I can hardly believe I agreed to do this, but I will be appearing on radio this weekend to debate the burning question, is there a law that requires people to pay federal income tax?
This is what comes of maintaining a website about tax protestors.
If you happen to be supremely bored from 10-11:30 am this Saturday morning (April 14), and you'd rather do almost anything else than whatever you're doing, you can listen in to the broadcast by streaming web radio here:
http://www.getonyoursoapbox.com/
The "you don't have to pay income taxes" position will be represented by Larken Rose, well-known tax protestor and convicted criminal, who just got out of prison four months ago.
This should be an informative debate -- not!
1 comment:
Wow... very professional of you to say such a thing. You must be a comedian as well.
I may not be a law professor.... but I do study the law and Supreme court cases and it seems that you take things our of context.
I am curious to know if you have heard of a Mr. F. Morse Hubbard, formerly of the legislative drafting research fund of Columbia University, and a former legislative draftsman in the Treasury Department?
He wrote a very interesting synopsis on our income tax law and what it actually was. It is entitled: "THE INCOME TAX IS AN EXCISE TAX, AND INCOME IS MERELY THE BASIS FOR DETERMINING ITS AMOUNT".
You can find it in the Congressional House record of 1943, 78th Congress first session, Volume 89- Part 2, p.2579-2580.
It describes out tax laws of past and present and the Supreme Courts interpretation of the laws and what they apply to. In conclusion in the debate, the sixteenth amendment did not confer any new power of taxation. I will quote it in its entirety.
"So far as the objections raised in the Pollock case are concerned, the principle applied to corporations under the act of 1909 with the approval of the Supreme Court might have been extended to individuals engaged in business. In that way investment income of most individuals as well as of corporations could doubtless have been brought under the terms of the act. And the field of income could have been completely covered by applying the principle that the ownership and management of investment property is an activity or privilege with respect to which Congress may impose an excise tax.
However that may be, congress chose to remove all doubt by an amendment to the Constitution. The resolution embodying the proposed amendment (S.J. Res.40, 36 Stat. 184; 61st Cong., 1st sess.) was deposited in the Department of State on July 31,1909, a few days before the act of 1909 was approved by the President. The amendment was duly ratified and became effective as the sixteenth amendment on February 25, 1913. (Secretary of State's Certificate of Adoption, 37 Stat. 1785). .....
The sixteenth amendment authorizes the taxation of income "from whatever source derived"--thus taking in investment income--"without apportionment among the several States." The Supreme Court has held that the sixteenth amendment did not extend the taxing power of the United States to new or excepted subjects but merely removed the necessity which might otherwise exist for an apportionment among the States of taxes laid on income whether it be derived from one source or another. So the amendment made it possible to bring investment income within the scope of a general income-tax law, but did not change the character of the tax. It is still fundamentally an excise or duty with respect to the privilege of carrying on any activity or owning any property which produces income.
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: it is the basis for determining the amount of tax."
This is how the Congress views our income tax law back in 1943, and I'm sure it hasn't changed to this day.
As you say in other statements, you can't take just pieces of Supreme Court cases out of context. I agree with you 100 percent. So you shouldn't either. I believe you have.
When you mentioned the Glenshaw case you forgot to mention that in "Footnote 11" it references the Congress and the definition of income and that it is used in its constitutional sense.
Also, the Court has said that Congress cannot define income because it is outside of its scope of its power.
I have to disagree with you in saying that compensation for labor is income because everything that comes in is not income. The Court has on numerous occasions declared and affirmed that position and the position for persons the right to sell their labor for just compensation (Adair v. U.S., Coppage v. Kansas).
I think that some more research on this topic is in order for you. I hope to hear your viewpoint on my conclusions.
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