the most powerful force they could find against two of their fellow church leaders in Columbus. No, it wasn't God--but close.

In a complaint filed with the Internal Revenue Service, the pastors alleged that the Rev. Russell Johnson and the Rev. Rod Parsley crossed the line into advocacy over the past year by preaching on political topics, initiating a voter registration drive and associating with Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, a Republican who is now running for governor.

Both Mr. Johnson and Mr. Parsley are fighting back, arguing that they've done nothing wrong by speaking out on what they see as moral, not just political, issues. If the IRS agrees with their accusers, however, the World Harvest Church and the Fairfield Christian Church could lose their tax-exempt status. It would be unusual for the IRS to mete out this kind of punishment, but as gay marriage, abortion and the war in Iraq increasingly draw religious leaders into politics, such complaints may become more common.

Just a few weeks after the pastors filed their grievance, the IRS released a report on the outcome of 132 similar anonymous filings against nonprofit organizations during the course of the 2004 presidential campaign, 63 of which are churches. The allegations against the churches include: inviting candidates to speak, donating money to politicians, endorsing individual candidates and publishing voter guides. Some of the cases were thrown out immediately, but 37 of the 47 churches that were investigated further were deemed to have run afoul of the tax code.

I'm not familiar with Rev. Johnson, but I've seen Rev. Parsley on TV and I know I certainly would not be comfortable in his church, but I wonder if this may be a case of people with glass churches shouldn't throw stones. How often during every major campaign has a Democrat candidate shown up in a black church somewhere to cajole the faithful and collect a little money? Just about every Sunday, that's how often.

I think there's a racial component in the Ohio case that Miniter doesn't address, and that's the fact that many of the accusers likely do not like the idea of a black candidate leaving the liberal reservation, and that may be driving the complaints as much as anything. Ken Blackwell is a prominent black conservative, and that's just not acceptable to many on the left.

Should the IRS rule against these two churches, the penalties could be extreme. They could lose their tax exempt status altogether, and could be required to pay a 10% excise tax on all contributions for a specified period of time. Not pretty, and the kind of thing that could shut a church down.

Should the complainants succeed, it may start an all-out war on churches as any sign of partisanship will result in a flurry of IRS complaints from those in the political opposition.