The Economic Rape of America - Chapter Seven: THE PLUNDERING, BLUNDERING, MURDERING IRS

The Economic Rape of America - Chapter Seven

THE PLUNDERING, BLUNDERING, MURDERING IRS

Should you not know justice? - you who hate the good and love the evil, who tear the skin off my people, and the flesh off their bones; who eat the flesh of my people, flay their skin off them, break their bones in pieces, and chop them up like meat in a kettle, like flesh in a caldron.
-- Micah 3, verses 1-3.

"Man, biologically considered... is the most formidable of all the beasts of prey, and indeed the only one that preys systematically on his own species.
-- William James
"The story of the Internal Revenue Service is a history of a tax collection agency drunk with power, ruthlessly smashing dissent among its own personnel and brazenly roughing up taxpayers at will. The IRS defies and intimidates its Congressional creators to go virtually unchallenged in its blatant illegal exercise of awesome powers against the American public...
The violations of the rights of American people today by their own government are ironically parallel to the injustices suffered by the Colonists in the years preceding the Revolutionary War. The Declaration of Independence states that the British King "has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat [out] their substance."
-- Congressman George Hansen, 1980
CAVEAT EMPTOR
The income tax is dead. If you are suffering from a jeopardy assessment, or a lien, or a midnight raid, or some other Internal Revenue Service outrage as you read this, you may well find that hard to believe; but, it's true. Indeed, we believe that the present outrages are symptoms of the system's demise. It's dead, but, like the dinosaurs, it has a pea brain and a primitive nervous system, which is taking too long to send the message. It's dead, but doesn't know it; and its death throes make it more dangerous than when it was alive."
-- Alan Stang, 1988
Nothing in this chapter is to be construed as legal or tax advice. In particular, nothing in this chapter is to be construed as an inducement to not file tax returns, or to not pay federal income taxes. Anyone who crosses the IRS may suffer horrible consequences, as in the tragic case of Robert William Smiley, as recounted in Tax Revolt: The Battle for the Constitution by Martin A. Larson.
On March 4, 1976, Clyde H. Allisan and Ralph W. Foster, two IRS agents, paid Smiley a "friendly visit" in the truck-camper he used as a business office in Salem, Virginia. Ten minutes later Robert Smiley was dead from a bullet wound in the head. The IRS men had departed. Behind Smiley's corpse there was a bullet mark in the wall - but the bullet was never found. At the other end of the camper a gun with no fingerprints was found. $2,000, which Smiley had in his pockets, was gone.
Local police reported the death as a suicide. No autopsy was performed. The IRS agents were neither interviewed nor interrogated. No hearing was held. The only IRS official permitted to discuss the matter said that he knew nothing about the incident. Smiley's close friends declared that the suicide theory was contrary to the known facts and at variance with Smiley's jovial and good-natured character.
A week later five IRS agents seized all the vehicles comprising Smiley's business inventory and sold them. The Treasury Department refused to answer any questions on the matter. They also refused that IRS agents Allisan and Foster, who were with Smiley when he died, be interviewed. Meanwhile, IRS agents continued to harass Smiley's broken-hearted, destitute, ill widow to the point that she attempted suicide on October 23, 1976.
The Spotlight (Washington) was the only publication to cover the Smiley tragedy - in their May 24, June, 14, August 9, November 8 and 15, 1976, and May 30, 1977 issues. No mention appeared in the local media.
OTHER IRS ATROCITIES
In June, 1988 Kay Council of High Point, NC came home one night to find a note from her husband, Alex: "My dearest Kay - I have taken my life in order to provide capital for you. The IRS and its liens which have been taken against our property illegally by a runaway agency of our government have dried up all sources of credit for us. So I have made the only decision I can. It's purely a business decision... You will find my body on the lot on the north side of the house." At the end of a nine-year battle over a disallowed tax shelter, the IRS claimed that the Councils owed $300,000 in taxes, interest, and penalties. When their financial resources were exhausted, Mr. Council committed suicide to provide Mrs. Council with $250,000 insurance money to continue the battle. Ironically, Mrs. Council eventually won a court ruling that she and her husband owed the IRS nothing - the IRS deficiency notice had been sent four months after the statute of limitations had expired. Mrs. Council, 48, said, "I was cheated of growing old with the man I love."
This atrocity story also comes from Tax Revolt: The Battle for the Constitution by Martin A. Larson, who got it from the Rocky Mountain News of May 3, 1979. It is the story of Jasper and Lucille Gates of Denver, CO, which began when they received a letter from the IRS stating that they had overpaid their 1972 tax by $1,197. However, they never received a refund. Instead, in June 1974 they were notified, without explanation, that they owed $4,451. Soon another letter came, claiming the deficiency was $4,206. In October the IRS claimed they owed $13,700, in November it was $15,000. By October 1975 the alleged deficiency had grown to $16,000 - all without explanation. Then in August 1978 the IRS seized their bank accounts worth about $13,000 and their home worth about $100,000. They sold the home for $16,000. Mrs. Gates, in a wheel-chair, was evicted. With the help of sheriff's deputies, the Gates' furniture and personal effects were thrown into the street. When the news media contacted the IRS, the response was that the IRS couldn't comment because of the Privacy Act.
In Tax Revolt: The Battle for the Constitution, Martin A. Larson gives ten other cases of IRS atrocities. Congressman George Hansen, in To Harass Our People: The IRS and Government Abuse of Power, devotes over a hundred pages to IRS terror tactics. In Chapter One, "Acts of Terror," Congressman Hansen describes three cases:

"The "secret police" arm of the IRS is very real and growing in power and ruthlessness... The taxpayers involved in all three cases had legitimate questions regarding the original IRS assessment against them. All these taxpayers tried to obtain reasonable explanations from the IRS... In each instance, the IRS refused to respond... [T]he IRS's attacks on these citizens came, in every example, without due process of law - a sure sign of the emergence of a police state."

The most dramatic example Congressman Hansen relates is that of Donald McGrath. The IRS claimed he owed $39.65. The IRS didn't want to tell him why. Instead they persuaded McGrath's bank to transfer $39.65 from his account to the IRS. From there the story got complex and nasty and ended with McGrath being shot in the head with a 12-gauge shotgun by a sheriff's deputy. He died a week later.
Congressman Hansen also relates the story of Stephen and Mona Oliver of Fairbanks, Alaska, which includes IRS agents smashing the windows of the Oliver's car with billy clubs:

"After the IRS agents had hurled Stephen from the car, they went after Mona. Several agents dragged her across the broken glass and shoved her onto the pavement, leaving her bruised and bleeding. Even under the authority of a search warrant, what the IRS ruffians did is tantamount to assault and battery. These agents seem to have knowingly committed the crime of assault by using excessive force against non-criminal, nonviolent citizens in a civil matter."

