Yeah, and I hear the only reason he won was because people with big ears voted for him.
I always find it funny when people in this country act like we are a nation subjected to all sorts of indignities at the hands of our law enforcement. Perhaps they are having flashbacks to the turmoil of the 60s and 70s; perhaps they simply don’t like living in reality. In a world that is filled with scenes like Tiananmen Square, we should appreciate the fact that we don’t allow our military to act as police (with some very limited exceptions), we don’t face a government that refuses to give up its authority when voted out of office, and we don’t have to spend our days and nights worrying for no good reason about jackbooted thugs showing up at our door demanding submission to their will.
Anyone who refuses to abide by the law of the land deserves to expect consequences for that. The measure of those consequences will be determined by their own level of defiance of the law. That includes so-called “tax protesters” who meet the representatives of the government with barred doors and loaded weapons.
This wolf wants to eat the mutton of that sheep. That wolf wants to eat the mutton of this sheep. As you can see, they have significant differences on the subject of eating sheep.
And that other wolf doesn’t want to pay any taxes at all? And still thinks that a wolf can live in a civilized society? No wonder the three little pigs made the wolf a byword for stupidity.
http://www.adl.org/mwd/suss6.asp#sixteenth Sixteenth Amendment not adopted: mentioning “The Law that Never Was” by Benson & Beckman: US v. Wm.J. Benson (7th Cir 1991) 941 F2d 598 [one of the authors of Law/Never] amended on other grounds 957 F2d 301; [ Benson convicted of tax evasion and sentenced to four years of prison followed by five years probation. US v. Benson (7th Cir 1995) 67 F3d 641 reh.den 74 F3d 152; it appears he violated the terms of his parole. Benson v. US (ND IL 1997) 969 F.Supp 1129]; M.D. Miller v. US (7th Cir 1988) 868 F2d 236; (“The validity of that process [adopting the 16th Amendment] and if the resulting constitutional amendment are no longer open questions.”) US v. Sitka (2d Cir 1988) 845 F2d 43 at 47 cert.den 488 US 827; US v. Thomas (7th Cir 1986) 788 F2d 1250 cert.den 479 US 853 (the leading case; held that the Sec of State’s 1913 proclamation of the adoption of the 16th Amendment is conclusive and “is now beyond review”); US v. House (WD Mich 1985) 617 F.Supp 237 aff’d (6th Cir 1986) 787 F2d 593(t)(used Benson as a witness, and thoroughly discussed his book); US v. Wojtas (ND IL 1985) 611 F.Supp 118; US v. Sato (ND IL 1989) 704 F.Supp 816 (the Constitutional provision that Congress will have exclusive authority over DC only means that no state govt has authority over DC but it does not limit Congress’s authority to make laws, including tax laws, only to DC); O.L. Brown v. CIR (2/9/97) TC Memo 1987-78 (judge declined to buy a copy); Spoelman v. Hummel (WD Mich unpub 5/26/89); US v. Stahl (9th Cir 1986) 792 F2d 1438 cert.den 479 US 1036; Spoelman v. Hummel (WD Mich unpub 5/26/89); {Note: The argument in “The Law That Never Was” by Benson & Beckman is a 1913 legal memo worked up for the Sec. of State by the Solicitor of the State Dept regarding the ratifications received from state legislatures for the proposed 16th amendment, noticing that several of these notifications contained tiny typos in reprinting the text of the proposed amendment. The Solicitor advised that, as a state could not amend or change the proposed text but only vote for or against ratification, and that the proposed amendment was available to members of all the legislatures in a number of published copies - most without any typos, and it is not known whether these typos existed in the copies seen by the members of the legislatures before they voted (no state govt ever complained that its vote on ratification would have gone different without the typos), and certainly the ratifications of previous and undoubted amendments also had similar flaws, that the notification of favorable ratifying votes is binding on the Sec of State, etc., it is presumed that all the votes were taken on the correct and proper text and therefore the ratifications are all valid and sufficient to adopt the amendment. The Sec. of State agreed. Contrary to the claims made by Benson & Beckman, there is no evidence that any ratification of any amendment was ever invalidated because of some typo in repeating the proposed amendment, and in fact there is a distinct shortage of precedents for invalidating an Act of Congress because of a comparable typo distinguishing the bills adopted by the House and the Senate. The book was dealt with in detail in US v. Thomas (7th Cir 1986) 788 F2d 1250 cert.den 479 US 853, and one of the co-authors tried to revive the rejected argument simply because he had written that book in US v. Benson (7th Cir 1991) 941 F2d 598, both times the court held that the validity of the adoption of the 16th Amendment was “beyond review”.}
Yes, but smart people realize that that version was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States in *Pollock v Farmer’s Loan and Trust *157 U.S. 429 (1895), necessitating a constitutional amendment to allow the federal government to continue levying such a tax. :smack:
The 1861/62/64/70 income tax was discontinued in 1872. Pollock was raised concerning the new tax of 1894, and concerned the technical distinction between “direct” and “indirect” taxes. An income tax on wages, being classified as an indirect tax, was not affected by Pollock. However, an income tax on interest, dividends, rents – income from property, in other words – was adjudged to be a direct tax, and, as a direct tax, coming under the control of the apportionment clause of the Constitution. Seeing that an income tax on wages alone was the exact opposite of what an income tax was intended to achieve, the 16th Amendment was framed specifically to allow income taxes, no matter the source of income, to be imposed without regard to apportionment.
In other words, unless you’re a gazillionaire living off your investments, the 16th Amendment doesn’t mean much to you. As with so many other cases in contemporary America, attacks on it show the right wing trying to fool the working class into campaigning against its own interests.
JWK beat me to it but I’ll add a bit more. The US Constitution explicitly gives Congress the power to impose taxes:
One of the concerns of the Framers was that a couple of the more populated states could band together and make one of the smaller states (like Rhode Island) pay a higher share of taxes, so they required that all taxes be apportioned by population. The 1861 income tax was never to my knowledge ruled unconstitutional. The 16th Amendment removed the apportion restriction. To quote Wikipedia:
(Emphasis mine.) The Pollock v. Farmer decision limited income taxes; it didn’t abolish them. If the 16th Amendment was somehow shown to be invalid we’d still have income taxes, they’d just be applied differently.
I always love the “not the framers’ intent” arguments. The framers didn’t intend air traffic control, either. It’s a similar argument: they DID intend regulation of interstate commerce by the federal gummint, and it’s extended to air traffic by modern interpretation. Similarly, they DID intend taxation by the federal gummint, and ditto.
Also amazing to me how the same people who don’t want to PAY for government services are first in line to scream if they don’t get their share of those services.
