Groups collectively spend at least $390 million a year,but recession seems to have taken a toll on their budgets

Washington, D.C. — The number of organizationsengaged in religious lobbying or religion-related advocacy in Washington, D.C.,has increased roughly fivefold in the past four decades, from fewer than 40 in1970 to more than 200 today, according to a new study on religious advocacygroups released today by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion &Public Life.

These groups collectively employ at least 1,000people in the greater Washington area and spend at least $390 million a year onefforts to influence national public policy. As a whole, religious advocacyorganizations work on about 300 policy issues. For most of the past century, religiousadvocacy groups in Washington focused mainly on domestic affairs. Today,however, roughly as many groups work only on international issues as work onlyon domestic issues, and nearly two-thirds of the groups work on both.

Theseare among the key findings of Lobbyingfor the Faithful: Religious Advocacy Groups in Washington, D.C.,whichexamines a total of 212 religion-related advocacy groups operating in the nation’scapital.

Other major findings include:

• Aboutone-in-five religious advocacy organizations in Washington have a RomanCatholic perspective (19%) and a similar proportion is evangelical Protestantin outlook (18%), while 12% are Jewish and 8% are mainline Protestant. But manysmaller U.S. religious groups, including Baha’is, Buddhists, Hindus, Muslimsand Sikhs, also have established advocacy organizations in the Washington area.In fact, the number of Muslim groups (17) is about the same as the number ofmainline Protestant groups (16). And the largest category today isinterreligious: One-quarter of the groups studied (54) either representmultiple faiths or advocate on religious issues without representing a specificreligion.
• Themedian annual advocacy expenditures by the 131 groups for which recent (2008 or2009) financial data were available was nearly $1 million. More than one-thirdof the groups (46 groups, or 35%) reported annual advocacy expenditures between$1 million and $5 million per year, while about one-in-ten (18 groups, or 14%)reported spending more than $5 million a year.
• Therecession in the U.S. economy from late 2007 to mid-2009 seems to have taken atoll on the budgets of many religion-related advocacy organizations. Of the 104groups for which data on expenditures in both 2008 and 2009 were available, 56reported that their advocacy spending was lower in 2009 than it had been in2008. The average decline for the 56 groups was about $500,000. In the sameperiod, 48 groups reported that their advocacy spending rose, with the averageincrease being about $300,000. Overall among the 104 groups, there was a netdrop of about $14 million in total advocacy expenditures during this period.
• Theissue agendas of religious advocacy groups touch on a wide array of domesticand foreign policy concerns. On the domestic front, the most commonly addressedissues are the relationship between church and state, the defense of civilrights and liberties for religious and other minorities, bioethics and lifeissues (such as abortion, capital punishment and end-of-life issues) andfamily/marriage issues (such as the definition of marriage, domestic violenceand fatherhood initiatives).
• Internationally,the most commonly addressed concerns are human rights, debt relief and othereconomic issues, and the promotion of peace and democracy. About one-in-fivegroups (21%) deal with religious freedom in particular countries or worldwide.
• Morethan eight-in-ten of the groups say they use targeted or mass emails tomobilize constituents. More than six-in-ten were using social networking toolssuch as Facebook and Twitter in 2009.
• Morethan three-quarters (79%) of the groups for which staffing data were availableemploy 12 or fewer people in the Washington area. More than half (55%) havefive or fewer employees.

The full report — including a brief history ofreligious advocacy in Washington — is available on the Pew Forum’s website. In addition, an online directoryincludes profiles of the 212religious advocacy groups in the study, as well as excerpts from their missionstatements and financial data, where available.

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The Pew ResearchCenter’s Forum on Religion & Public Life conducts surveys, demographicanalyses and other social science research on important aspects of religion andpublic life in the U.S. and around the world. As part of the Washington-basedPew Research Center, a nonpartisan, nonadvocacy organization, the Pew Forumdoes not take positions on any of the issues it covers or on policy debates.