This incident was personally witnessed by tax attorney Donald W. MacPherson and is also described in his Tax Fraud & Evasion: The War Stories:

"In the parking lot was the VW with the Olivers, surrounded by agents and onlookers, including Freeman. The tow truck waited. Freeman was giving verbal abuse to the agents and pointing at them. Photographers and reporters were there, a story in the making. With billy clubs, the agents broke the glass on driver and passenger side of the vehicle and dragged the Olivers out of the vehicle over the glass. Mrs Oliver was screaming about her heart medication in the glove compartment. Through the struggle, pills were scattered with the glass. Freeman continued his barrage of screams, "Would you look at that? It's the modern-day Gestapo." Photographers took it all in. Mark and I watched, not knowing whether to be enraged or disgusted. Our heads appeared in the back of the nationally-circulated photos... Acts of terrorism such as I found only added to the fuels of fire of the tax rebellion. It proved the tax protesters all too correct and, as well, added to my commitment to defeat the Beast."

On the lighter side, Charles Adams in Fight, Flight and Fraud: The Story of Taxation, describes an IRS special task force organized in the 1970s to crack down on the use of tax havens:

The biggest scandal was the famous "Briefcase Caper." A foreign banker arrived in Miami with a briefcase full of banking records. The IRS boss in Miami decided to ignore normal subpoena procedures and use a female escort to distract the banker with sexual favors while agents stole the briefcase, broke open its lock, and photographed the records. Since the banker and the prostitute enjoyed each other so much, she was then sent to the Bahamas to steal additional banking records in open daylight from the banker's desk."

In Taxscam: How The IRS Swindles You And What You Can Do About It, Alan Stang relates his collection of IRS horror stories:

• In 1983, five IRS thugs raid the home of Vietnam veteran Charles Streich, ostensibly to collect $500. His four-year old son mysteriously gets a bloody nose. They arrest Streich and take his AR-15 rifle. The IRS "doctors" the rifle and it turns up in court with M-16 parts. Streich is convicted of assault and possession of an unregistered machine gun.
• In 1987, with the Collaboration of Post Office officials, IRS agents stole a mortgage check written by Donald Thurow. They altered the check by stamping "Internal Revenue Service" over the payee line, and cashed it.
• In 1984, seven or eight armed IRS agents from Detroit occupied the Engleworld day-care center in Allen Park. They changed the locks, took about 20 children hostage, and locked them up. Because the day-care center's alleged tax liability of $14,000, parents had to pay ransoms before the IRS would release their children. Marilyn Derby, Director of Engleworld said, "It was a very scary situation, like the Gestapo was here. Children were crying. Parents were trembling. I told one woman whose hands were shaking that she shouldn't sign anything she didn't want to. She signed anyway."
• The IRS claimed that Thomas Treadway owed them $247,000 - so they seized his girl friend's farm and bank accounts.

THE IRS AS GESTAPO
In the Introduction of To Harass Our People: The IRS and Government Abuse of Power, Congressman Hansen quotes a former IRS agent:

"I was talking to a lady in an accountant's office Tuesday. She was from Germany and she said to me, 'You know, the IRS is getting just like the Gestapo was in Germany. When it first came out, nobody thought too much about it, but within two or three years when you'd here the name Gestapo, you'd really get a chill.' She said, 'That's the way it is now with the IRS.' I'm not sure she wasn't absolutely right. I think people are afraid."

Congressman Hansen goes on to describe some of the powers of the IRS. Among government agencies, only the IRS has all these powers:

• To attach 100 percent of an alleged tax debtor's wages and/or property.
• To invade a citizen's privacy without any court order.
• To seize property without a court order, based on conjecture.
• To force a citizen to try his case in a special court governed by the IRS (the Tax Court).
• To compel production of documents, records, and other materials without a court order.
• To publish a citizen's alleged debt to the IRS.
• To subject citizens to electronic surveillance without a court order.
• To freely violate a written agreement with a citizen.
• To maintain lists of citizens guilty of no crime for the purpose of monitoring and harassing them.
• To conduct reprisals against citizens and public officials alike.

According to Congressman Hansen, the IRS publicly admits that its purpose is to instill fear into the citizenry as a technique of performing its function of "voluntary compliance" with its Tax Code.
In two chapters - "Education at Gunpoint" and "Armed Raid on St. Anthony" - Congressman Hansen describes how the IRS "educates" its victims in "voluntary compliance." He uses phrases like "armed shakedowns of innocent citizens," "hit lists of citizens," "an agency out of control," and "the IRS considers itself above the law." Congressman Hansen writes:

"As I reached a stoplight I turned to my wife and said, "Warren Bates admitted today that the IRS uses armed agents to go to taxpayers' homes and demand their tax returns. They have lists of people who they claim are violent. I've gone over one of those lists and even called several of the people on it. Most Americans aren't violent, Connie. Their names shouldn't be on a hit list. What in the world is the IRS trying to do? The implication from Bates was that this is becoming standard procedure for the IRS. Can you believe they almost conducted an armed raid on homes in Fremont County - in St. Anthony?

... Over a period of time, I was able to piece together the plan for an armed raid on St. Anthony. As the story fell into place a greater and even more terrifying nightmare unfolded when the magnitude of IRS crimes against the rights of American citizens everywhere began to emerge...

The IRS, armed with an inaccurate and meaningless collection of names amassed by ridiculous methods, but with very deadly weapons, prepared to "educate" the citizens of Fremont County. On November 3, 1975, Howard Martin gave the final go-ahead...

Ostensibly, the specific task of the strike force was "to determine the degree of voluntary compliance, to secure any delinquent returns and to educate the public about tax laws." Apparently, the IRS believes that people learn more easily, volunteer more readily, and pay up more rapidly when they are staring down the barrel of a .38 Special... "

To their credit, some of the IRS agents selected for this raid balked, and the raid was called off.
In a chapter called "The Bounty Hunters" Hansen describes how the IRS treats its own personnel:

• "The IRS goes to extraordinary lengths to determine the "loyalty" of its employees to the corrupt system."
• The IRS uses special recorder spools on which conversations with taxpayers and spoken reports on IRS personnel are recorded. This information is never typed up, hence is not subject to the Freedom of Information Act.
• "Dissent is simply not tolerated by the IRS. Agents are punished for showing any sign of leniency toward taxpayers."
• IRS management sometimes demand that employees who balk at IRS procedures undergo psychiatric or medical treatment.
• "On the other hand, the ruthless pursuer of the taxpayer is promoted."
• Revenue agents are performance rated by the numbers of individuals and businesses they force into bankruptcy. "Taxes, of course, are the first payments made upon a declaration of bankruptcy. Driving individuals and businesses into bankruptcy is not only standard procedure, it is actually organized on a competitive basis between the various IRS districts."

In the chapter called "Rigging Elections" Congressman Hansen says:

"The Internal Revenue Service works diligently to ensure that public officials toe the IRS line. Political leaders are quickly taught that complaints about the IRS are not allowed. The FBI, the CIA, and other agencies of government have been searchingly investigated from time to time... But not the IRS...

