DiscussMormonism.com

Much has been said already on various boards, including this one, concerning the Mormon church's finances and whether such churches ought to have the right to keep their finances private. I ran across recently a brief article by Marci A. Hamilton (a legal expert in Constitution and trademark law) speaking of abuses by churches, in relation to finances, and thought you all might enjoy it.

The question is to you all: How much freedom should a religion have to keep its finances private? This obviously brings up the constitution and the 1st Amendment. Where is the line?

This need not be limited to finances, per se, but any abuses by religions.

I post below just a short part of her comments and would be interested in your thoughts and ideas on the subject. Should religions be treated as any other big business? Why so? Or why not? What do you think of Madison's concerns in the quote below?

As I have documented in my recent book, God vs. the Gavel: Religion and the Rule of Law, religious institutions are perfectly capable of acting in ways that harm others. Yet elected representatives, whether state or federal, tend to have a huge blind spot when it comes to religious organizations. The operating assumption is that religious groups do good, are good, and deserve to be trusted. The facts on the ground, however, transform this blind spot into an abdication of their obligation to protect the weak from abuses of power…

One of the enormous inequities in current society is the unequal power between organized religion and individuals - often including their own members. Religious entities are not required to disclose their financial dealings, which means victims, employees, and others must respond to church actions without significant, let alone full, information. Only extraordinary pressure will bring such institutions to the public stage to reluctantly disclose some facts about their finances.

In this era when we are repeatedly told how good religion is, and when we watch its national influence lead to dubious results, it is worth a few moments to hearken back to the Framer of the First Amendment, including the Establishment Clause, James Madison. At the end of his presidency, Madison was quizzed about what worried him most in the United States. He warned of the "danger of silent accumulations & encroachments by Ecclesiastical Bodies," and worried that they "have not sufficiently engaged attention in the U.S." His concern about their opportunities for abuse of power was just one part of his larger view, which undergirds the entire constitutional structure, "that all men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree."
Contemporary elected representatives seem utterly incapable of understanding -- let alone implementing -- Madison's sage concerns. Until the power of the government is used to call religious institutions to account, there will be countless victims of their overweening power.

Link: http://writ.news.findlaw.com/hamilton/20060504.html

Edited to add: Sorry, I don't seem to know how to make this link come alive. Liz? Help? You can PM me. Edited again to add: I think I fixed it. thanks anyway.

It might at first be apropos to understand exactly what it is this author is talking about. What abuses. Examples? I'm not aware of anything regarding the LDS Church in this area.

One major problem I do see at the outset see is that the establishment clause of the Constitution has little to do with the authors subject here. The entire First Amendment to the Constitution is a broad protection of the people, as well as organized religion, from government. The clause in question proscribes Congress from making any law regarding freedom of press, speech, or religion, and neither gives nor implies any mandate to government or any government agency to monitor or regulate the finances of churches. It is utterly astounding the extent to which modern liberals can see in the First Amendment clear provisions justifying government meddling and probing into the affairs of its citizens, financial or otherwise, when that is precisely what that amendment exists to prohibit. The sole implied prohibitions in the amendment are to ensure that their will be no state religion nor any religion enjoying special preferred treatment by the state. That is where the amendment ends.

Madison's concerns here are simply not relevant to the modern western world including North America, where there is no issue of church/state separation of the kind faced 200 years ago by the founders, who had to confront on occasion some long standing Christian sects approaching the state for special treatment and government approved status at taxpayer expence and at the expense of other denominations not so favored. No such issue exists at present (two caveats are relevant hear, however. One would be the attempt to force "creation science" into the public school classroom, and the other would be environmentalism, but that's for another thread).

If there is compelling evidence or wrongdoing by a religious body, that's one thing. However, the overall tone of this thread so far seems to indicate a presumptive suspicion toward all churches broadly speaking, who handle large quantites of funds and an aconstitutional attempt to use the First Amendment as a regulatory stick to meddle in the private financial affairs of religous bodies on the presumption that that organized religious groups per se, to quote Anthony Quinn from High Wind In Jamaica "must be guilty of...something."

Loran

If there is compelling evidence or wrongdoing by a religious body, that's one thing. However, the overall tone of this thread so far seems to indicate a presumptive suspicion toward all churches broadly speaking, who handle large quantites of funds and an aconstitutional attempt to use the First Amendment as a regulatory stick to meddle in the private financial affairs of religous bodies on the presumption that that organized religious groups per se, to quote Anthony Quinn from High Wind In Jamaica "must be guilty of...something."

Loran

Abuses of power and/or money collected from the public that is supposed to go to the good deeds done by the church:

1. covering up for pedophile priests
2. Jimmy Swaggert
3. Main Street Plaza
4. the new shopping mall
5. bishops interviews behind closed doors with teens that include sexual questions, with no parent present
6. excommunications that don't start at the local level
7. the SCMC
8. picketing military funerals of non-members
9. covering up for pedophile members
10. etc etc etc

And you'd rather people just take it instead of fighting back and demanding accountability, wouldn't you, Loran?

