WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) — Churches and other houses of worship can now endorse political candidates to their congregations, in a landmark decision by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
The historic move comes after two Texas churches and a group of Christian broadcasters sued the IRS, alleging that the 1954 Johnson Amendment, which requires that nonprofits not endorse political candidates, violates their “First Amendment rights to the freedom of speech and free exercise of religion.”
The Johnson Amendment states that certain organizations lose their tax-exempt status if they “participate in, or intervene in…, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.”
In a settlement agreement between the plaintiffs and the IRS, jointly filed on Monday, the IRS agreed that a house of worship does not participate or “intervene” in a political campaign when it communicates to its own congregation.
“Bona fide communications internal to a house of worship, between the house of worship and its congregation, in connection with religious services, do neither of those things, any more than does a family discussion concerning candidates,” stated the joint motion.
The decision said that the Johnson Amendment has until now been interpreted in a way that creates “serious tension with the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause” by treating “religions that do not speak directly to matters of electoral politics more favorably than religions that do so—favoring some religions over others based on their speech to their own congregations in connection with religious services…”
The IRS has admittedly failed to enforce the Johnson Amendment with regard to churches at times, as a 2022 investigation by ProPublica and the Texas Tribune alleged. In 2014, the IRS settled a lawsuit filed by the atheist Freedom from Religion Foundation (FFRF), which complained that the IRS was ignoring reports about churches violating their tax-exempt statuses.
The government had put a moratorium on the IRS’ investigations of tax-exempt organizations after the scandal that broke in 2013 over its targeting of pro-life, pro-family, and Tea Party groups.
Erik Stanley, senior legal counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom and head of the Pulpit Initiative, previously told LifeSiteNews that “the IRS has no business censoring what a pastor preaches from the pulpit.”
The tax-exempt status of churches is not an even trade-off to give up free speech, he said. “No one would suggest a pastor give up his church’s tax-exempt status if he wants to keep his constitutional protection against illegal search and seizure or cruel and unusual punishment,” he said.
“Churches are constitutionally entitled to a tax exemption and that exemption cannot be conditioned on the surrender of constitutional rights.”
Election years often bring out criticisms of churches from political opponents. Pastors who speak against abortion or homosexuality are often accused of being political, but Stanley says that’s because “society has been taking issues that are biblical, slapping a political label on them, and telling churches that they are now off-limits. The church has not been invading the realm of politics. Rather, politics has been invading the realm of the church.”
