This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

U.S. v. Tweel, 550 F.2d 297, 299-300 (1977) "Silence can only be equated with fraud when there is a legal or moral duty to speak, or when an inquiry left unanswered would be intentionally misleading... We cannot condone this shocking conduct...If that is the case we hope our message is clear. This sort of deception will not be tolerated and if this is routine it should be corrected immediately"

Lavin v. Marsh, 644 F.2nd 1378, 9th Cir., (1981) "Persons dealing with government are charged with knowing government statutes and regulations, and they assume the risk that government agents may exceed their authority and provide misinformation"

Bollow v. Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, 650 F.2d 1093, 9th Cir., (1981) "All persons in the United States are chargeable with knowledge of the Statutes-at-Large.. It is well established that anyone who deals with the government assumes the risk that the agent acting in the government's behalf has exceeded the bounds of his authority"

Economy Plumbing and Heating v. U.S., 470 F.2d 585 (Ct. Cl. 1972) "Persons who are not taxpayers are not within the system and can obtain no benefit by following the procedures prescribed for taxpayers, such as the filing of claims for refunds."

Long v. Rasmussen, 281 F. 236, at 238 "The revenue laws are a code or a system in regulation of tax assessment and collection. They relate to taxpayers, and not to non-taxpayers. The latter are without their scope. No procedures are prescribed for non-taxpayers, and no attempt is made to annul any of their rights and remedies in due course of law. With them Congress does not assume to deal, and they are neither the subject nor the object of the revenue laws."

Redfield v. Fisher, 292 P. 813, 135 Or. 180, 294 P.461, 73 A.L.R. 721 (1931) "The individual, unlike the corporation, cannot be taxed for the mere privilege of existing. The corporation is an artificial entity which owes its existence and charter powers to the state; but the individuals' rights to live and own property are natural rights for the enjoyment of which an excise cannot be imposed."

U.S. v. Ballard, 535 F2d 400, cert denied, 429 U.S. 918, 50 L.Ed.2d 283, 97 S.Ct. 310 (1976) "income" is not defined in the Internal Revenue Code

"Congress has taxed INCOME, not compensation." Conner v US 303 F Supp. 1187 (1969) "There is a clear distinction between `profit' and wages', or a compensation for labor. Compensation for labor (wages) cannot be regarded as profit within the meaning of the law. The word `profit', as ordinarily used, means the gain made upon any business or investment- - - a different thing altogether from the mere compensation for labor."

Treasury Order 150-1, Paragraph 5 States: "US Territories and Insular Possessions. "The commissioner shall, to the extent of authority otherwise vested in him, provide for the administration of the United States internal revenue law [ small i ] in the U.S. territories and insular possessions and OTHER AUTHORIZED AREAS OF THE WORLD."

TO's 150-1 thru 150- 29 are the Delegation of authority orders for the IRS from the Dept. Of Treasury. No section or paragraph is found in any of these which authorize the Commissioner to administer the internal revenue laws anywhere other than the above paragraph.

Bente v. Bugbee 137 A. 552, 553, 103 N. J. Law 608 . In that case the court held: A tax is a legal imposition exclusively of statutory origin (37 Cyc.724, 725), and, naturally, liability to taxation must be read in the statute, or it does not exist. (Emphasis added).

In State v. Chicago & N.W.R. Co., 112 N.W. 515, 520; 132 Wis. 345, quoting and adopting the definition in State v. Certain Lands in Redwood County, 42 N.W. 473, 40 Minn. 512, the court held: That a tax is a liability created by statute we think admits of no doubt, either upon principle or authority. (Emphasis added)

"The taxpayer must be liable for the tax. Tax liability is a condition precedent to the demand. Merely demanding payment, even repeatedly, does not cause liability". [Boathe v. Terry, 713 F.2d 1405, at 1414 (1983).]

A FEW CASES ON INCOME

US Supreme Court. So. Pacific v. Lowe, 247 U.S. 330 (1918) "income; as used in the statute should be given a meaning so as not to include everything that comes in."

House Congressional Record March 27th 1943, page 2580, by F. Morse Hubbard, Treasury Dept. legislative draftsman: "The income tax is, therefore, not a tax on income as such. It is an excise tax with respect to certain activities and privileges which is measured by reference to the income which they produce. The income is not the subject of the tax."