Blackmail and extortion are ugly words. But they are the only fair words to describe why IRS is alone among government agencies not being subject to scrutiny. Anyone who complains - anyone - is a candidate for destruction."

Congressman Hansen then continues to describe how in the cases of Senator Ed Long and later Senator Joseph Montoya, the IRS illegally leaked false tax information on them to their opponents during election years, resulting in both cases in their defeat. In 1976 they did the same to Congressman Hansen, however, he was nevertheless re-elected by a narrow margin. An IRS agent involved in the leak later wrote a letter of apology to Congressman Hansen.
Some morsels from subsequent chapters:

• "... [A] farmer was audited because he refused to give the IRS information regarding his neighbor's finances."
• "Special agents aren't auditors, they're a police force."
• IRS agent's arrogance: "You're noncommercial because I define you that way and if you don't like it, sue me."
• "Confiscating a person's wages is another favorite weapon of the IRS."
• "... [T]he IRS pounced upon the victims of the devastating Teton Dam flood - a $400 million disaster in eastern Idaho."
• "IRS officials viewed the reimbursement payments as a literal grab-bag for capital gains taxes."
• "Farmers whose fields had been ruined as potato ground were not allowed to switch their fields to wheat or alfalfa without paying an excessive capital gains tax on the new farm equipment."
• Around 1965 the IRS developed radically new methods of enforcing "voluntary compliance" - including cloak-and-dagger methods to humiliate and destroy taxpayers, opening and monitoring mail, and making lists of people at political rallies.
• "Once you are a taxpayer to the government, and all the more if you are a tax collector, access to your books and records by that government is guaranteed."
• The IRS Tax Court is essentially a kangaroo court. You are assumed guilty, unless you can prove your innocence. The court denies the right to a jury trial. It denies the right to appeal to a higher court. Many of its judges are former IRS employees. The court's decision is final. Refusal to pay taxes assessed by a Tax Court is a felony. To pursue a Tax Court injustice, you have to first pay the court assessment, then sue the government to get your money back.
• Vicious, relentless persecution and prosecution of waiters and waitresses regarding tips.
• "At the time that Bates made his assertion that there was only one violence list, I had three in my possession... Everything that Bates had just told me was a lie."
• The IRS is not "much concerned with such archaic ideas as truth or justice."
• "The rules now in existence and approved at least tacitly by the Congress allow the IRS to assess any amount it chooses against anyone."
• "I have always contended that the Congress, intentionally or not, set up the IRS to be outside the Constitution."
• "... [T]he IRS has recently chosen to pursue and destroy America's private schools."
• Sarcastic bumper sticker: "Fight Organized Crime - Abolish the IRS."
• The number of tax resisters and tax rebels is growing. They regard the government as the enemy of its citizens, and guerilla warfare in tax matters as a legitimate weapon of an occupied people.
• The system guarantees that the middle and poorer taxpayers lose ground faster than the rich - "it is not the rich but the average person who is being fleeced."
• "More than 40 percent of the price of an American-made automobile is tax load. A loaf of bread would cost only a fraction of the current price if the taxes on it were removed."
• "The IRS is now redistributing not accumulated wealth, but income and wages. It is no longer a matter of taking from the rich to give to the poor, but taking from everyone to support the bureaucracy."
• "In the 1930s, members of the Roosevelt administration stated clearly that the social utility of the Internal Revenue Code was more important than its role as a source of revenue."

All Congressman Hansen's allegations are backed by solid evidence, including internal IRS documents received from whistleblowers. He also says:

"The danger of turning the IRS into a "catch-all" enforcement agency for social policy is brought out time and time again in the chapters of this book. This agency is developing awesome powers and admits no limits to what it judges right or wrong. To achieve its goals, it will lie, cheat, blackmail, and subvert the system of Justice."

When prosecuting taxpayers, the prosecutor is routinely and illegally provided with the tax details of all the potential jurors in the jury pool. The tax information is not provided to the defense. This amounts to blatant jury rigging. Says Congressman Hansen: "The IRS tabby cat created to collect taxes in a "voluntary system" has grown into a full-sized saber-tooth tiger."
BUT IS THE IRS REALLY A PAPER TIGER?
According to tax attorney Donald W. MacPherson (Tax Fraud & Evasion: The War Stories - one of the best tax books I know of):

"Once you get past all of the tax statutes passed by Congress, the rules of evidence and of criminal procedure, interpretation by the courts of the laws and the rules, you are left with human drama. Conflict. IRS special agent versus citizen target. Justice Department prosecutor versus defense attorney. The final arbitrator of this combat is the jury of twelve. That which is public record is but one-tenth of the story. The flesh and blood war stories are intended to cut through the legalese to the end that you will be brought to understanding, and through understanding harbor fear no longer. Nor will the Monster, discovered as a paper tiger, any longer intimidate you, the sovereign citizen, the master. Beastmaster...

Failure to file an income tax return, failure to pay income taxes, and attempted income tax evasion are not crimes in this country. Not yet anyway. For those acts (or failures to act) to constitute a crime, one first must act with specific intent to violate the law; knowing what the law forbids or requires, one must set out with the specific purpose to violate the law. Willfulness. Specific criminal intent. Ignorance of the law is an excuse. Congress has declared that the tax laws are so complex that ignorance of the law is a defense so far as it goes to the citizen's state of mind ;or, in other words, so far as it tends to negate willfulness.

Second, the government must assemble evidence and prove beyond a reasonable doubt to the satisfaction of twelve jurors that you intended to violate the law. If good faith belief or misunderstanding or reliance on the advice of counsel is raised, then the government must, in effect, prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you did not believe in good faith or did not in good faith rely on the advice of your attorney or accountant. At least some federal appellate courts hold that the belief or misunderstanding is subjective not objective. This nuance means, in the final analysis, that it is not even relevant whether what you believed was right or wrong, or whether the jury determines it was reasonable or unreasonable for you to so believe what you claim you believed. All that matters is whether you in fact believed it. Put another way, the government must, then, prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you did not believe what you claim you believed.

Is it any wonder then the fine-tune processing by IRS and Justice Department of criminal tax cases? After two years of investigation by the IRS special agent of the Criminal Investigation Division (CID) and review by his supervisor, plus further review by chief of CID and IRS District Director, the case then goes to the office of District Counsel, the IRS lawyers, for review. Then to Justice Department in Washington, D.C. for review where it may remain for another year or two. Then back to the local U.S. Attorney for further fine-tuning and additional investigation, if necessary, and the ultimate prosecution by way of grand jury indictment or, in the case of misdemeanor rather than felony, by a charging paper signed by the U.S. Attorney, called an "Information." A long, arduous pipeline. For the Beast can ill afford to lose criminal tax cases. If IRS cannot succeed in putting behind bars those it believes to be tax cheats, what then the impact upon the remaining one hundred million and our system based upon "voluntary compliance?"

