On that IRS Provision about Non-Profit Politiking

Stanley Fish:

The story goes that when he was running for re-election to the Senate in 1954, Lyndon Johnson was opposed by a couple of non-profits that urged voters to reject him and his radical communist ideas. (And you thought things were crazy today.) In response, Johnson had new language inserted into the section of the IRS code, which defines a tax exempt entity. His addendum declared that an exempt organization “does not participate in or intervene in (including the publishing or distributing of statements), any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.”