A federal judge declined on March 31 to hear a settlement pact that sought to allow churches to endorse political candidates without losing their tax-exempt status.
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas Judge John Campbell Barker ruled he had no authority to enter a settlement agreement proposed by the IRS and the plaintiffs that would have required the court to declare the Johnson Amendment, a 70-year-old federal law, unconstitutional.
Barker said he didn’t have the authority to approve the proposed judgment.
Congress “‘is the appropriate body to weigh the relevant, policy-laden considerations, such as the harshness of the present law, the consequences of an unjustified revocation of [tax-exempt] status, and the number of organizations in any year threatened with such revocation,’” the judge wrote in the order….
