Is it Illegal for Feds to Say "Merry Christmas"?

Here's what Newt Gingrich had to say on the campaign trail in Davenport, Iowa this week:

I've been investigating this for the last three days. I am told that this is actually a 20- or 30-year-old law, which I have to say I find strange, and I would advocate repealing the law. Apparently if the president sends out Christmas cards, they are paid for the Democratic or Republican National Committees because no federal official at any level is currently allowed to say 'Merry Christmas.'

Having seen federal employees exchange Christmas greetings over the years, that seemed unbelievable to me. And it turns out that's because, according to the assiduous fact-checkers at PolitiFact, it simply isn't true.

There's no law or regulation, PolitiFact found, that prohibits federal employees at any level or in any branch of government from saying "Merry Christmas." And in fact there are policies dating back to the Clinton administration that explicitly require agencies to allow a fairly wide range of religious expression in the workplace.

The tradition of using national political committees to send out presidents' Christmas cards appears to exist out of a desire to be seen as good stewards of taxpayer money, not because of any official requirement.

On Capitol Hill, there are official limits on when federal funds can be used for certain forms of expression. For example, both the House and the Senate restrict the use of lawmakers' free postage privilege to send out holiday greeting cards. The House regulations on that issue are dated June 1998, when the House Speaker was -- you guessed it -- Newt Gingrich.

(Flickr image by Leo Reynolds)