Appeal brief warns per-capita tax could spawn ‘cataclysmic event’
The Layman Online, July 11, 2003
Representatives of two Ohio congregations today urged the highest court in the Presbyterian Church (USA) to invalidate their presbytery’s resolution that would make per-capita apportionments compulsory.
Merit brief of appellants-complainants
The Reverend John C. Minihan
and J. Randall Richards
Brief of Presbytery of Scioto Valley
Excerpts from briefsThey also warned that a ruling in favor of the resolution could open the door for a “cataclysmic event within the PCUSA.”
The warning was included in a brief submitted to the General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission by the Rev. John C. Minihan, pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Newark, Ohio, and J. Randall Richards, a lawyer who is an elder at Liberty Presbyterian Church in Delaware, Ohio.
Minihan and Richards are appealing a synod court decision to uphold a policy resolution by the Presbytery of Scioto Valley in Ohio. The resolution declares that sessions in the presbytery have a “responsibility” to pay per-capita apportionments to support the work of higher governing bodies – presbyteries, synods and the General Assembly.
Minihan and Richards say the language of the resolution – particularly the word “responsibility” – implies that sessions that do not pay their per-capita apportionments, whether because of inability to do so or to express dissent over some of the actions or decisions of higher governing bodies, can be punished. The resolution would allow non-payment by local congregations only if the presbytery excused presbyteries from payment.
Historically, church law has said that local church sessions cannot be compelled to pay their congregational per-capita apportionments and that sessions have the absolute authority to determine how to spend the undesignated tithes and offerings given by members.
The General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission heard oral arguments in the case this morning. The court was scheduled to reach a decision this weekend and send its ruling to participants by registered mail before making public its determination.
The Layman Online was en route to attend that trial, but a flight was canceled because of weather conditions. The Layman Online did receive copies of trial briefs that were filed by the presbytery and Minihan and Richards.
“Affirming the [Scioto] Resolution would forever alter the voluntary nature of our per capita system, creating instead a system of involuntary taxation,” Minihan and Richards said in their brief.
“Since its founding five hundred years ago, the Protestant Church in general and the Presbyterian Church in particular has been loath to tax its churches,” they said. “Indeed, the Reformation itself, which split the Catholic Church and gave rise to the Protestant Revolution, was a direct result of the Catholic Church’s coercive over-taxation of its parishes. By permitting this Resolution to stand, the GAPJC will be opening the door for a similar, historical and cataclysmic event within the PCUSA.”
In response, the counsel for the presbytery brief argued that “Appellants may not like the fact that sessions have a responsibility to make per capita payments, but such responsibility is not unconstitutional.”
The presbytery’s brief focused on a 1992 addition (G-9.0404d) to the Book of Order that says, “The presbyteries shall be responsible for raising their own per capita funds, and for raising and timely transmission of per capita funds to their respective synods and to the General Assembly. The presbyteries may direct per capita apportionments to the sessions of the churches within their bounds.”
The presbytery’s resolution “represents both an implementation of the rights of a presbytery under G-9.0404d and a clarification for the local churches within the presbytery of their responsibility to transmit per capita payments to the presbytery,” the presbytery said.
The presbytery brief asked the court to answer a number of questions, including: 1. Does a presbytery have the authority to direct sessions to transmit per capita payments to the presbytery pursuant to G9.0404d? 2. Is the withholding of per capita an appropriate means of protest or dissent?
It also challenged the motives for the appeal. “The unspoken and underlying theme of Appellants is their desire to be able to withhold per capita payments as a means of dissent or protest, and to do so with impunity. Individual dissent and protest are important rights recognized by the Book of Order (G-9.0303 and G-9.0304). However, the 210th General Assembly stated that ‘the withholding of per capita by governing bodies is not an appropriate exercise of dissent or protest.'”
The Presbytery of Scioto adopted its policy resolution on per capita in February 2002. In 2001, the presbytery asked the 213th General Assembly to approve a similar statement making per-capita compulsory, but the General Assembly rejected the overture and reaffirmed the historical right of sessions to determine how their congregations’ tithes and offerings are spent.