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Nonprofits, Politics, And Privacy, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer Oct 2016

Nonprofits, Politics, And Privacy, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

No abstract provided.


Politics At The Pulpit: Tax Benefits, Substantial Burdens, And Institutional Free Exercise, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer Oct 2016

Politics At The Pulpit: Tax Benefits, Substantial Burdens, And Institutional Free Exercise, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

More than fifty years ago, Congress enacted a prohibition against political campaign intervention for all charities, including churches and other houses of worship, as a condition for receiving tax deductible contributions. Yet the IRS has never taken a house of worship to court for alleged violation of the prohibition through political comments from the pulpit, presumably at least in part because of concerns about the constitutionality of doing so. This decision is surprising, because a careful review of Free Exercise Clause case law - both before and after the landmark Employment Division v. Smith decision - reveals that the prohibition …


The Much Maligned 527 And Institutional Choice, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer Oct 2016

The Much Maligned 527 And Institutional Choice, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

The continuing controversy over 527 organizations has led Congress to impose extensive disclosure requirements on these political organizations and to consider imposing extensive restrictions on their funding as well. The debate about what laws should govern these entities has, however, so far almost completely ignored the fact that such laws raise a complicated institutional choice question. This Article seeks to resolve that question by developing a new institutional choice framework to guide this and similar choices. The Article first explores the context for making this determination by describing the current laws governing 527s, including both federal election laws administered by …


Grasping Smoke: Enforcing The Ban On Political Activity By Charities, Lloyd Histoshi Mayer Oct 2016

Grasping Smoke: Enforcing The Ban On Political Activity By Charities, Lloyd Histoshi Mayer

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

The rule that charities are not allowed to intervene in political campaigns has now been in place for over fifty years. Despite uncertainty about the exact reasons for Congress' enactment of it, skepticism by some about its validity for both constitutional and public policy reasons, and continued confusion about its exact parameters, this rule has survived virtually unchanged for all of those years. Yet while overall noncompliance with the income tax laws has drawn significant scholarly attention, few scholars have focused on violations of this prohibition and the IRS' attempts to enforce it. This Article focuses on the elusive issue …


What Is This "Lobbying" That We Are So Worried About?, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer Nov 2013

What Is This "Lobbying" That We Are So Worried About?, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

Lobbying is both an essential part of our democratic process and a source of some of our greatest fears about dangers to that process. Yet when Congress, the public, and scholars consider loosening or, as is more often the case, tightening the restrictions on lobbying, they usually assume that everyone knows what activities are in fact lobbying. They therefore overlook the fact that multiple definitions of lobbying currently exist in the various federal laws addressing lobbying. This Article seeks to fill this gap by answering the question of how lobbying should be defined for purposes of the existing federal laws …


Nonprofits, Politics, And Privacy, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer Dec 2011

Nonprofits, Politics, And Privacy, Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

The time is ripe for a deeper consideration of the policy concerns that underlie public disclosure requirements for politically active tax-exempt nonprofit organizations and the related issue of privacy. To clarify the discussion, one aspect for deeper consideration is recognizing that this particular area is at the intersection of three significantly different disclosure regimes. Those three regimes are (1) federal tax law generally, (2) federal tax law as it applies to tax-exempt nonprofit organizations, and (3) federal election law. These regimes are a study in contrasts. Federal tax law strongly protects taxpayer information from public disclosure. And while federal tax …


Grasping Smoke: Enforcing The Ban On Political Activity By Charities, Lloyd Histoshi Mayer Dec 2006

Grasping Smoke: Enforcing The Ban On Political Activity By Charities, Lloyd Histoshi Mayer

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

The rule that charities are not allowed to intervene in political campaigns has now been in place for over fifty years. Despite uncertainty about the exact reasons for Congress' enactment of it, skepticism by some about its validity for both constitutional and public policy reasons, and continued confusion about its exact parameters, this rule has survived virtually unchanged for all of those years. Yet while overall noncompliance with the income tax laws has drawn significant scholarly attention, few scholars have focused on violations of this prohibition and the IRS' attempts to enforce it. This Article focuses on the elusive issue …