The Lead

The United Church of Christ is being investigated by the Internal Revenue Service over a speech Senator Obama gave at a church conference in June:

The IRS has notified the UCC that it has opened an investigation into Obama's address at the UCC's 2007 General Synod in Hartford, Conn., the UCC said yesterday.

According to a copy of an IRS letter that the church received Monday, the IRS is launching the inquiry "because reasonable belief exists that the United Church of Christ has engaged in political activities that could jeopardize its tax-exempt status."

Under federal law, churches are barred from becoming directly or indirectly involved in campaigns of political candidates.

According to a text of the speech posted on the church's Web site, Obama promised to sign a universal health care bill in his first term as president, and he denounced the Iraq war.

Read it at The Trail a political blog of the Washington Post.

The UCC has issued a press release announcing the creation of a legal defense fund:

In a Feb. 27 letter to members and supporters, General Minister and President John H. Thomas said the fund was necessary "to ensure that money given for mission will not be needed to pay legal bills, instead of ministry needs."

"In order to adequately defend ourselves as well as protect the broader principle of the freedom of religious communities to entertain questions of faith and public life, we will need to secure expert legal counsel, and the cost of this defense, we are told, could approach or exceed six figures," Thomas wrote. "This is troubling news."

From the church's own reporting of the investigation:

In an introduction before Obama's speech, Thomas said Obama was invited as "one of ours" to provide reflections on "how personal faith can be lived out in the public square, how personal faith and piety is reflected in the life of public service."

Thomas said the IRS's investigation implies that Obama, a UCC member, is not free to speak openly to fellow UCC members about his faith.

In its reporting on the speech at the time the AP wrote

“But somehow, somewhere along the way, faith stopped being used to bring us together and faith started being used to drive us apart. Faith got hijacked, partly because of the so-called leaders of the Christian Right, all too eager to exploit what divides us,” the Democratic presidential candidate said in a 30-minute speech before a national meeting of the United Church of Christ.

Comments (5)

I must first confess I am a Hillary Clinton supporter. That said, this is exactly the kind of rooky mistake that we have been afraid of. I support the UCC in their defense, and hope they don't lose their tax exempt status, but any political candidate must know that making political statements and in effect "campaigning" from the pulpit of a church runs the risk of bringing of IRS investigation.

We have applauded when conservative churches have been investigated for politicizing the pulpit, and using church money to endrose candidates. Sen. Obama has stepped on perhaps his first mine in the field, and there will be more.

When the Republican attack machine gets through with Barack we may have to say "Humphrey, McGovern, Dukakis, Gore, Kerry, Obama."

Sadly, the democratic party seems to have a knack for nominating the wrong person for the wrong reasons.

Posted by trey merritt | February 27, 2008 7:35 PM

See Susan Russell's observations here,
http://inchatatime.blogspot.com/2008/02/irs-strikes-again.html

Posted by John B. Chilton | February 28, 2008 9:30 AM

Giving a candidate time to speak to the general synod without giving equal time to the other candidates is wrong. It doesn't necessarily matter what the candidate says. Obama was given time and was presented as a prominent member of the denomination who, by implication, deserved support. I fear a gradual erasure of the separation between church and state. Asking a candidate to speak during the campaign season is unwise. Sounds as if UCC got into a gray area of IRS rules.

Gary Paul Gilbert

Posted by garydasein | February 28, 2008 11:30 AM

Excuse me folks -- I realize this campaign has been going on for a while but the speech was given last June.

Posted by bill bonwitt | February 28, 2008 12:20 PM

The rules for 501 (c) (3) and political advocacy may be found at the IRS's website:

http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=154712,00.html

Allowing a candidate to speak to a group and not giving equal time to others is a violation of the rules. It is complicated but I agree with the rules in general. Church and state must remain separate.

Posted by garydasein | February 29, 2008 5:02 AM

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