90% irrelevancy and 10% substance. Exactly what I have come to expect from you Harmony.

1. covering up for pedophile priests
2. Jimmy Swaggert
3. Main Street Plaza
4. the new shopping mall
5. bishops interviews behind closed doors with teens that include sexual questions, with no parent present
6. excommunications that don't start at the local level
7. the SCMC
8. picketing military funerals of non-members
9. covering up for pedophile members
10. etc etc etc

Whateve the merit of a few of these may have (and a number of your examples here are simply personal subjective biases), not a one of them has anything whatsoever to do with the First Amendment of the Constitution.

Coggins7 wrote:90% irrelevancy and 10% substance. Exactly what I have come to expect from you Harmony.

1. covering up for pedophile priests
2. Jimmy Swaggert
3. Main Street Plaza
4. the new shopping mall
5. bishops interviews behind closed doors with teens that include sexual questions, with no parent present
6. excommunications that don't start at the local level
7. the SCMC
8. picketing military funerals of non-members
9. covering up for pedophile members
10. etc etc etc

Whateve the merit of a few of these may have (and a number of your examples here are simply personal subjective biases), not a one of them has anything whatsoever to do with the First Amendment of the Constitution.

I know as much as you about the First Amendment (which is another way of saying you are blowing smoke up your butt again). What these illustrate are those compelling evidences of abuse of power by church leaders. I thought you'd be pleased... not all of them are LDS-related.

I know as much as you about the First Amendment

Uh huh...

What these illustrate are those compelling evidences of abuse of power by church leaders. I thought you'd be pleased... not all of them are LDS-related.

Some of them are compelling, and some of them are most probably Signature Books culture anti-Church hype. Regardless of which is what, none of these examples have anything to do with the establishment clause of the Constitution. Swaggart was disgraced and defrocked by his denomination. Pedohiles in the LDS church, at least, will have to undergoe church discipline and, if they have committed actual crimes, turned over to secualr authority. Any church that misuses funds is liable to secualr authority as well, just as much as Enron. But none of this is a establishment clause issue, and only some of them are issues for either civil or criminal courts.

I have no idea what you are actually attempting to say here

This is an interesting topic. Religious organizations tend to gain most of their funding through "charitable" contributions, yet don't have the same accountability as a charity would, purely because of 1st amendment concerns. I'm almost tempted to get a copy of Hamilton's book to see how the constitutional issues come into play (after I finish slogging through Executioner's Song - fascinating!). For instance, I wonder what the issues would be if there were some sort of required accountability for all charitable donations (tithes, etc.) and the fruits thereof (shopping malls, investments, etc.), with the penalty for non-disclosure being the loss of tax-exempt status. At least this way, the religious institution isn't necessarily being forced to disclose, but there would be a consequence if it didn't. I'm assuming that there is may some precedence that makes this unworkable - perhaps Hamilton's book covers this.

Hi Cog. Wake up on the wrong side of the bed today, or is it another problem you might have?

Anyway, a little bit about this author. She is a conservative Christian. At one time, she believed in some similar fashion as you concerning the separation of Church and State. She changed her mind after working in the trenches, arguing in courts, including the U. S. Supreme Court, and witnessing first-hand, church abuse, both to non-members and to their very own members.

Anyway, she is not a liberal in her religion. You may call her so in her political and judicial philosophy. But, I really don't think it is going to help your argument any by insisting that people who don't have your philosophy are some kind of crazy liberals out to get churches, no matter what.

To tell you the truth, you come across as uneducated, when you act like that. But, do as you wish. Don't let me stop you.

I'm sorry you don't think what she is talking about has anything to do with the 1st Amendment. But, you are wrong. Plain, flat out wrong.

You may not think that it should have anything to do with the 1st Amendment, but that is a whole 'nuther ball of wax, isn't it? I think I will take her take her word for it over yours.

You asked for a list of some of these abuses and I will just go over some of those briefly with you. When I read through more of the book, I will be able to share in more detail.

Just a few here: children as victims of religiously-motivated harm, including not only clergy sexual abuse, but also faith-healing, abandonment, etc.; marriage; land use; schools; the prisons and military; and housing and employment discrimination.

There is more, to be sure, but that should give you enough to chew your teeth into, no?

Some of the above would also apply to the Mormon church. If you are not aware of clergy sexual abuse in the Church, I don't know what to say. You need to follow the news more closely. My heavens, there is just another allegation in the news today, is there not, about a missionary for the church (though it may amount to nothing, to be sure)? Why would this be a surprise to you? The church has settled out of court many times in the last few years over this very thing. How does this not have to do with the 1st Amendment? Please provide support for your assertion that this has nothing to do with the 1st Amendment.

About the 1st Amendment and religions. Churches, as you know, have never had an absolute privilege to do whatever they want. Since Reynolds, it has become even easier to sue churches for various church actions, especially in property cases, and even more so in other areas in the last 10 years. This seems to be the trend.

