Talk:Christian Coalition of America

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this article is good. one thing, though. i'm very interested in the CC gaining an exemption to avoid taxes, however i simply cannot find anything via google substantiating this. i have more looking to do, but so far, everything i've seen only refers to the CC losing its status, nothing on their later gaining an exemption. peace, [Note: This question was posed by an anonymous user at IP address 68.115.193.125 on 24 October 2005.]

Contents 1 Tax Exempt Status 2 Christian Coalition & Dominionism 3 afl-cio claim removed 4 Requested move 4.1 Survey 4.2 Discussion 5 Article Rewrite

[edit] Tax Exempt Status

As the person who wrote previously to me noted, neither can I find any information verifying that the Christian Coalition won tax exempt status. The only important event on the subject that I found was that the coalition was denied its request for this status: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/daily/june99/christian11.htm Could someone verify this information, or correct it? [Note: This question was posed by an anonymous user at IP address 24.130.254.155 on 9 January 2006.]

Dear Fellow Editors: The article as currently written contains apparent contradictions. Is this organization currently tax exempt or not? That is, is the income of the organization exempt from Federal income taxation under U.S. law? The web site for the organization, as of this posting, includes the following statement:

Christian Coalition of America is organized and operates as a 501(c)(4) organization, gifts to which are not deductible for Federal income tax purposes. [[1]]

If the Christian Coalition is a 501(c)(4) organization, then its income may be generally tax-exempt for Federal income tax purposes, but "contributions" to the organization would not be deductible by the donors -- at least, not as charitable contributions.

I'll try to nail down the facts on whether this organization really is a 501(c)(4) organization later. Famspear 05:13, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I found references and included the info (the loss of its tax-exempt status in 1999 and its consent decree, restoring its 501(c)(4) status in 2005) in a general rewrite. Hope this helps.--HughGRex 18:15, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Christian Coalition & Dominionism

The Christian Coalition is strongly associated with Dominionism in both the mainstream press and in the academic world. This is a fundamental (pardon the pun) point in understanding the spectrum of viewpoints about the Christian Coalition and the political waters in which it swims. Constantly chasing the point out of the article leaves out a significant viewpoint, and will not pass muster with WP:NPOV.

As for sources for this viewpoint, Cornell University's Center for Religion, Ethics and Social Policy is an unimpeachable academic source, and specifically cites the Christian Coalition as being dominionist: [2], [3]. Including this viewpoint as an attributed statement in the article fully meets all provisions of WP:V, WP:RS, and WP:NPOV. Instead of continued deleting or white washing of this viewpoint, I suggest the responsible parties find a more constructive way to contribute to the project. FeloniousMonk 18:20, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

The viewpoint is also well-documented at religioustolerance.org. FeloniousMonk 19:18, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

The Cornell group does not say the Christian Coalition is dominionist. It merely uses it congressional score card to rank congresmen. Likewise the religioustolerance website does not characterize the group (it quotes Ralph Reed criticizing another group). What you hav here is simply low grade conspiracy theory. Rjensen 19:30, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

"The Cornell group does not say the Christian Coalition is dominionist." Really? "Low grade conspiracy theory," you say? Right.

From Cornell's theocracywatch.org [4]:

Dominionist Influence in The U.S. Congress

One way to measure the political strength of dominionists is to study voting patterns of members of Congress. A recent amendment added to a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives, HR 2123, allows religious discrimination in Head Start hiring which is a serious blow to both religious liberty and civil rights. more The graph on the right shows how Representatives voted.

210 Republicans and 10 Democrats voted for the amendment. 9 Republicans, 186 Democrats and 1 independent voted against the amendment. This graph illustrates that dominionists reside overwhelmingly in one political party. Since the Republican Party has majorities in both houses of Congress, they set the agendas, chair the committees, and decide which bills will and won't come up for a vote.

Congressional scorecards from organizations such as the Christian Coalition, Family Research Council, and Eagle Forum also illustrate the strength of dominionists in Congress. [5]

Claiming Cornell's Center for Religion, Ethics and Social Policy does not say the Christian Coalition is dominionist [6] is an excerise in denying the obvious. FeloniousMonk 19:47, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] afl-cio claim removed

I have removed the following (and edited, to make the ref inline):

Like many Christian right groups, it is against organized labor. One of its political training manuals states:

 :"Christians have a responsibility to submit to the authority of their employers since they are designated as part of God’s plan for the exercise of authority on the earth by man." (ref: [http://www.wisaflcio.org/political_action/rightwing.htm "Politics in America: The Right Wing Attack on the American Labor Movement"; URL accessed April 29, 2006.)

If you want to determine the views of CC, you might use as a primary source the CC itself, or much better, a reliable 3rd party source, such as NY Times, CNN, etc... These sould be easy to find. However, the above is using organized labour itself, as a source of CC's views on organized labour. It states the chracterization as fact, not as the opinion of the organization (revealing the name, only in the footnote). Also, it would be a little more useful to be somewhat more precise. What are the views of CC on organized labour? Let's give exmaples of their views on different labour legislation.

Incidently, this type of sourcing would be as bad, as using the CC as source to say somebody is opposed to organized religion. Generally, organizations make bad secondary sources in articles about their opponents. This is so, even if the claim is true.

NOTE: If you have personally found the CC manual in question (and it is publicly available, e.g. "published"), read it, confirmed the quote, then you may use *that* as a source, because it would be CC characterizing itself. But, if that was done, you would have to better word it. Also, the quote, doesn't actually support the claim of fact. --Rob 01:06, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article Rewrite

I think a prominent interest group such as this one deserves a better article than what's currently here. There is one section which is "brief history" (which happens to not be brief but just a summary of facts and statements relating to CCA). I came here for research on the organization and found nothing of use in regards to political activities and legislation that it's supported and been against. In fact, there's more facts here making the CCA look bad (though I may be biased as a right-wing protestant) than there are showing what good it has done.

With the above said, the latter half of "brief history" has no organization or coherence to it; something all Wikipedia articles should have. I'm willing to work on it at a later date but for now, I am giving it the rewrite tag. Agree or Disagree below. --Novaprospekt 22:11, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

(I'm moving this section to the end of the page, to conform with the Wikipedia standard.)

Okay, I've made a stab at a rewrite. I've found a number of references to back up what was written in the article, reworded some phrases and sentences for clarity, and sectioned off parts of the "Brief" history. I hope this contributes to a much better article, but I don't think we're there yet. Much further rewriting will help.

Is this wholesale revision sufficient to remove the "rewrite" tag?--HughGRex 18:27, 10 March 2007 (UTC)