The behind-the-scenes behavior of the IRS tax-exempt org., handoff to leftist groups the problem

Reader comment on: Allison Versus Durbin

Submitted by Mark Michael (United States), Aug 9, 2013 18:04

Of course you're right on the basic First Amendment requirement of the IRS to make sure that the laws concerning tax-exempt organizations are indeed being followed. What makes it so difficult to object to Sen. Durbin's 300 letters is what we know went on behind the scenes at the IRS. How they repeatedly asked just conservative applicants for 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) tax-exempt status for more and more information and rubberstamped hundreds of leftist applications at the same time. The information that they asked for violated the rules that the IRS was allowed to ask. They then broke the law by feeding that info they got from the conservative ones to leftist organizations. Those organizations then threatened to boycott the conservative businesses, emailed their customers with threats of various sorts. The IRS also audited many of the donors to Tea Party or other conservative organizations. Well, you know the whole litany of abuses, many directly broke the law.

Of course, a strict interpretation of the U.S. Constitution could easily say that all law restricting political campaign donations are a violation of the 1st Amendment, since they restrict how widely you can promulgate your "speech". The SCOTUS seems to be too timid to go the whole way and throw them all out. Instead, they trim around the edges. Citizen's United is an example.

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