A Discussion Case for Illegality and Public Policy Doctrines
The Deseret News (Salt Lake City, Utah) has an interesting article that may provide useful context for a class discussion of the illegality and against public policy doctrines. That tax exemption may be denied because an organization is devoted to an illegal purpose or a purpose against public policy is unremarkable in the abstract but, as Professor Brennen has written about, difficult to apply in particular cases. The Deseret News story talks about a group (Helping, Encouraging, and Loving Polygamists) organized to assist people in polygamist communities:
Polygamists, ex-polygamists, activists, lawyers and government officials were all in the same room Saturday night, supporting the newest organization to reach out to offer help to people in Utah’s cloistered polygamous communities. A fundraiser gala at Gardner Village drew nearly 200 people for the debut of Holding Out HELP (Helping, Encouraging and Loving Polygamists). “People from all walks of life are here,” said executive director Tonia Tewell, as she stood in a crowded room where a debate for or against polygamy would be conspicuously absent from the evening’s festivities.
Tewell launched the group after sheltering a couple of women and four children who were leaving a bad situation in polygamy. Speaking to the crowd, one of those women (who asked her name not be used) said everyone’s situation is different. “In the midst of my own crisis, my own heart went out to those from other polygamous communities who are struggling,” she said. “Maybe they just need a listening ear or a nonjudgmental heart. Maybe they wish to leave but can’t for a variety of reasons. As I see the faces of the people I left behind in my polygamous community, I have no desire to hurt them. I just wish that I am able to help them in any way I am able to. I don’t resent them.”
Should the fact that polygamy is illegal or, at the very least, contrary to public policy, make a group that supports people living in those communities (without taking a stand on whether polygamy is good, bad, or indifferent) preclude the group from tax exemption. The question is worth exploring because the illegality and public policy doctrines have been used to the serious detriment, for example, of organizations formed to support displaced persons whose circumstances arose from the interminable conflict between Jewish and Palestinian peoples. On a deeper level, the doctrine forces us to think about whether the term “Independent Sector” is accurately descriptive. When does a grassroots organization’s purpose stray so far from the “party line” that it ought to be denied tax exemption? Is this a relevant question in any event? What if the group’s name was “Helping, Encouraging, and Loving relatives of Freedom Fighters” and simply donated money to rebuild houses torn down by the Israeli government after a family member participated in terrorist activity? I’m pretty sure there would be loud objections to granting such a group tax exemption. We need to better understand and articulate the illegality and public policy doctrines, not necessarily for an organization devoted to helping people who live in polygamist communities, but to address the larger issue of the extent to which government should be allowed to influence or determine the goals pursued by members of the “independent” sector.
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