Although the practice has been illegal for decades, the IRS rarely takes any action to reprimand high-profile scofflaws.
Hammond’s church was the subject of a complaint to the IRS after his 2006 endorsement of Bachmann from the pulpit.
On Tuesday, Minnesota Senators debated whether taxpayer funds should be used to pay for private religious school tuition as part of an omnibus tax bill. Republicans hope the proposal, which is modeled after one in Arizona and has been dubbed a “backdoor voucher” system by some, will pass constitutional muster. The U.S. Supreme Court released a decision on Arizona’s system on Monday that could boost state Republicans’ hopes, but DFLers say regardless of the measure’s constitutionality it represents the GOP’s ultimate goal of “dismantling” public education altogether.
Potential presidential candidate Newt Gingrich and his wife will be in Minneapolis in May to present their film “Rediscovering God in America,” a Citizens United production. The event is hosted by the Minnesota Family Council, according to an event listing on the Newt Gingrich’s campaign website. The film recounts Gingrich’s assertion that the founding fathers envisioned a religious United States and decries secularism.
A provision in the House Omnibus Education Finance bill released by Republican leadership on Monday could run afoul of the state constitution: School vouchers. Minnesota’s constitutional ban on taxpayer funding for religious schools, which stems back to anti-Catholic sentiment in the late 1800s, could create legal problems for the bill, as other states have found.
The watchdog group Americans United for the Separation of Church and State sent a letter to Minnesota Senate leadership Monday warning the chamber that Pastor Dennis Campbell’s prayer last week was unconstitutional. Addressed to Senate President Michelle Fischbach, Majority Leader Amy Koch and Minority Leader Tom Bakk, the letter also urged the leaders to either refrain from allowing prayers in the Senate or to ensure that if it continues to do so it does in a way that respects other traditions.
Pastor Dennis Campbell of St. Cloud’s Granite City Baptist Church appeared on Bradlee Dean’s radio program on Saturday to talk about a controversial prayer he gave on the Minnesota Senate floor last week that offended many of the non-Christians of that body. Campbell said that the Founding Fathers would have supported his prayer and that Jewish members of the Senate shouldn’t be offended because, after all, Jesus Christ was a Jew.
Controversial Pastor Dennis Campbell gave a Jesus-filled prayer on the Minnesota Senate floor on Monday on the invitation of Senate Republicans. That speech led to calls by several of the chamber’s non-Christians to ensure that prayers in the Senate are conducted in a nondenominational manner for fears of violating the state and federal constitutions. Watchdog groups say those are very real concerns.
Republican Rep. John Kline is a sponsor of a resolution in the U.S. House that would reaffirm “In God We Trust” as the national motto and encourages the posting of the motto on government buildings and in public schools. The resolution has raised the ire of secular groups who say the resolution is unnecessary and that it is discriminatory against non-believers as well as faithful Americans whose religious traditions do not involve a Judeo-Christian god.
President Obama named a dozen faith leaders to the President’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships on Friday, and two of them hail from Minnesota. Leith Anderson of the National Association of Evangelicals, who is also Tim Pawlenty’s pastor, was appointed by Obama, as was fellow Minnesota Bishop Mark Hanson of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The council, formerly known under President Bush as the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, has had a healthy number of Minnesotans under Obama.
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