... Just how far can you push IRS and not be prosecuted? What are the "limits of the tax law?" What must the IRS prove? The answers are found in the criminal tax cases that are won! The proof is in the pudding. If an Arkansas woman who did not file a tax return for eighteen years beat IRS at criminal charges, by what should you feel intimidated?

Consider this analogy: you go to a haunted house as a child and under cover of darkness are frightened by ghosts and goblins. Your imagination runs wild while at the house, and later you attempt, without success, to stave off recurring nightmares. In effort to put the matter to rest, your parents take you during daylight hours back to the haunted house and show you the tricks of the trade. The props used. That goblin was but one-sixteenth inch cardboard. Cardboard which even as a child, you could rip apart with your bare hands. Don't you feel silly? The nightmares go away...

The paper tiger. The bureaucrat, also known as the bureaurat. If the IRS agent was truly competent and was not lazy, why had he not struck out for business on his own? Coffee and cigarettes and federal service retirement pay? The paper tiger exposed by the light of day. But who would dare to turn on the switch, or open the curtain, for this vampire Monster to be exposed to sunlight?"

THE TYGER (With acknowledgment and apologies to William Blake)

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
With thy terror, might, and fright
What immortal hands or eyes
Could expose thy fearful lies?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burns the hot fire of thy eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder, and what art
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And what could stop thy heartbeat?
What dread hand? And what dread feet?

What the hammer? What the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? What dead grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

Could our wise Founding Fathers
Arise from their restful graves,
Would they smile their work to see?
Or cackle with deadly glee?

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
With thy terror, might, and fright
What immortal hands or eyes
Dare expose thy fearful lies?

IS THE FEDERAL INCOME TAX VOLUNTARY?
In the Introduction to To Harass Our People: The IRS and Government Abuse of Power, Congressman George Hansen says that, "the Internal Revenue Service has turned its back on its legal charter as a tax collector in a voluntary compliance program for the United States government." If the federal income tax is indeed voluntary, this would mean that every action taken by the IRS to force those citizens (for whom the tax is voluntary) to file 1040 tax returns and pay taxes, constitutes economic rape. Let us examine the issue.
Like all government agencies, the IRS has a mission. Its mission as published in the Federal Register of March 25, 1974, includes: "The mission of the Service is to encourage and achieve the highest degree of voluntary compliance... " Do IRS Commissioners agree with the voluntary nature of federal income tax?

• "Each year American taxpayers voluntarily file their tax returns and make a special effort to pay the taxes they owe." Johnnie M. Walker, IRS Commissioner, 1971, Internal Revenue 1040 Booklet.
• "Our tax system is based on individual self assessment and voluntary compliance." Mortimer Caplin, IRS Commissioner, 1975 Internal Revenue Audit Manual.
• "In fairness to the millions of taxpayers who voluntarily file, report all their income and pay the tax due... ." Jerome Kurtz, IRS Commissioner, 1979 Internal Revenue Annual Report.
• "The IRS's primary task is to collect taxes under a voluntary compliance system." Jerome Kurtz, IRS Commissioner, 1980 Internal Revenue Annual Report.
• According to Alan Stang (Taxscam: How The IRS Swindles You And What You Can Do About It), Robert J. Brann, Chief of Technical Services Branch, IRS, Washington, D.C., wrote to a "gentleman in New York" on March 11, 1981, "... In carrying out its responsibilities for administering the federal income tax laws, the Service encourages voluntary compliance by taxpayers. Voluntary compliance places on tax payers the initial responsibility for deciding whether under the law they are required to file returns, and the responsibility for paying any tax that may be due... "
• "... Encourage and achieve the highest possible degree of voluntary compliance... " Harold M. Browning, IRS District Director, Hawaii, 1984.
• "Let's not forget the delicate nature of the voluntary compliance tax system... " Lawrence Gibbs, IRS Commissioner, Las Vegas Review Journal, May 18, 1988.
• "We don't want to lose voluntary compliance... We don't want to lose this gem of voluntary compliance." Fred Goldberg, IRS Commissioner, Money magazine, April, 1990.

During the Eighty-Third Congress in 1953, Dwight E. Avis, head of the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax Division, Bureau of Internal Revenue, testified before the Ways and Means Committee, "Let me point this out now: Your income tax is 100 percent voluntary tax, and your liquor tax is 100 percent enforced tax. Now, the situation is as different as night and day."
The tax return for a manufacturer of tobacco products says, "The information is mandatory by statute. (26 USC 5061, 5703)." All mandatory tax returns mention penalties for not filing, for example, the Alcoholic Beverage Tax Return states, "... punishable upon conviction by a fine of not more than $100,000.00... " Check your 1040 for the statute that says you must file, and the penalty for not filing - you won't find them.
Congress has a legal research branch called the Congressional Research Service. A letter, dated June 26, 1989, from the office of Senator Daniel K. Inouye in Hawaii to a tax consultant Fred Ortiz states, that based on the research performed by the Congressional Research Service, "there is no provision which specifically and unequivocally requires an individual to pay income taxes." [Emphasis added]
Let me cite three court cases that seem to support the notion that the federal income tax is voluntary:

• "Our system of taxation is based upon voluntary assessment and payment, not upon distraint [seizure by distress]." Flora v. U.S., 362 U.S. 145, 176 (1959).
• In case of any ambiguity of statutory construction, the doubt should be resolved in favor of the taxpayer, not the government. Greyhound Corp. v. U.S., 495 F. 2d 863 (1974).
• "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... For the condition precedent of liability to be met, there must be a lawful assessment, either a voluntary one by the taxpayer, or one procedurally proper, by the IRS. Because this country's income tax system is based on voluntary assessment, rather than distraint [seizure by distress], the Service may assess the tax only in certain circumstances and in conformity with proper procedures." Bothke v. Fluor Engineers & Construction, Inc., Ninth Circuit (1983).

The Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states, "No person shall... be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself." However, the Supreme Court has ruled:

• The Fifth Amendment "applies alike to criminal and civil proceedings." McCarthy v. Anderson, 266 U.S. 34.
• "There can be no question that one who files a return under oath is a witness within the meaning of the [Fifth] Amendment." Sullivan v. U.S., 15 F2nd 809.
• "The information revealed in the preparation and filing of an income tax return is, for Fifth Amendment analysis, the testimony of a "witness" as that term is used herein." Garner v. U.S., 424 U.S. 648.

