Abuse of the First Amendment

The first amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, ...".

• Well, tax exemption is a law respecting an establishment of religion, and not just one, but all who claim to be religions!
• Excluding tax on donation income that goes to the poor is one thing, but exempting all taxes??? No way! It is a clear violation of the Constitution.
• This is a case of give them an inch and they took a mile!
• Madalyn Murray O'Hair fought for the separation of church and state and won the removal of prayer from public schools. She was driven out of Maryland by vicious harassment including the stoning of her house by her local neighbourhood religious residents. With this kind of inhuman treatment of opposition to government favouritism for the religious, those who would challenge the constitutionality of exempting religions from taxes fear for their lives.
• This bleeding of our government strongly inhibits our ability to provide necessary services and benefits for the unfortunate. The funds that could go for these benefits and emergency have been drained off by the religions since the first exemptions for charity began in 1894.
• Exempting expenses for charitable giving is one thing, but it has been manipulated so that the religions get all income exempted and only the rich get to exempt charitable gifts (One must itemize deductions, and have enough to make the itemized total bigger than the standard exemption.
• This means you must have paid a lot of money for interest on a home, state and local taxes, and giving. The vast majority of people with lower incomes, especially renters, do not have enough of these expenses to qualify, and, consequently cannot take the tax deduction for charitable gifts.
• [for 2013 the Single = $5,950, Married Filing Jointly = $11,900, and Head of Household = $8,700] A single person making $30,000, would have to have taxes, interest, and charity contributions totaling $6,000 to be able to take a charitable deduction, that's 20% of his or her income. Nobody that I know that poor can afford that much.
• The poor are discriminated against by the rich and the inequity in this charitable deduction scheme. Who benefits? The religions and the rich.
• They bleed funds which could serve the poor, as well as everybody for public transportation, education, and public research leading to new products and services.
• Where do these funds go? They go into the pockets of the rich, and into the wealth and well being of religions and the clergy as well as all the property these organizations collect while only a trivial share actually ends up in the hands of the poor.
• But they sure make big noise about the few they do help.
• Moral of the story? taxes have been abused by the religious and the rich at the expense of all the rest of us.
• Tax the churches and every property and income that is not actually dispensed as help to the poor and unfortunate.
• If it is used to maintain the religion, such as building and maintaining a church, TAX it.
• If it is given away to the poor and unfortunate, then, and only then, exempt it.

BACK