Preface: David Miscavige dissembled in his 1999 Declaration in the Wollersheim case when he claimed:
“9. Church of Scientology International (“CSI”) is the Mother Church of the Scientology religion and has been since its inception….”
This doublespeak is not true. The real and original “Mother Church” was the Church of Scientology of California — that is unless the “Scientology religion” did not begin until 1981.
Probity wrote an excellent piece at xenu.net in 2009. Entitled Requiem for the Church of Scientology of California, 1954 – 2004, this piece describes how CSC, like CAN, met an unlamented fate.
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Requiem for the Church of Scientology of California, 1954 – 2004
• The Church of Scientology of California (CSC) forms on 02/18/1954 to accept and adopt the aims, purposes, principles and creed of The Mother Church, “THE CHURCH OF AMERICAN SCIENCE”, of Camden, New Jersey. On 01/02/1957 the Internal Revenue Service exempts CSC from tax.
• The IRS revokes CSC tax-exempt status in 1967 for financial irregularities. CSC refuses to file for-profit income tax returns, instead CPA Greenberg prepares Form 990 returns (as if exempt) for years 1970 – 1972. On 03/28/1978 CSC files suit against the IRS in US Tax Court to challenge the IRS determination of tax deficiency based on filed CSC exempt returns for 1970 – 1972.
• New California corporations are formed to assimilate CSC authority in a reorganization attempt to sidestep mounting legal and tax threats: Church of Scientology International (CSI) 11/18/1981, Religious Technology Center (RTC) 01/01/1982, and Church of Spiritual Technology (CST) 05/28/1982.
• The Church of Scientology Flag Service Organization, Inc. (FSO) incorporates in Florida 05/19/1981. FSO takes over from CSC the Flag Land Base (Mecca of Scientology Gross Income) and severs CSC’s income source. In the UK, CSC assets are transferred to the Church of Scientology Religious Education College Incorporated (Australia). Bridge Publications 02/02/1981 (later Galaxy Press) perpetuate CSC financial fiction that LRH fiction income funds LRH research.
• After six years litigation the tax case between CSC and the IRS comes to a decision before the US Tax Court (“CSC vs. Commissioner of the IRS,” No. 3352-78 ). On 09/24/1984 the court issues judgment against CSC, which CSC appeals. On 07/28/1987 the US Court of Appeals ruling in this case (“CSC vs. Commissioner of the IRS,” No. 85-7324) upholds the 1984 decision:
“We affirm the Tax Court decision upholding the Commissioner’s revocation of the Church of Scientology of California’s tax exempt status on the ground that a portion of its income inured to the benefit of L. Ron Hubbard and others…”
• On 07/08/1988 the IRS (citing CSC bad acts) denies tax-exempt status to CST, RTC and CSI and demands for-profit income tax returns for all years since inception. The IRS assigns examiners full-time to audit CSC income tax for years 1967 – 1984. CSC consolidates income of both Scientology UK operations and the clandestine income siphoning to LRH via the Religious Research Foundation (RRF) during the Flagship Apollo era. CSI funds and directs the CSC tax audit legal defense. Weekly OSA INT statistics graph CSC tax liability as income and expense issues undergo examination.
• The US Supreme Court denies Scientologist charitable tax deductions in Hernandez v. Commissioner, 490 U.S. 680 (1989). CSI asserts inconsistent IRS administration in US Tax Court trial April 4-22, 1992 (Garrison v Commissioner).
• The IRS completes the CSC audit by 1993, a half billion dollars with penalty and interest. With both the final CSC tax assessment and the decision in Garrison on the horizon, the IRS abruptly pulls the plug on the CSC assessment, instead enters into the 10/01/1993 closing agreement with David Miscavige. The closing agreement is explicitly silent on the CSC income tax examination. The hot topic of CSC tax liability, which is for years the IRS primary attack target, mysteriously evaporates in a rumor cloud that David Miscavige sanctions covert operations against government officials. Here are the clear, simple facts:
• The closing agreement does not recognize CSC as tax exempt. CSI pays $12.5 million to the IRS, a suppressive (2½%) percentage of the half billion dollar CSC liability, or hardly enough to cover unreported Social Security taxes on CSC employee wages, wages which are never to appear on a Social Security earning statement despite CSI & IRS joint promises to rectify this omission.
• The State of California, long since agreed to abide by IRS findings, ultimately settles with its namesake for cents on the California tax dollar.
• Since 1993, CSC files for-profit tax returns ‘under protest’, vows to never give in only to dissolve quietly without sorrow in a 2002 to 2004 filing approved by California Attorney General Bill Lockyer (now California State Treasurer).
• CSI presently touts US tax exemption as proof of church status without mention that Hubbard’s mother church CSC is not US tax exempt but factually was considered by the IRS only a for-profit entity up to final dissolution in 2004.
• Inurement to the benefit of LRH is the undisclosed basis of Scientology.
Categories: The Scientology Money Project
Why did David Miscavige lie in his 1999 Declaration? He knew that CSC was the original Mother Church and chose to skirt the issue of CSC’s inurement in an attempt to place a revised Church history into the legal record. The Church of Scientology excels at both skillful lying and outright deception.
From the 1987 opinion in CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY OF CALIFORNIA, PETITIONER V. COMMISSIONER OF INTERNAL REVENUE:
“STATEMENT
1. a. Petitioner was organized in 1954 to propagate Scientology, a religion founded by L. Ron Hubbard. During the tax years at issue here, 1970-1972, it was the ‘Mother Church’ of all Churches of Scientology in the United States….”