HOW THE IRS TRICKS ITS VICTIMS INTO BECOMING "LIABLE"
By filing a 1040 tax return, you voluntarily assess yourself, you acquiesce to IRS jurisdiction, and you become "liable" for federal income tax.
When you open a bank account, on your signature card you sign something like, "Under penalty of perjury I certify that... The number shown on this form is my correct taxpayer identification number." The signature card may also commit you to adhere to all current and future IRS regulations. Simply by opening a bank account you condemn yourself to being a "taxpayer" and you swear that your "social security number" is your "correct taxpayer identification number."
To fully understand whether or not an individual is "liable" for an income tax, we need to make a distinction between "direct" taxes and "indirect" taxes. Article I, Sections 2 and 9 of the U.S. Constitution authorize direct taxes, and Article I, Section 8 authorizes indirect taxes - see Chapter Five.
A direct tax is also called a head tax, poll tax, or capitation. It is a tax on an individual, for example, so many dollars per person per year. The principle of "apportionment," as stated in the Constitution, places the States as buffers between the individual and the federal government. A direct federal income tax would have to be collected by the state governments and handed over to the federal government.
An indirect tax is also called an excise tax. It is a tax on a thing (income), rather than on an individual. The Sixteenth Amendment states, "The Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without any regard to any census or enumeration." In fact, the Sixteenth Amendment uses legal sophistry to circumvent the apportionment barrier. It effectively defines the income tax as an indirect tax, rather than a direct tax. The Supreme Court has found:

"... [T]he Sixteenth Amendment conferred no new power of taxation, but simply prohibited the previous complete and plenary [absolute] power of income taxation possessed by Congress from the beginning from being taken out of the category of indirect taxation to which it inherently belonged and being placed in the category of direct taxation... ", Stanton v. Baltic Mining Co., 240 U.S. 112.

When you as an end-consumer buy a book, the price you pay to the retailer includes sales tax. The retailer sends the tax you paid to the government. You pay the tax indirectly to the government. The retailer is liable for the tax. To qualify as an indirect tax, the person liable for the tax must be someone other than the ultimate consumer.
In the case of tax on distilled spirits, Internal Revenue Code section 5005 makes the distiller or importer liable. In the case of wine, section 5043 places liability on the proprietor of the bonded wine cellar or on the importer. For cigars and cigarettes, section 5703 makes the manufacturer or importer liable. Section 2502(d) makes the donor (giver) of a gift liable for gift tax, not the receiver. Similarly, section 2002 makes the executor of a will liable for estate tax, not the inheritor.
Because the income tax is an excise tax on a thing (income), and an indirect tax, by definition the ultimate receiver or consumer of the income cannot be liable for income tax on it. In other words, you cannot be liable for income tax on your income. I have a notarized statement from Scott Lewis Rendelman (enrolled to practice before IRS, enrollment number 28753), which states:
"In my extensive research of the Internal Revenue Code, I can say unequivocally and with absolute certainty that nowhere in the Internal Revenue Code is there a section where liability for income tax is established. And furthermore, by definition of an excise tax, if anyone could say for sure that he or she is not liable for the income tax, it is the "ultimate consumer," the person receiving the income."
THEY BEAT THE IRS IN AND OUT OF COURT
This article appeared in August 1991 issue of The Connector:

"Patriot, Tom Hauert - charged with five counts of 7203 willful failure to file returns in March 1990 - put the prosecuting U.S. Attorney on the spot in Federal District Court, Chicago. Ill. At a hearing before the court on October 1st, 1990, Tom stated that he did not understand the charges. Tom read from the Internal Revenue Code the first three words of Section 7203, "Any person required." Then he asked, "How is it established in this section that I am one of those persons required?" The judge read and reread that section, and finally admitted that he understood that Tom was asking for the statute that creates the determination of who is required. The judge said, "Mr. Prosecutor, you can provide a copy of that statute, can't you?" At that point the prosecuting attorney started stammering and stuttering, and said he wasn't familiar with that part of the Code, and the judge told him to find someone to help find it. Well, it's now May 1991... and the government has not provided the information. For ten years Tom wrote many letters to the IRS, asking what statute made him liable? Neither the IRS, nor the government attorney has ever told him or shown him the statute that made/makes him liable. Could it be there is none? That's correct, there isn't any statute that makes a citizen within the fifty states liable. That's why Congress said, "Our tax system is based on voluntary self-assessment." So don't gripe about high taxes if you voluntarily assess yourself."

The following account describes how an employee of the federal government beat the IRS. It also demonstrates how a salaried employee can successfully file a W-4 tax exempt form with his employer, so he receives his salary in full. An article, describing NASA engineer Doug Ross's method for beating the IRS, appeared in the Federal Times of June 3, 1991:

"... [H]e has neither filed nor paid income taxes since 1984. "The system is based on voluntary compliance, and I stopped volunteering," Ross said. Not only has he stopped paying taxes, but Ross is encouraging others, including other federal employees, not to file returns or pay taxes, either. Since 1989, Ross has held seminars on not paying taxes every other Saturday from September to April. "If people don't have control over their financial resources they are essentially slaves and can't prosper in capitalist society," Ross said.

Ross said his inspiration not to pay taxes came when he saw Irwin Schiff on television. Schiff counsels citizens not to pay and has written books... [like] How Anyone Can Stop Paying Income Tax... "I called the IRS and asked questions about it, and they hung up on me. I thought, okay, when the IRS hangs up on you, you must be asking the right questions," said Ross. Ross said he has received innumerable notices of tax liability and penalties from the IRS, but his salary keeps on coming. "They send you notices, but like I tell people, I get junk mail every day... I have no tax liability," Ross said.
So how does he get away with it? Ross said he simply filed a W-4 form with NASA saying he was exempt from taxes, and they have not been withheld since. "When I started, people I work with would say, 'I'll see you in jail.' Now... I tell people I saved another $18,000 this year, I'm single and I make over $50,000 a year... I am a government employee. If I was violating any law my agency would be an accomplice," Ross said."
Our next story is based on an article from the July 1991 issue of the Justice Times. It involves Roy and Dixie Powell who were convicted of "willful failure to file income tax returns" for 1982 through 1984. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the decision in the earlier Arizona District Court trial, because of the defendants' "good-faith belief" that filing tax returns is voluntary and that wages are not income. Because the Powells believed they were not subject to the income tax, they filed W-4 Exempt forms to stop withholding from their pay. The Ninth Circuit decision was based on a Supreme Court decision:

"If the defendant had a subjective good faith belief, no matter how unreasonable, that he was not required to file a tax return, the government cannot establish that the defendant acted willfully." Cheek v. U.S., 111 S.C. 604 (1991).

The Ninth Circuit opinion (No. 90-10060) was filed on June 13, 1991. In addition to overturning the Powells' earlier conviction, the Ninth Circuit Court found that in the earlier trial Judge Alfredo C. Marquez had made several errors:

• He instructed the jury to apply a standard of objective reasonableness as to the interpretation of the law; whereas the crucial issue was the defendants' subjective interpretation of the law.
• He instructed the jury that reliance on federal statute 26 USC 602(b) did not relieve the Powells of filing returns.
• He refused to allow the Powells to introduce the statutes and cases they relied on for their belief.