C.R.S. Report Congress 92-303A (1992) by John R. Lackey, Legislative attorney with the library of Congress: "When a court refers to an income tax as being in the nature of an excise, it is merely stating that the tax is not on the property itself, but rather it is a fee for the privilege of receiving gain from the property. The tax is based upon the amount of the gain, not the value of the property."

Murdock v. Pennsylvania 319 U.S. 105 480-487 (1943) "It could hardly be denied that a tax laid specifically on the exercise of those freedoms would be unconstitutional."

American Airways v. Wallace 57 F.2d 877, 880; "The terms "excise tax" and "privilege tax" are synonyous. The two are often used interchangeably."

Nicol v. Ames 173 U.S. 509 (1899): "A tax upon the privilege of selling property at the exchange,differs radically from a tax upon every sale made in any place." "A sale at an exchange differs from a sale made at a man's private office or on his farm, or by a partnership, because, although the subject-matter of the sale may be the same in each case, there are at an exchange certain advantages, in the way of finding a market, obtaining a price, the saving of time, and in the security of payment, and other matters, which are more easily obtained there than at an office or a farm."

26 CFR §39.22(b)-1 (1956): "No other items may be excluded from gross income except (a) those items of income which are, under the Constitution, not taxable by the Federal Government."

Coppage v. Kansas 236 U.S. 1 (1915): "Included in the right of personal liberty and the right of private property- partaking of the nature of each- is the right to make contracts for the acquisition of property. Chief among such contracts is that of personal employment, by which labor and other services are exchanged for money or other forms of property."

Jack Cole Company v. Alfred T. MacFarland, Commissioner, 206 Tenn, 694, 337 S.W.2d 453 Supreme Court of Tennessee (1960): "Since the right to receive income or earnings is a right belonging to every person, this right cannot be taxed as privilege."

Simms v. Ahrens, 271 SW 720 (1925): "An income tax is neither a property tax nor a tax on occupations of common right, but is an excise taxThe legislature may declare as 'privileged' and tax as such for state revenue, those pursuits not matters of common right, but it has no power to declare as a 'privilege' and tax for revenue purposes, occupations that are of common right."

Pollock v. Farmers Loan & Trust, 157 U.S. 429 and 158 U.S. 601 (1895): "The power to tax real and personal property and the income from both, there being an apportionment, is conceded: that such a tax is a direct tax in the meaning of the Constitution has not been, and, in our judgment, cannot be successfully deniedOrdinarily, all taxes paid primarily by persons who can shift the burden upon some one else, or who are under no legal compulsion to pay them, are considered indirect [excise] taxestaxation on income is in its nature an excise entitled to be enforced as such."

Besides the Supreme court rulings I have posted on the 16th Amendment, it also includes the Constitution, which says :

Constitution:

1. The powers of Congress, and the limitations set upon those powers, are set forth in Article I of the United States Constitution. Section 8 specifies both the power to collect, "Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises," and the requirement that, "Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States." If the income tax is not uniform they are illegal.

2. However, the Constitution specifically limited Congress' ability to impose direct taxes, by requiring it to distribute direct taxes in proportion to each state's census population. It was thought that head taxes and property taxes (slaves could be taxed as either or both) were likely to be abused, and that they bore no relation to the activities in which the federal government had a legitimate interest. The fourth clause of section 9 therefore specifies that, "No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or enumeration herein before directed to be taken." Again, it has to be in proportion to the Census or enumeration, or else it isn't legal, which the income tax is being taken as right now.

3.Article 1 Section 2 Paragraph 3 states "...direct taxes shall be apportioned..." which they are not being apportioned right now, so it is unconsitutional.

4. The 16th Amendment did not give Congress any more taxing powers than it already had, which it could not tax directly, it was talkin about corporate profits and gains.

Also, in order for a tax to be paid, it must be a liability.