Even in cases around the country involving resignation or excommunication of a church member, what policies a church is allowed to follow in their ex-communication procedures has been limited by doctrines such as active/passive control, pre-withdrawl and post-withdrawl resignation discipline, etc.

You write:

It is utterly astounding the extent to which modern liberals can see in the First Amendment clear provisions justifying government meddling and probing into the affairs of its citizens, financial or otherwise, when that is precisely what that amendment exists to prohibit.

I don't know that it is a liberal thing or not. I know that Justice Rehnquist, who some would say was a conservative, was not happy at all with church-state separation to some extent (see his dissent in Serbian Orthodox, et al. I'll try to get a link for that later, but not now.)

With that being said, see my suggestion above. There is no reason to make this a liberal/conservative, bad guy/good guy thing. I was hoping for some nice dialogue where we could all learn together. I am certainly no expert in the area and would welcome everyone's viewpoint and input.

The funny thing, when I was in law school, I had conservative friends who turned out to be very liberal in their judicial perspectives, and vice versa. It would probably be easier for you, cog, if it was more black and white, but I think it isn't so easy to draw such clear lines. That is why some Presidents turn out to be a little unhappy with some of their choices for Justices.

O'Connor was very conservative in some areas and quite liberal in others. You just can't draw a line with all of them. Of course, some of them are quite predictable, to be sure.


You write further:

The sole implied prohibitions in the amendment are to ensure that their[sic] will be no state religion nor any religion enjoying special preferred treatment by the state. That is where the amendment ends.

Well, that is how you would like to see it, but that isn't how it has worked out.

You write again:

Madison's concerns here are simply not relevant to the modern western world including North America, where there is no issue of church/state separation of the kind faced 200 years ago by the founders, who had to confront on occasion some long standing Christian sects approaching the state for special treatment and government approved status at taxpayer expence and at the expense of other denominations not so favored.

The author doesn't agree with you. Clinton, that damn liberal, himself, was very instrumental in creating what Madison himself was so wary of when he helped create the environment in which The Coalition for the Free Exercise of Religion came to exist (for good or ill, you must judge). One can argue, and she does in her book, that this was not a good thing for individuals.

You write even further:

If there is compelling evidence or wrongdoing by a religious body, that's one thing. However, the overall tone of this thread so far seems to indicate a presumptive suspicion toward all churches broadly speaking, who handle large quantites of funds and an aconstitutional attempt to use the First Amendment as a regulatory stick to meddle in the private financial affairs of religous bodies on the presumption that that organized religious groups per se, to quote Anthony Quinn from High Wind In Jamaica "must be guilty of...something."

Like I said above, the author used to be on your side, but after fighting in the trenches and seeing the abuses first-hand, her perspective has changed.

Madison was concerned with churches wielding their unequal power over the small guy. The author has found that some of Madison's concerns are well-founded through her actual experience.

So, cog, just have a discussion here. No reason to get huffy. I am interested in everyone's views. Let's see what people think about this and not take it , as best we can, into the ad hominem level. What do you think?

harmony wrote:

If there is compelling evidence or wrongdoing by a religious body, that's one thing. However, the overall tone of this thread so far seems to indicate a presumptive suspicion toward all churches broadly speaking, who handle large quantites of funds and an aconstitutional attempt to use the First Amendment as a regulatory stick to meddle in the private financial affairs of religous bodies on the presumption that that organized religious groups per se, to quote Anthony Quinn from High Wind In Jamaica "must be guilty of...something."

Loran

Abuses of power and/or money collected from the public that is supposed to go to the good deeds done by the church:

1. covering up for pedophile priests
2. Jimmy Swaggert
3. Main Street Plaza
4. the new shopping mall
5. bishops interviews behind closed doors with teens that include sexual questions, with no parent present
6. excommunications that don't start at the local level
7. the SCMC
8. picketing military funerals of non-members
9. covering up for pedophile members
10. etc etc etc

And you'd rather people just take it instead of fighting back and demanding accountability, wouldn't you, Loran?

See also my list of a few abuses in my response post to cog.

skippy the dead wrote:This is an interesting topic. Religious organizations tend to gain most of their funding through "charitable" contributions, yet don't have the same accountability as a charity would, purely because of 1st amendment concerns. I'm almost tempted to get a copy of Hamilton's book to see how the constitutional issues come into play (after I finish slogging through Executioner's Song - fascinating!). For instance, I wonder what the issues would be if there were some sort of required accountability for all charitable donations (tithes, etc.) and the fruits thereof (shopping malls, investments, etc.), with the penalty for non-disclosure being the loss of tax-exempt status. At least this way, the religious institution isn't necessarily being forced to disclose, but there would be a consequence if it didn't. I'm assuming that there is may some precedence that makes this unworkable - perhaps Hamilton's book covers this.

Exactly. No accountability.

It really becomes a problem when a church raids its retirement fund, for example, and its employees are left out in the dark on the matter, until it is too late. Should churches be able to hide behind the 1st Amendment clause and avoid accountability for their shady practices, just because they are a church? No other big entity gets to do this. The individual gets just as injured. So, why the protection?