The irony of the "income tax law" is that it has become such a convoluted mess that there is probably not even one person in the world who can make an objective determination of what it means - except for the verdict: It's all junk!
Your mind will muse on the terror: "Where is the one who counted? Where is the one who weighed the tribute? Where is the one who counted the towers?" No longer will you see the insolent people, the people of an obscure speech that you cannot comprehend, stammering in a language that you cannot understand.
-- Isaiah 33, verses 18-19
THE INCREASING COMPLEXITY OF THE TAX CODE
"Well, it's a system so utterly complex and ultimately inexplicable that half the time the tax professionals themselves aren't sure what the rules are - a system that even Albert Einstein is said to have admitted he couldn't begin to fathom. You know, it's said that his hair didn't look that way until after he experienced his first tax form." - President Ronald Reagan, 1985
Every year since 1987 Money magazine has run a contest in which 50 tax preparers complete the federal income tax return for a hypothetical family. In 1988 there were ten correct returns, in 1989 two, in 1990 one, and in 1991 zero. For the 1991 tax year the "target tax" was $26,619 - the tax amount for a correct tax return. Not one of the professional tax preparers got it right. At the low extreme, one tax preparer calculated the tax due as $16,219. She spent 25 hours on the job and charged a fee of $750. At the high extreme, another professional tax preparer calculated the tax due as $46,564. It took him 40 hours and he charged $3,000.
The contestants presumably fancied themselves as expert tax preparers, and did their utmost to win first prize. They consisted mostly of professional CPAs and former IRS agents. If you take your papers and records to two "professional tax preparers," one might calculate your tax as $26,000, and the other as $46,000! Need I say any more?
The following is from a Libertarian Party flier:

"1040 Federal Income Truth-in-Taxing Forms and Instructions

We know that filling out a Tax Return is not fun, so this year we've made it easier for you. In fact you may even be able to file the new shorter Form 1040EZ, instead of the normal Form 1040 Confession, which we strongly urge you to do, so that we can screw you out of all your deductions.

Although we have never had the proper delegation of authority from the Secretary of the Treasury to require you to file anything, we're at it again by sending you the new forms anyway. You'll be thrilled to see all the clever new ways we've developed to defraud you out of your hard-earned Federal Reserve Notes.

As usual, our instruction booklet is filled with high-sounding, carefully worded, totally indecipherable, bureaucratic semantics. This social jargon was cunningly designed so as to leave you more confused than ever. But don't worry, you can call our new "Confused HOT LINE." You'll be happy to know that the same untrained and uninformed IRS personnel who helped you last year will attempt to answer your questions again this year. Remember, last year we wrong only 39% of the time.

Please remember to report ALL of your taxable income! Why? Because Big Brother is watching YOU! and we're going to make every effort we can to threaten, intimidate and coerce you into giving us your last dime. As you know, the strength of the entire IRS superstructure is based on your being in FEAR of us. (FEAR = False Evidence Appearing Real.) By the way, your tax dollars have paid for that image. You (the American People) have become passive, complacent, extremely gullible, soft and mentally weak. This strong indicator shows us just how effective our social programming has been. As long as you're in FEAR, it makes it easy for us to stimulate you into giving us your money, and terrorize you into giving up your Constitutional Rights. As you can clearly see, eventually we (the IRS) will rule your entire life.

Despite all these deceitful practices, we still receive stupid inquiries from people who want to make an extra voluntary contribution to reduce the Public Debt. If you persist in wanting to contribute to this hopeless cause, just have your employer sign you up on our new FICA Plan II (Financial Independence Crushing Act). We guarantee you that these funds will be used to erode any vestige of your freedoms that you still enjoy.

Each year, millions of Americans voluntarily file their tax returns and make a special effort to pay income taxes they don't really owe. So, as Commissioner, I want to thank you again for your voluntary compliance, voluntary cooperation and voluntary support, as well as your unwavering willingness to continuously allow us to take advantage of you year after year.

Sincerely,

Karl Marx, Jr.
(Acting) Commissioner of Internal Revenue"

THE IRS ASSAULT ON RELIGION
Both Martin A. Larson (Tax Revolt: The Battle for the Constitution) and Congressman George Hansen (To Harass Our People: The IRS and Government Abuse of Power) deal with the IRS assault on churches. Congressman Hansen devotes a 60-page special section to the "assault on religion." Both these authors include many gross violations of the First Amendment ("Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.") which supposedly guarantees religious freedom:

• Rescinding churches' tax-exempt status for frivolous reasons - like criticizing public officials.
• Arbitrarily assessing "tax debts" and imposing fines and penalties.
• Sending churches intrusive questionnaires, demanding information to which the IRS has no right.
• Armed raids.
• Illegally seizing and destroying church property.
• After a court found that church property had been illegally seized, not returning all the property - but charging the church for storage!
• Padlocking churches and church schools.
• Jailing ministers and parents for their religious beliefs.
• Turning churches into tax collectors through the unconstitutional social security tax on churches.
• The "public policy" of the government is to impose a "state religion." In my opinion, these are its main elements:
  1. The State is God.
  2. The State owns its citizens - it may "draft" them like slaves.
  3. The State owns the minds of its citizens - it dictates what the young shall be taught and who shall teach them.
  4. The State ultimately owns all property - it can take what it likes when it likes.
  5. The State must take care of its citizens because they cannot help themselves - this justifies the State taking whatever it likes.
  6. Regarding sexual and racial matters - and morality generally - the State dictates what is right and wrong.
  7. Fear of the State must be induced by any means to ensure obedience.
  8. The State shall be the only god.

IRS REVENGE ON GEORGE HANSEN
In Taxscam: How The IRS Swindles You And What You Can Do About It, Alan Stang describes how the IRS got their revenge on Congressman George Hansen:

"When the State of Nebraska threw pastor Everett Sileven into jail for using "uncertified" teachers in the Faith Baptist Church, in Louisville, George Hansen went there to help. No other national political leaders did so, even after the State Police invaded the Church, where about seventy preachers from around the country were on their knees praying. The police picked the preachers up, carried them out, threw them on the lawn - and padlocked the church. Typically, the Prostitute National Press squelched the story for a long time. Your reporter gave it substantial coverage, in our daily, nationally syndicated, radio news commentary; and was told by many listeners with vehemence that no such outrage had happened or could happen in America."

On April 15, 1987 both Stang and Hansen were back at the Louisville church, attending a conference on liberty. They received a message from Hansen's wife that two U.S. marshalls had arrived at Hansen's home. She told the marshalls that Hansen was flying home from Omaha that night. The marshalls said they would "pick him up and take him home." Other marshalls, without a warrant, arrested Hansen at Eppley Airport in Omaha, and threw him into the Douglas County jail. From there he was flown in chains to Washington, where they booked him into the Alexandria City Jail under the assumed name, "Fred Smith." Neither Hansen, his wife, nor his attorney knew that an assumed name had been used. The purpose of these Gestapo tactics was to prevent Hansen from testifying at the Congressional hearings on the "taxpayers' bill of rights," of which he was the author. According to Stang:

"George was thrown into a dark basement cell full of cockroaches and lice, surrounded by drunks... He had to sleep in a bunk too narrow to contain him, and wear his Omaha coveralls for ten days... George is 6'6" tall, and weighed 270 pounds when the daymare began... Congressman Hansen was imprisoned under a law that contains no criminal penalties."

