A group of rebel pastors is breaking the U.S. tax code which prohibits churches and other non-profits from engaging in electoral politics

John Adkisson / Reuters

Pastor Mark Harris of First Baptist Church gives his sermon during the fifth and largest "Pulpit Freedom Sunday" in Charlotte, N.C., Oct.7, 2012.

Cohen is the author of Nothing to Fear: FDR's Inner Circle and the Hundred Days That Created Modern America

On Sunday Oct. 7, about 1,500 pastors of various faiths engaged in an organized act of civil disobedience: they endorsed political candidates from the pulpit, and many will continue to do so until election day. That may not sound like a crime, but the pastors were violating the U.S. tax code, which prohibits churches and other non-profits from engaging in electoral politics.

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Pulpit Freedom Sunday, organized by a group called Alliance Defending Freedom, has been an annual event since 2008. The participants are trying to bait the IRS into coming after them so they can mount a legal challenge to the politics ban. So far, no luck, though they show no signs of quitting.

Many of the participants are from conservative evangelical churches, and one critic Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Church and State has argued that the Pulpit Freedom clergy want to elect Mitt Romney. It is hard to know how all of the actual endorsements broke down, but Lynns take may not be completely off.

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Indiana pastor Ron Johnson told his congregation that for people who believe in the Bible voting against President Barack Obama is a no-brainer. Jim Garlow told Skyline Church, a San Diego megachurch, that he himself planned to vote for Romney though he did not make a formal endorsement. (Some pastors avoided the presidential race altogether; Mark Harris of the First Baptist Church in Charlotte, N.C. only endorsed a Republican candidate for state Supreme Court.)

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Pulpit Freedom: Should Churches Endorse Political Candidates?