Churches and the Election
The advocacy group Americans United for Separation of Church and State is urging the Internal Revenue Service to take action against four churches for exercising their First Amendment rights. Here's hoping the churches stand their ground, and, if need be, force this matter to court, where some wise judge will have the opportunity to explain to both the IRS and Americans United the meaning of the phrase "Congress shall make no law."
The alleged violations cited by Americans United included two in Maryland. One church, Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church of Cambridge, Md., reportedly hosted a rally for the Democratic candidate for governor. At another, Mount Emmon Baptist Church in Clinton, the pastor reportedly criticized the Republican senatorial candidate, Michael Steele, from the pulpit while Mr. Steele's opponent, Benjamin Cardin, sat in the front row on the Sunday before Election Day.
Americans United is also complaining about an Arkansas church, Lakeview Assembly of God at Hot Springs, that had a Republican candidate for governor come speak but not the Democratic candidate. And it complains about the Sioux City Baptist Church in Sioux City, Iowa, which it said made available printed voter guides from the Iowa Christian Alliance that Americans United said were "clearly stacked to favor Republican hopefuls."
The Federal Election Commission tried going after the Christian Coalition on the voter guide issue in the late 1990s and was dealt a defeat by a federal judge. The IRS has also been treading this ground for the past several years, having previously investigated other religious groups. Americans United prompted an investigation of the conservative Pennsylvania Pastors Network, apparently for the crime of supporting Senator Santorum for his stances on social issues. The IRS also launched an investigation of All Saints Episcopal Church at Pasadena, Calif., after the rector there delivered an anti-war sermon before the 2004 election.
In those cases, as in the latest round Americans United is trying to spur, if the IRS tries telling a preacher what he can or can't say on the pulpit or whom he can or can't invite to his church, it would be violating not only the First Amendment provision on free exercise of religion but also the provisions on freedom of peaceable assembly and freedom of speech. The great thing about freedom of religion in America is that it allows churches and synagogues and mosques to flourish even if they are politically involved and no matter what sides of the spectrum they are on, right alongside those that are politically neutral. The attack on politics in the churches really is an attack on the free exercise of religion that is America's First Freedom.
