Logan Darklighter Wrote:Not true. The questions asked the conservative groups were unconstitutionally intrusive. Here’s one example:
Do you directly or indirectly communicate with members of legislative bodies? If so, provide copies of the written communications and contents of other forms of communications.
What is an “indirect” communication? A newspaper article that a legislator might read? A speech a legislator’s spouse might attend? The question is impossibly broad and vague.
Here’s another example:
List each past or present board member, officer, key employee and members of their families who:
a) Has served on the board of another organization.
b) Was, is or plans to be a candidate for public office. Indicate the nature of each candidacy.
c) Has previously conducted similar activities for another entity.
d) Has previously submitted an application for tax exempt status.
So now the spouses, parents, and children of conservative leaders are under scrutiny?
Or, how about this:
Do you have a close relationship with any candidate for public office or political party? If so describe fully the nature of that relationship.
These questions read like a wish list for far-left activists trying to examine every aspect of the conservative grassroots movement and chill or intimidate activists into silence.
Not from where I sit, they don't. These are perfectly legitimate, non-partisan questions.
"Do you directly or indirectly communicate with members of legislative bodies?" - If they do, then they are lobbyist organizations.
"List each past or present board member, officer, key employee and members of their families who (etc)" - Is a household trying to "double-dip" in the tax-exempt trough?
"Do you have a close relationship with any candidate for public office or political party?" - If they do, then they are potentially lobbyists, and actual lobbyists if said candidate is elected.
If these actually are "unconstitutional," that goes a long way toward explaining why your political system is so dysfunctional. However, I strongly suspect that they are not.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."
- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012