IRS the final arbiter

Ruling May Open Finance Loophole

By DAVID JOHNSTON

WASHINGTON, June 7 ; The Internal Revenue Service has restored the tax-exempt status of a charitable organization that helped pay for lectures by Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker, a step that some tax and election law experts say was highly unusual.
The I.R.S. reversal, according to these experts, opens a potentially large loophole in the new federal campaign-finance restrictions and allows more political activity by charitable groups.
The decision was sweet vindication to Howard H. Callaway Jr., 76, a prominent Georgia Republican who served in the House and was secretary of the Army under President Gerald R. Ford. Mr. Callaway, who counts among his longtime friends Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney, had battled the I.R.S. for nearly five years over the charity he had headed, the Abraham Lincoln Opportunity Foundation, now defunct.
The I.R.S. notified Mr. Callaway on April 4 that he had won his fight.


http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/08/politics/08EXEM.html?th

I have often wondered how and who in the IRS make the decisions of what is allowable and what is not? What the law allows and what it does not ?
It seems that they are the judge and jury. Have you ever wondered?