As faith-based groups push the wall between church and state, the role of tax in promoting religion, and of religion in promoting particular political candidates, becomes ever more worrisome. I have written previously, here, about Bush's faith-based initiative and the concerns it raises regarding too close a connection between church and state and the use of tax revenues to support particular government officers dedicated to assisting faith-based groups in acquiring government funding. I have also noted, here, the surge in religious intervention in politics and the concern that pastors and churches may be stepping over the bounds of talking about issues to supporting particular candidates, in violation of the requirements for their tax-exempt status. Churches are not permitted to endorse a particular candidate or party or take other actions that appear to focus on one candidate or one candidate's issues in ways that suggest endorsement.
As the campaign season heats up for the 2006 elections, we will likely see more activity by churches, both liberal and conservative, that threatens to cross the line into overt campaigning. Beginning in the 2004 campaign, Republicans openly solicited church members to provide copies of church directories that can be used for get-out-the-vote efforts. See here and here. Partisan groups are now training pastors of churches to get-out-the-vote; some of that training appears to step over the line and favor particular candidates. See David Kirkpatrick, Pastors' Get-Out-the-Vote Training Could Test Tax Rules, New York Times, Mar. 21, 2006, at A16. The article reports on a well-funded organizing effort in Pennsylvania to train pastors to get out the vote to support conservative causes and politicians. Let Freedom Ring, the organizer for this first training session, is a conservative group funded initially during the 2004 campaign with $1 million from an anonymous donor. See this story. The group claims to stand for "constitutional principles, economic freedom and traditional values."
The first training session featured Rick Santorum, one of the most vocal anti-gay union and anti-abortion Senators, who spoke to the group via videotape for seven minutes, urging the pastors to "let your voices be heard from the pulpit" against gay rights. Santorum's book It Takes a Family was provided to attending pastors and described as a rebuttal to Senator Clinton's book It Takes a Village, although the presenter "pointedly said he would not name the author [Clinton]." Id. When interviewed for the story, the organizer of Let Freedom Ring claimed the meetings were unrelated to Santorum's campaign and explicitly told pastors not to endorse candidates. Id. He went on to say that a former Democratic mayor of Boston, who now supports Bush and stumps for social conservative causes, was also invited to speak.
If the restriction against political campaigning means anything at all, it surely is violated when a Senator running in a tight race is conspicuously highlighted in videotape and book distributions. Surely a token member of another party who no longer supports the positions of that party is not enough to whitewash the meeting and make it non-partisan.
The restrictions against tax exempt church participation in partisan campaigning are important and should be enforced. Bringing religion into politics creates a volatile mix that can easily result in denials of freedoms to those who do not adhere to the majority religion.
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