We the undersigned petition President Obama to instate taxes on religious organizations and churches presently considered "tax-exempt" under IRS code section 501(c)(3).
Our positions:
-Church tax exemptions violate the Establishment clause. (Precedent: William O. Douglas, LLB, US Supreme Court, Walz v. Tax Commission of the City of New York, 1970).
- Solutions to the present economic crisis should include taxes on churches, which could raise as much as $71 billion in revenue yearly (see: http://www.secularhumanism.org/index.php?section=fi&page=cragun_32_4).
- Charitable activities once handled by churches are now effectively managed by private business and government social services. Moreover, churches exist primarily for religious activities that should not be publicly subsidized.