Christian Coalition of America
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The Christian Coalition of America, originally called the Christian Coalition, Inc., is a US Christian advocacy group, which includes Christian fundamentalists, evangelicals, neo-evangelicals and charismatics. It once wielded great power within the Republican Party but membership has declined drastically in recent years. It claims to have 1,200,000 members. The Christian Coalition was founded by Rev. Pat Robertson, who served as the organization's president from its founding until February 2001. The current president is Roberta Combs.
While labeling itself as the Christian Coalition, the organization represents certain viewpoints among numbers of Christians in the United States, but Christians with other beliefs disagree with the organization's ideas. The CCA's values are consistent with those of the Christian right.
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[edit] Brief history
[edit] Beginnings with Pat Robertson and Ralph Reed
Following a well-funded but failed bid for the U.S. presidency in 1988, religious broadcaster and political commentator Pat Robertson used the remains of his campaign machinery to jump-start the creation of a voter mobilization effort dubbed the Christian Coalition. Americans for Robertson accumulated a mailing list of several million conservative Christians interested in politics. This mailing list formed the foundation for the new organization.
However, despite public announcements that excitement among evangelical and Christian right voters prompted the creation of the Christian Coalition, the incorporation records of the State of Virginia reveal that the Christian Coalition, Inc. was actually incorporated on April 30, 1987, with the paperwork filed earlier, and with planning having begun before that. Thus the Christian Coalition was actually planned long before Pat Robertson's run for President began. Robertson's candidacy appears to have been planned from the start for launching the Christian Coalition.[citation needed]
Ralph Reed, a University of Georgia Ph.D. candidate and hotel waiter, whom Robertson had met at an inaugural dinner for George H.W. Bush in January, 1989, took control of day-to-day operations of the Coalition in 1989. From 1989 through 1997, the Christian Coalition wielded sizeable influence, largely in the form of the charismatic and persuasive public face of Ralph Reed, who became a commanding public voice in the news media. The perception if not the reality that Christian Coalition activists controlled local Party machinery in many locations and could reliably turn out large blocs of votes for Religious Right candidates caused many Republican and Democratic politicians at local levels to either vote as the Christian Coalition urged or else struggle with explaining their votes. The fear of being listed on Voter Guides as casting anti-Christian votes prompted politicians in moderate to conservative districts to carefully consider the positions urged by the Christian Coalition.
After its founding, it was granted a grace period to operate as a 501(c)(4) tax-exempt organization before the IRS made its final determination. Forty-nine state chapters were also created as independent corporations within their states, including the Christian Coalition of Texas. A handful, including the Christian Coalition of Texas successfully obtained non-profit status as a 501(c)(4) tax-exempt organization, while the national group's application remained pending and unresolved.
In 1990, the national Christian Coalition, Inc., headquartered in Chesapeake, Virginia, began producing "non-partisan" voter guides which it distributed to conservative Christian churches, with 40 million being distributed in the 1992 and 1996 presidential election years. Under the leadership of Reed and Robertson, the Coalition quickly became the most prominent voice in the conservative Christian movement, landing Reed on the cover of Time in May, 1994, its influence culminating with an effort to support the election of a conservative Christian to the presidency in 1996 or 2000.
Complaints that the voter guides were actually partisan led to the denial of the Christian Coalition, Inc.'s tax-exempt status in 1999. The Christian Coalition, Inc. filed a lawsuit against the IRS after which the IRS backed down for most of the years in question, holding out only on 1992. However, instead of pursuing legal action, Pat Robertson renamed the Christian Coalition of Texas, Inc. as the Christian Coalition of America, Inc., since the Texas chapter already enjoyed tax exempt status, and transferred the trademark and all operations to the Texas-based corporation.[citation needed]
[edit] Decline in influence and challenges to tax-exempt status
| first =Alan | coauthors =Thomas B. Edsall | title =Christian Coalition Shrinks as Debt Grows | publisher =The Washington Post | date =2006-04-10 | url =http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/09/AR2006040901063.html | accessdate =2007-03-10}}</ref>[1]
In 1998, an advocacy group for religious freedom Americans United urged the IRS to review the Coalition’s partisan political activities over the decade in which its tax-exempt status was pending. The following year, the IRS revoked the Coalition’s provisional tax-exemption, in view of the Coalition's distribution of "voter guides" which had a partisan bias. The revocation cost the Coalition up to $300,000 in back taxes and penalties. Following this, the Coalition reorganized as the Christian Coalition of America, as an effort to regain its tax-exempt status.[2][3] Churches that once embraced the Christian Coalition have disassociated themselves for fear of losing their own tax-exempt status.[3] After its tax-exempt status was denied, CCA was able to turn all of its attention to politics. In 2000 the coalition moved from its long-standing base of operations in the Chesapeake Bay area to an office on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C.
After Robertson stepped down as the group's president in 2000, Roberta Combs took over the Coalition. Since Mrs. Combs has taken over the organization, CCA has distributed over 100,000,000 voter guides around the country and continues to be a viable force in America's poltics.
In 2005, the Coalition concluded a settlement agreement with the Internal Revenue Service, ending its long-running battle with that agency regarding its tax exempt status.[4] As a result, the IRS has now recognized the Coalition as a 501(c)(4) tax-exempt organization, the first time in the Agency's history that it has granted a letter of exemption to a group that stated in its application that it would distribute voter guides directly in churches. The consent decree enforces limitations on the terminology that may be used in the Coalition's "voter guides".[4]
In 2009 Wipf & Stock Publishers released the detailed history of Christian Coalition, authored by long-time staff member Joel Vaughan, "The Rise and Fall of the Christian Coalition - The Inside Story." The book relives the glory days of the Coalition, and the reason for the group's troubles after 1999 staff shakeups and financial woes.
[edit] See also
[edit] Notes and references
- ^ Hallow, Ralph Z. (2001-04-23). "Christian Coalition Shrinks as Debt Grows". Insight on the News. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_15_17/ai_74011912. Retrieved on 2007-03-10.
- ^ Edsall, Thomas B.; Hanna Rosin (1999-06-11). "IRS Denies Christian Coalition Tax-Exempt Status". The Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/daily/june99/christian11.htm. Retrieved on 2007-03-10.
- ^ a b Jackson, Brooks (1999-06-10). "Christian Coalition surrenders in tax-exempt fight, splits into two groups". CNN. http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/06/10/christian.coalition/. Retrieved on 2007-03-10.
- ^ a b Cooperman, Alan; Thomas B. Edsall (2006-04-10). "Christian Coalition Shrinks as Debt Grows". The Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/09/AR2006040901063.html. Retrieved on 2007-03-10.
