Ronald B. Flowers on IRC 107 Flowers v. United States Bungling Through to a Resounding Thud By Ronald B. Flowers (excerpts) It is rare for a scholar of church-state relationships to be able to write an analytical paper on a case in which he was involved, but this is one of those times. Ronald B. and Leah E. Flowers v. United States, 49 AFTR 2d 483 (1981), is a case involving the ministerial parsonage allowance, authorized by Section 107 of the Internal Revenue Code... The paper is an analysis of the case, with autobiographical background and appropriate homilies along the way. We lost all around. What did the case accomplish? Nothing! It continued the illusion that Section 107 is valid law and is impervious to constitutional attack. However, the case afforded the opportunity for this analysis which shows that Section 107 is clearly unconstitutional and, to say the very least, raises problems much more severe than any benefits it may offer. The impact of the case is that it reaffirms the governments propensity to meddle in this sensitive constitutional area. Section 107 should be repealed for the reasons suggested here. It legitimately can be asked, if I so strongly think that Section 107 is unconstitutional, why did I take the housing allowance in the first place and then agree to be part of a suit to try to preserve it? The answer is that I did not know any better when I was first employed as a pastoral minister and then, later, as a religion professor at TCU. Since coming on the faculty I simply had not thought about it. I agreed to be the plaintiff (a bad mistake) because I thought then that a valid principle of church-state relationships was involved, i.e., the unconstitutional governmental preference of one kind of religious institution over another. ------------------------------------------------
Posted on: Sun, 27 Oct 2013 03:58:39 +0000
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