The 16th amendment passed in 1913. Sometime after that a bill was passed and signed into law instituting a federal income tax.
So where is that law really? I’m sure its with every other law signed by Wilson in 1913, but where are those exactly? Is there is a master copy somewhere in Washington? If I wanted to look at the law, take a picture, and shove it in every moron’s face that asks “Where is the law” could I do that? How do I find the house and senate bill numbers? Where can I find the copy with Wilson’s signature on it?
Browsing through the Statutes at Large is not very helpful. Most laws are full of references like “Delete Section 5.2(a)(A)(ii) of the previous law and replace with …” or “Strike the word ‘and’ in Section 5.2(a)(B)(iii) of the previous law and replace with ‘or’.” So the Public Laws are now complied into volumes called the United States Code where they are organized by subject and somebody actually changed the word “and” to the word “or” so you don’t have to go back to the beginning of every law ever written and reconstruct it yourself. The predecessor of the United States Code was the Revised Statutes of the United States.
Were a horrible accident happen to the physical copy of the bill, would change its status ?
My understanding is, that patents work that way (you need the physical bit of paper), but does anything else in the legal system get invalidated if the physical bit of paper recording it get destroyed ?
Really? If the patent office (or wherever the records are kept) goes up in flames, then all the hundreds of thousands of patents stored there suddenly are invalidated?
Of course not, but you’re not a tax protestor. The “birthers” are wimps compared to the tax protestors. They want to see the “long form” original birth certificate of the law. And if you manage to produce it, they still have a thousand other arguments that the income tax is a fraud:
The IRS is a Philippines trust illegally preying on gullible Americans
The courts that send tax protestors to jail are operating under the Unconstitutional King’s Admiralty Law because they have gold-fringed flags.
You don’t have to pay income taxes, but they trick you into volunteering to pay when you employer asks you to sign a W-4 form.
I’ve only scratched the surface to give you a few examples.
The legal reasoning that comes from deluded slaves like you and me who refuse to accept the truth and stand up for our rights means nothing to them.
The full text of Title 26 has, of course, been amended many many times since it was originally passed. If you are looking for the original version of the bill, you’ll need to go to a library and browse through hard copies of the congressional record. The Library of Congress only has bills online back to 1973. Contact them if you need more assistance.
Wanted to add that this site might be helpful, an online Tax History Museum. It includes an archive of 1040s from 1913 to 2006, Presidential tax returns back to FDR. It’s a great resource, which seems to have a scholarly focus, rather than partisan.
To be specific the law you are asking about was The Revenue Act of 1913, Public Law 63-16. The original copy signed by President Wilson is in the National Archives Building at 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington DC. More information here.
It is also available on microfilm. You may be able to view the microfilm version at other, more convenient libraries. The public can visit the archives and view material such as this, but you should study their rules on what you can bring with you and how to handle materials.
And also be aware that the Internal Revenue Codes of 1939, 1954, and 1986 made major changes to the original law President Wilson signed in 1913 and little from that law remain in effect.
Alley Dweller deserves praise for giving you an excellent head start, but you needn’t go all the way to DC to see the text of the income tax law. There are many Federal Depository Libraries around the country, and you can find them through the GPO web site. In Dallas, TX, you have three options:
[ol]
[li]Dallas Public Library System, J. Erik Jonsson Library[/li][li]Dallas Baptist University, Vance Memorial Library[/li][li]Southern Methodist University, Central University Libraries[/li][/ol]
There are probably also some surburban Depository Libraries that may be nearer to where you live. Just go in and ask the research desk for help locating the United States Statutes at Large, which print the full text of every public and private law passed by Congress. The Revenue Act of 1913 is cited as Public Law 63-16 (38 Stat. 166). This means it was the 16th law passed by the 63rd Congress (which ran from March, 1913 to March, 1915) and is printed in Volume 38 of the *Statutes at Large *starting on page 166. Good luck.
If you just wanted to read the text of the law, it’s right here.
If you want to look at a microfilmed image of the original piece of parchment engrossed by the Congress and signed by the President, that can be found at libraries. Look for the National Archives Microfilm Publications M337and M1326 (I don’t know which one this particular law is in).
If you absolutely need to see the original piece of parchment engrossed by the Congress and bearing the President’s original signature and make your own copy, you have to go to the National Archives in Washington.
Though the question was inspired by a few tax protestors I knew in Dallas, I don’t doubt the legality if the income tax. It just made me realize I was ignorant about how laws were cataloged and where they were stored. My response to “Where is the law” was always, “I don’t know, but its probably in the same place every other law passed that year is stored.”
In hind site the National Archive should have been obvious…duh. The US Statutes at Large is a ream gem. I’m surprised I’ve never heard of it. The online tax history museum is also great.
One benefit of the tax protestors I knew is that I know the 16th Amendment by heart from the hundreds of times I quoted it to them. “…income, from whatever source derived, without apportionment. Wtf do you think that means!”
That’s the ridiculousness that all tax protestor arguments come back to, that an Amendment to the Constitution was ratified that meant nothing and did nothing. I always asked these guys what was the purpose of the 16th amendment. They never could give me an answer.
Seriously? One of the tax protesters’ arguments is that if the actual piece of paper signed by the president cannot be shown, it’s not valid? Or are they suggesting that the law was never passed and it’s all one big conspiracy? It’s ridiculous either way.
Thats my understanding. Your ownership of the patent is conveyed by ownership of the physical “ribbon copy” of the patent document. If a patent is invalidated you must give up the ribbon copy