Section 1 of the Internal Revenue Codebook, (IRC) is the only part that refers to Income Taxes. There is no section that describes an income tax liability to pay or file unlike other sections of the IRC for Tobacco, Alcohol and Firearms that give a penalty, say "liability" to file and pay if you sell these types of things.--206.111.181.109 19:32, 11 November 2005 (UTC)BB69

I have removed the 16th amendment addition. It contains commentary and original work that is not appropriate for an article. We should add a see also link to other articles such as the one on the 16th amendment. - Tεxτurε 19:52, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

I agree with adding a "see also link" for "Intent and purpose of 16th Amendment". Can you do that? or how do I? Do I create a WP page and then supply link to it? Thanks --bb69 20:05, 11 November 2005 (UTC)BB69

Actually, the article on the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is already about intent and controversy. You should update that one. I'll add a link to the article. - Tεxτurε 22:36, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

It isn't about the same intents and controversy. It adds to what the article doesn't already have. --bb69 15:33, 13 November 2005 (UTC)BB69

Ok. That one works. - Tεxτurε 18:47, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Stare recently wrote a comment on BB69's page, but Stare doesn't have a page to comment on. Since it was pertinent to this page, I will post it and comment on it. --bb69 16:55, 28 November 2005 (UTC)BB69

From Stare:

"Dear BB69:

The citations to IRC section 6020 and related provisions added on 23 Nov 2005 are matters of law. Your repeated attempts to remove these citations are understandable given your apparent antipathy with respect to the U.S. tax system, but are not appropriate on the page in question. As stated above by another user, no one is trying to prevent you from stating a position against the income tax. However, the statutes, regs and case cited are on point, as a matter of law, regardless of what you or I personally feel about the income tax. Your edit comments are also revealing. For example, you state that you removed citations because "none specifically cite IRS agents are the secretary [ . . . ]". Unfortunately there is no rule of law that requires a valid delegation to "specifically cite IRS agents are the secretary" and, in any case, raising such an objection with respect to the statutes and regs themselves is 'way off base.' The verbiage ("They must produce it. If not they have no authority.") also betrays your frustration, but is not legally sound. You state that the cite to the case (Craig) was removed "since case doesn't imply IRS has delegation, i.e., pocket commission." This statement is an example of what some legal scholars call "legally frivolous tax protester rhetoric." Further, the Court in Craig specifically ruled that the IRS Revenue Agent did have a valid delegation under the statutes and reg cited. So, your objection is without merit. In any case, removing cites to primary legal authority that is directly on point is not appropriate. I assume from the structure and the substance of your arguments that you are probably neither a tax lawyer nor a certified public accountant (hey, maybe that's a good thing). However, please recognize that these areas of Wikipedia are regularly perused by such creatures -- who have studied tax protest arguments in depth."

The reason I believe the citations to IRC section 6020 to be appropriate on the page in question because in the history page a member said they removed the comments because they weren't sourced. I sourced them. Fortunately, their is rule of law that require a valid delegation from the Secretary or must be the Secretary of state as stated in section 6020, whether you want to believe that or not, that is the applicable law to cite for my additions. None of my verbiage has betrays my frustration, as you put it. They are all legally sound. If you don't believe it then challenge it. I have been very conscious in producing challening laws and supreme court cases to back up my points. Regardless, if anyone, including what some legal scholars may think is "legally firvolous tax protestor rhetoric", that is merely their way of saying "I have nothing to back up what I'm saying". Quote the specific part of the Craig case that says the IRS Revenue Agent did have a valid delegation under the statues and reg cited. I saw nothing on it. The ruling must state what the delegation order said and by what statute or it's null and void. As you see, removing your cases was entirely appropriate because you didn't quite see the point. Just posting a regulation that says IRS agents have authority when they have word from the Secretary of stated doesn't say that the IRS Revenue agents who approach people do have authority. They must produce the delegation from the Secretary of State and have a Pocket Commission showing they have authority, which only ATF Officers have, not Revenue Officers. That is the point that everyone needs to know. So, you see what you posted was redundant, since I already mentioned that they do have authority when authorized and by what means. Be aware that you don't have to be a tax lawyer or a CPA in order to understand the law and how it is applied. All you need are eyes to read. If you are either of these, be aware you are being watched by people who are going to read the laws, so don't try any trickery.--bb69 16:57, 28 November 2005 (UTC)BB69

Just to clear up one misconception, Stare does indeed have a talk page where you could respond to his comment. Cheers! BD2412 T 17:29, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

"If the most successful tax protest is defined as getting the powers-that-be to acknowledge the validity of your tax protest theories and stop their attempts to collect, and if the least successful is defined as a protest that ends with the protester imprisoned and more of his assets seized than he would have had to pay in taxes if he had been complying with the tax laws as interpreted by the authorities, almost all tax protesters find a fate somewhere between these extremes.

