Defending the Truth

I thought that only the "little people" pay taxes?

sgtdmski wrote:All this has been resolved nearly a hundred years ago by the Supreme Court of the United States, the final arbiter of the Constitution, and they decided that the sixteenth amendment "income tax" is an excise tax, considering the phrasing "without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." This is all explained in the Research Notes. Government was never granted the power to lay a direct tax upon the inhabitants of the States, and there is nothing in the sixteenth amendment that repeals Article Four of the Bill of Rights.



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Perhaps you forget, the Constitution trumps the Supreme Court, therefore, the Amendment was enacted to give the Congress the power to tax income. Yes while the Consitution in Article 1 Section 2 requires Congress to apportion direct taxes according to the enumeration or census, Article 1 Section 8 gives the Congress the power to lay and collect taxes. The 16th Amendment gives Congress the power lay and collect taxes on income without the need for enumeration.

Yes the Supreme Court has ruled that the wording of the 16th Amendment reads that the income tax is an excise tax, which means that it must, in order to be consitutional, be applied uniformly. That is exactly what US Code Title 26 Subsection A Section 1.

A a single tax-payer living in Alaska, I pay the same percentage on my income for my wage level as does an individual living in California, Michigan, Florida, or Texas would pay.

Furthermore nothing in the 16th Amendment violates the 4th Amendment. There is no seizure but rather a tax which the Congress has the power to lay and collect.

I hate the income tax as much as anybody, but, despite the rhetoric that has been provided, it is a legal tax that I am by law required to pay. I can take my chances and not pay it, but then I must rely on having a jury say that I am right in not paying it.

dmk

The Solicitor General for the government made much the same argument that you are making, that the sixteenth amendment created a new kind of tax, and in an amicus curiae brief, had made the argument: "The Sixteenth Amendment removed the restriction of apportionment as to such income taxes as before were subject thereto." The Court, in their opinion, in which there was no dissent, and noting this "confusion", declared this to be an "erroneous assumption" on the part of the government, and "wholly without foundation". The Court declared that "it was settled that the provisions of the Sixteenth Amendment conferred no new power of taxation"; and that the amendment simply prohibited the income tax from being taken from the category of indirect taxation, and being placed into the category of a direct tax.

It was also explained that the Congress of the United States had no intention of destroying the two great classes of taxation by the wording of the Sixteenth Amendment, but placed an income tax into the category of taxation in which it inherently belonged; the indirect class, or excise, and because the tax is not apportioned, nor subject to the census or enumeration, it is an excise tax, a tax upon the exercise of privileges, such taxes not being subject to the condition of apportionment to the States.

If you have a problem with the opinion of the Court, then maybe you should take it up with the Justices who wrote it. I didn't write their opinion for them.

"This method lays the burdens on those possessing the ability to pay, and compels those who reap the largest harvests under the sunshine of our generous institutions to give more of that harvest for the common good. ...an income tax will not touch a hair upon the head of a laboring man in the United States" — Congressman T. J. Hudson Congressional Record 15 January 1894

"An income tax places burdens upon accumulated wealth, where they can be most easily borne. It is right, because it exacts tribute of accumulation and not of endeavor. ...The artisan who goes forth to labor for his daily bread must pay upon the tools he works with; the brickmason upon his trowel, the carpenter upon his chisel and plane, the wood-chopper upon his ax, the miner upon his pick, and so on through all the list of wage-earners, yet none escape taxes upon what they eat and wear." — Congressman Fithian Congressional Record 24 January 1894

"The view taken by the Congress which passed the tax law in question is plain on its face. The object was to redress in some degree the flagrant inequality by which the great mass of the people were made to furnish nearly all the revenue, and leave the very wealthy classes to furnish very little of it in comparison with their means. Of course, nothing, therefore, was to be taken from the wages of labor" — Attorney James C. Carter Pollock v Farmers Loan & Trust 157 US 429, 517 (1895)

The federal "income tax" was legislated to lighten the burden of taxation on the working man, and place the tax upon those who are more able to pay, but there are those who argue vehemently that they want to pay that tax too. You're not one of "those", are you?

sgtdmski wrote:You agree, then, that "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated", and that no State inhabitant has an obligation to report their personal business to government.

And what does this have to do with taxes? The Constitution also gave Congress the power to lay and collect taxes did it not? We are just going around in a circle here. The income tax like it or not is legal. The Supreme Court cannot overturn an Amendment to the Constitution. An amendment to the consitution by its inclusion is thus constitutional, which means that the supreme court must uphold it.

dmk

If income tax is legal, how did this guy win his case?

The Shreveport Times

From the article:
"A Shreveport attorney who has challenged the government for years on the legality of filing federal income taxes has been acquitted on charges he failed to file returns. A federal jury unanimously found Tommy Cryer not guilty this week on two misdemeanor counts of failure to file."

Mr. Cryer showed the jury that the sixteenth amendment did not repeal the fourth amendment, and that he had no obligation whatsoever to report his personal business to government.

Also, the federal "income tax" is an excise tax, and not a direct tax upon the inhabitants of the States. An excise tax cannot be laid upon an individual as a direct tax.

sgtdmski wrote:Yes, I guess you are one of THOSE after all...