The Internal Revenue Service, because of understaffing, outdated technology, legal restrictions, and bureaucracy, is often unable to successfully collect even from the tax evaders it knows about and whose assets it can identify. For this reason, it is not at all uncommon for even those tax protester theories that have been laughed out of court to have practitioners who are successfully keeping their money from the tax collector year after year. "

Some of the tax protester arguments (for instance the fringe-on-the-flag and missing-13th-Amendment arguments) aren't really tax-protester-specific and might be better if moved to the patriot mythology page with a link to there from here. -Moorlock 22:37, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Regarding the following text from a prior version of the article:

The Supreme Court held that "a good-faith misunderstanding of the law or a good-faith belief that one is not violating the law negates willfulness, whether or not the claimed belief or misunderstanding is objectively reasonable" (and not based on an argument about its constitutionality), that belief may be a defense with respect to the element of willfulness, even if the belief is unreasonable.

The quoted language is actually from the syllabus, not from the Court's opinion in the Cheek case. For editors not familiar with analysis of legal texts, this means that the quoted language is from secondary material printed as a headnote immediately above the actual text of the Court's opinion. The standard disclaimer issued by the Supreme Court states that a syllabus (or headnote) printed above the opinion of the Court "constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader." (emphasis added). Also, the anonymous insertion of this quote resulted in an awkward syntax construction. I therefore reverted the edit. Famspear 15:40, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Dear editors: The following text was removed on 20 March 2006:

More recently, the term has been used to describe persons who simply ask questions about the Tax Code, such as the unambiguous data-mining results found in Tax Code when the Code is searched with a computer. Other questions prompting this label are those asked to U.S. Senators, Congressmen and the GPO (Government Printing Office) regarding the fact that every year of official U.S. tax regulations on the GPO website are incomplete.

I removed the material because it is unsourced and I don't see the connection to an article on "tax protesters." The anonymous editor who posted this seems to be implying that "people who simply ask questions about the Tax Code" are being called "tax protesters." The question becomes: "being called tax protesters by whom?" Virtually everyone at some time or another "asks questions about the tax code" including tax lawyers, CPAs, members of Congress, IRS employees, etc., etc., etc. Perhaps the editor who inserted this material can provide some backup or sourcing for this material. Yours, Famspear 15:38, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

REPLY: If you ask a question of your Senator or Congressman related to data-mining the tax code, or even ask for the citation of imposing law, your Senator or Congressman will reply with a slightly altered form letter that says such questioning is frivolous, and implies that people who ask such questions are bad people that will go to jail.

First, read about data-mining the tax code with a computer at http://whatistaxed.com Second, write your Senator/Congressman to ask why all of the available years of 26CFR online at the GPO are complete. Ask them why the Code contradicts current tax practice of taking an unprescribed tax. [Note: These comments were added by an anonymous user at IP address 71.33.60.54 on 20 March 2006.]

Dear user at IP 71.33.60.54: Thank you for the clarification. If you sent your Senator or Congressman a letter and he or she replied with a letter saying your questioning was frivolous, it might be because your letter made some express or implied assertion about the supposed invalidity of the Federal income tax system, or claimed "that every year of official U.S. tax regulations on the GPO website are incomplete," or asked why "all of the available years of 26CFR online at the GPO are complete" [sic; you may have meant to say "incomplete"] or some other such thing.

I hope this doesn't come as a shock, but your Senator or Congressman is not here to prove to your personal satisfaction that the Federal income tax system is valid, and neither is anybody else. (Your Congressman may not be as blunt with you as I am being, but, hey, I'm not running for public office.) As a general rule, your elected officials do not owe you or me an explanation about the Federal income tax laws, any more than they owe you or me an explanation about the laws about contracts, or property, or securities, or the environment, etc. If you don't like the current laws, I suggest you vote for somebody else or start a campaign to get the laws changed.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) also is not here to prove to your personal satisfaction that the Federal income tax system is valid. Yes, the IRS publishes explanations of what the law is -- to educate you, not to persuade you or prove anything to you.

Congress enacted the tax statutes, and the IRS enforces them. The modern income tax statutes and related tax regulations have been on the books for over 92 years. After hundreds of attempts by tax protesters over a period of over 25 years to obtain a favorable ruling for the theories that the Federal income tax is somehow unconstitutional, or bogus, or invalid, or that wages are not income, or that wages are not taxable, or that income includes only corporate profits, or that the Internal Revenue Service is not a government agency, etc., etc., etc., no court has ever so ruled. These arguments are without merit. Indeed, they are so baseless that they are legally frivolous. The term "frivolous" as used here is not merely colloquially pejorative; it is also a technical legal term.

The 535 members of Congress, the President, the tens of thousands of IRS employees, the thousands of other executive branch Federal employees, the hundreds of Federal judges, the hundreds of law professors, the tens of thousands of attorneys, the tens of thousands of certified public accountants, etc., (many of whom have more ready access to tax law materials than you have, and who study the tax law with far greater care and in far more depth than any tax protester can possibly hope to study it) are not engaged in some sort of grand, silent conspiracy to hoodwink you or me or anybody else regarding the validity of the Federal income tax system. Anybody who believes a tax protester argument is, however, being hoodwinked in a very massive way.

No, people who merely ask questions about the Federal income tax laws are not necessarily bad people, and they will not go to jail merely for asking such questions. People who willfully refuse to timely pay Federal income taxes or willfully refuse to timely file Federal income tax returns do sometimes get caught and go to jail. People who willfully attempt to evade or defeat the assessment or payment of Federal income taxes do sometimes get caught and go to jail. People who willfully file false Federal income tax returns do sometimes get caught and go do jail. In particular, some "professional" tax protesters such as Irwin Schiff -- who have supposedly "studied" (using the word "studied" very loosely) the tax laws far more than the average tax protester -- are hopelessly incorrect in their feeble "analysis" of the law, and they are paying heavy penalties -- in terms of finance and personal freedom -- for taking things a step further and willfully violating the law.

By the way, tax lawyers and CPAs are "data mining" the Internal Revenue Code and the Treasury regulations in the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) every day -- and they're doing this much more thoroughly and with much more expensive, more sophisticated search engines than are available to you for free on the internet. Sorry. Yours, Famspear 23:33, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

From Famspear, to everyone: I copied the following from my own Talk page on 22 March 2006:

Often we are directly asked where in the law do we find the command that we pay income tax. How do we handle such foolishness? There is an income tax on the books. Everyone knows that we must pay it. Ignorance is no defense. John wesley 16:23, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Dear John wesley: With respect to the Federal income tax on individuals, the basic tax is imposed by 26 U.S.C. § 1. Under that statute, the tax is imposed on a legal concept called "taxable income," which in turn is defined at 26 U.S.C. § 63. Taxable income basically means "gross income" less the allowable deductions. "Gross income" is defined at 26 U.S.C. § 61. Many tax protesters are well aware of these provisions, but for many of them it does not really matter how much law they read; they simply refuse to accept it. All tax protester arguments, by definition, are feeble. Not only are the arguments incorrect as a matter of law, they are so flaccid that they are legally frivolous. As fellow editor BD2412 has said, tax protester arguments are based on very fundamental misconceptions about how law and the legal system actually work -- not just Federal income tax law, but law in general. As a result, tax protester arguments are easy to refute. Tax protesters are also hampered by the fact that there are so many different tax protester arguments and theories -- and these theories have been rejected over and over by the courts for so many years. Tax protest theories were fatally hampered many years ago -- because of the foolish insistence by many tax protesters that the theories actually be litigated. To litigate a tax protester argument is to lose. And each time a tax protest argument loses in court, it hampers the efforts of later tax protesters. The tax protester is a real life equivalent of the poor "coyote" in the "Road Runner" cartoons that used to be popular on television in the United States. Tax protest arguments are, however, fun to study (if you're a tax geek like me)! Yours, Famspear 16:47, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Post-script: For those who are not familiar with the old "Road Runner" cartoons on U.S. television (see Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner), the coyote character was a character who tried, over and over each week, to capture the road runner (a bird) with one elaborate but ridiculous scheme after another. Each contraption fabricated or acquired by the coyote to capture the road runner failed miserably -- with the virtually inevitable result that the coyote was horribly (but, to the television viewer, hilariously) smashed against some rock or cliff or otherwise crushed, burned, etc. Despite always losing, the coyote never learned his lesson -- always coming back with yet another ridiculous contraption to defeat the road runner -- and always failing in the most miserable and silly way. Yours, Famspear 19:31, 22 March 2006 (UTC)