THE NATURE OF THE IRS BEAST
The Declaration of Independence talks about "swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance." Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson understood that taxation is the modern incarnation of cannibalism -- "eat out their substance." The IRS is a gang of modern cannibals.
To the IRS the U.S. Constitution is a joke. The fear of the IRS is so pervasive that, with the exception of a few individuals, no policeman, judge, politician, or U.S. President will lift a finger to curb the IRS. Like the Gestapo in Nazi Germany, the IRS can do whatever it likes to terrorize, consume, and destroy -- "the power to tax is the power to destroy."
The primary purpose of the IRS is to implement "public policy," which includes converting citizens to the "state religion." The IRS's main weapon is fear. Karl Marx, in The Communist Manifesto, advocated a heavy, progressive income tax and the abolition of private property as essential means for achieving communism - the IRS is a tool for moving the U.S. closer to socialism. Eliminating private schools is also "public policy" -- Marx advocated compulsory state education.
Most bankers, judges, and politicians are in league with the IRS -- a Grand Coalition for Economic Rape. The politicians and bureaucrats create the huge debts, which initiate the issue of currency. The Federal Reserve bankers create the debt-currency which must be repaid. The IRS collects taxes to pay the Federal Reserve Bankers interest and capital. The commercial bankers provide the IRS with information they use to rip off their victims. The judges jail the dissidents.
IRS rape is more than economic. It is also emotional and psychological: induce fear. IRS rape is intellectual: destroy private schools. It is also religious: destroy private churches. IRS rape is also legal rape: subvert and corrupt judges and the legal system. It is also political: destroy public officials who oppose it.
As a nation the U.S. may collapse before the IRS is curbed or abolished. But as an informed individual, your chances of beating them are very high. Tax attorney Donald W. MacPherson (Tax Fraud & Evasion: The War Stories) calculates the chances of an individual being prosecuted in any given year being about 1 in 70,000; and the chances of being jailed at 1 in 146,000. As a general rule, the IRS goes after the "easy pickings." In reality you don't deal with the "IRS monster," but with individual bureaucrats - often not the most competent individuals. Once you know the major weaknesses of the IRS - the soft belly of the monster - you have little to fear. You don't have to passively submit to their economic and other forms of rape. To the informed individual the IRS really is a paper tiger.
"[I]n a recent conversation with an official at the Internal Revenue Service, I was amazed when he told me that, 'If the taxpayers of this country ever discover that the Internal Revenue Service operates on 90% bluff, the entire system will collapse.'"
-- Senator Henry Bellmon, 1969
"The entire, increasingly rickety, structure is designed to preserve the secret of the "income tax"; which is that - as presently applied to working people - it has been perverted into a direct tax on the source without apportionment. Such a tax is as illegal today as it was when the Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution. That is the secret our friends at I.R.S. are trying to hide."
-- Alan Stang, 1988
"It is a proven fact: the men and women of the Internal Revenue Service can be beaten. If you remain, in spite of this revelation, fearful, it is your choice. This is not to say you should feel now the expert in tax matters. We have barely scratched the surface. But at the very least, you should have learned that the Bully has a soft belly, an Achilles heel, and is mentally and physically lazy. Not only a coward, he is a paper tiger."
-- Donald W. MacPherson, 1989

The Economic Rape of America - Chapter Six: STRETCH YOUR IMAGINATION

The Economic Rape of America - Chapter Six

STRETCH YOUR IMAGINATION

I, the Teacher, when king over Israel in Jerusalem, applied my mind to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven.
-- Ecclesiastes 1, verses 12-13

"In the province of the mind, what one believes to be true is true or becomes true, within certain limits to be found experientially and experimentally. These limits are further beliefs to be transcended. In the mind there are no limits."
-- John Lilly
In Chapter One you were asked to stretch your imagination and to consider the possibility of "free market money." The notion that people should be free to choose their own money may have seemed bizarre at first. Most of us, including most economists take it for granted that a country must have one currency, that the government must dictate what that currency shall be, and the government must control the value of that currency. With a stretch of your imagination you can transcend this limitation. This is what F.A. Hayek, winner of the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1974, did. In his book Denationalization of Money he wrote:
"In my despair about the hopelessness of finding a politically feasible solution to what is technically the simplest possible problem, namely to stop inflation, I threw out in a lecture... a somewhat startling suggestion, the pursuit of which has opened quite unexpected new horizons. I could not resist pursuing the idea further, since the task of preventing inflation has always seemed to me to be of the greatest importance, not only because of the harm and suffering major inflations cause, but also because I have long been convinced that even mild inflations ultimately produce the recurring depressions and unemployment which have been a justified grievance against the free enterprise system and must be prevented if a free society is to survive.
The further pursuit of the suggestion that government should be deprived of its monopoly of the issue of money opened the most fascinating theoretical vistas and showed the possibility of arrangements which have never been considered. As soon as one succeeds in freeing oneself of the universally but tacitly accepted creed that a country must be supplied by its government with its own distinctive and exclusive currency, all sorts of interesting questions arise which have never been examined. The result was a foray into a wholly unexplored field."
Many authors attempt to communicate a particular set of ideas, beliefs, and conclusions. They also attempt to persuade the reader to follow a particular pattern of behavior. This chapter attempts to present you with ranges of ideas. It invites you to think for yourself, to select and formulate the set of ideas most appropriate for you. The purpose of these ranges of ideas is to stretch your imagination, so that you will have more options available to you, when it comes to deciding what you will do about the economic rape of America.
VOLUNTARY EXCHANGE
A central issue we need to address is that of value creation, value consumption, and value destruction. Generally, wealth is accumulated through value creation. When you produce and deliver products and services that benefit the lives of others, you create values. They provide you with value in return, usually in the form of money or currency. When you provide opportunities for others to create values - for example, by an invention that saves time and effort, by a medical breakthrough that extends human life, or by creating a great company - you also create values.
When you eat your food or drive your car you consume values. When you transport products from a place where they have little or no value to a place where they are of great value, you consume values (fuel, time, energy) in order to create value (the increase in value of the products transported). Some of the values you consume - for example, the air you breathe and energy from the sun - you receive free and gratis.
Some regard the human individual as the greatest value. If you murder someone you destroy a value. Though you could argue that murdering a "Hitler" - an extreme value destroyer - would on balance represent a creation of value. War represents one of the greatest value destroyers. AIDS is a value destroyer - or, at least, the virus and other factors that bring about AIDS. Sometimes values are destroyed to create greater values - for example, sometimes an old building, though still having value and being useful, is demolished in order to erect a new, larger, and much more valuable building.
Different people value things differently. This makes it possible for people to exchange products, services, and money so that all parties achieve an increase in value. Example: I can apply the information in a particular book to increase my income by $1000 without any additional effort, besides reading the book. (I estimate the cost of my reading effort as $200). It costs the publisher $15 (including company overheads) to produce, market, and distribute the book. I buy the book for $20, and achieve an increase in value of $780 ($1000 - $20 - $200). The publisher achieves an increase in value of $5 ($20 - $15) for every book sold. All parties achieve an increase in value. (Note that even if I had paid $50 or $100 for the book, it would still have been a bargain!)
Generally, voluntary exchange occurs because all the parties involved achieve an increase in value. Voluntary exchange could be called the economic means for obtaining the values necessary for survival. It involves working in order to live.
One could also obtain the values needed for survival through stealing or robbing. When individuals do it, we simply call it stealing or robbing. In the case of slavery, we force others to provide us with values. When many people organize themselves into a "government" in order to steal and rob, we call it "taxation." This could be called the political means for obtaining the values needed for survival.
TAX AS EXCHANGE
How does tax fit into the picture? Please stretch your imagination. Theoretically, taxes could be organized in different ways:

• Taxpayers could force the government to receive their taxes. Any government agent who refuses to receive taxes would be subject to severe penalties.
• The government could be forced to pay taxes to people outside government. Any government agent who refuses to pay taxes to a non-government individual would be subject to severe penalties.
• Non-government individuals could be forced to receive taxes from the government. Any non-government individual who refuses to receive taxes would be subject to severe penalties.
• Taxpayers could voluntarily pay part of their income to the government for the services they receive that they value more highly than the tax they pay.
• Rich people could voluntarily pay taxes for honor and public recognition (refer to the "liturgy" system of ancient Greece - Chapter Eight).
• Taxpayers could voluntarily exchange money on an item by item basis for products and services from the government that they value more highly than the price they pay.
• Taxpayers could be forced to pay part of their income to the government, irrespective of whether they want government services or not, and irrespective of how they value government services. Anyone who refuses to pay taxes would be subject to severe penalties.

Of course, the word "tax" is inappropriate in some of the above sentences. I leave it to you, the reader, to decide how taxes should be organized, and why - and the implications of taxes being organized in some particular way. Some questions may help:

• Does a value producer have to force clients to pay for his or her products whether they want them or not - or does the value producer advertise to persuade clients to buy?
• Does a value producer charge whatever he or she likes for a product or does the price depend on how consumers value the product and what they are willing to pay?
• Does a value producer charge clients for products, irrespective of whether the products are delivered or not?
• Does a value producer have to "outlaw" competition "mafia-style" in the areas he or she regards as his or her "exclusive domain" (for example, the post office)?
• Would you rather be confronted by an advertisement that invites you to buy, or a person with a gun who effectively says, "Your money or your life?"
• In general, who gains and who loses in the case of enforced transactions?
• What do you call someone who pokes a gun in your face and says, "Your money or else... ?"

Please consider:

• Who are the value creators?
• Who are the value consumers?
• Who are the value destroyers?
• Who lives like a parasite (or cannibal) off the values created by others? ("He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.")
• What are the consequences of paying taxes?
• What are the consequences of not paying taxes?
• What do you finance when you pay taxes?
• Can any or all of these items or functions be financed through voluntary exchange?
• How much tax do you have to pay to bring about the greatest value?
• Is paying tax good or evil?

In the Appendix to Trial by Jury, Lysander Spooner wrote in 1852:
"It was a principle of the Common Law, as it is of the law of nature, and of common sense, that no man can be taxed without his personal consent. The Common Law knew nothing of that system, which now prevails in England, of assuming a man's own consent to be taxed, because some pretended representative, whom he never authorized to act for him, has taken it upon himself to consent that he may be taxed. That is one of the many frauds on the Common Law, and the English constitution, which have been introduced since Magna Carta. Having finally established itself in England, it has been stupidly and servilely copied and submitted to in the United States.
If the trial by jury were reestablished, the Common Law principle of taxation would be reestablished with it; for it is not to be supposed that juries would enforce a tax upon an individual which he had never agreed to pay. Taxation without consent is as plainly robbery, when enforced against one man, as when enforced against millions; and it is not to be imagined that juries could be blind to so self-evident a principle. Taking a man's money without his consent, is also as much robbery, when it is done by millions of men, acting in concert, and calling themselves a government, as when it is done by a single individual, acting on his own responsibility, and calling himself a highwayman. Neither the numbers engaged in the act, nor the different characters they assume as a cover for the act, alter the nature of the act itself.
If the government can take a man's money without his consent, there is no limit to the additional tyranny it may practice upon him; for, with his money, it can hire soldiers to stand over him, keep him in subjection, plunder him at discretion, and kill him if he resists. And governments always will do this, as they everywhere and always have done it, except where the Common Law principle has been established. It is therefore a first principle, a very sine qua non of political freedom, that a man can be taxed only by his personal consent. And the establishment of this principle, with trial by jury, insures freedom of course; because: 1. No man would pay his money unless he had first contracted for such a government as he was willing to support; and, 2. Unless the government then kept itself within the terms of its contract, juries would not enforce the payment of the tax. Besides, the agreement to be taxed would probably be entered into but for a year at a time. If, in that year, the government proved itself either inefficient or tyrannical, to any serious degree, the contract would not be renewed. The dissatisfied parties, if sufficiently numerous for a new organization, would form themselves into a separate association for mutual protection. If not sufficiently numerous for that purpose, those who were conscientious would forego all governmental protection, rather than contribute to the support of a government which they deemed unjust.
All government is a mutual insurance company, voluntarily agreed upon by the parties to it, for the protection of their rights against wrong-doers. In its voluntary character it is precisely similar to an association for mutual protection against fire or a shipwreck. Before a man will join an association for these latter purposes, and pay the premium for being insured, he will, if he be a man of sense, look at the articles of the association; see what the company promises to do; what it is likely to do; and what are the rates of insurance. If he be satisfied on all these points, he will become a member, pay his premium for a year, and then hold the company to its contract. If the conduct of the company prove unsatisfactory, he will let his policy expire at the end of the year for which he has paid; will decline to pay any further premiums, and either seek insurance elsewhere, or take his own risk without any insurance. And as men act in the insurance of their ships and dwellings, they would act in the insurance of their properties, liberties and lives, in the political association, or government.
The political insurance company, or government, have no more right, in nature or reason, to assume a man's consent to be protected by them, and to be taxed for that protection, when he has given no actual consent, than a fire or marine insurance company have to assume a man's consent to be protected by them, and to pay the premium, when his actual consent has never been given. To take a man's property without his consent is robbery; and to assume his consent, where no actual consent is given, makes the taking none the less robbery. If it did, the highwayman has the same right to assume a man's consent to part with his purse, that any other man, or body of men, can have. And his assumption would afford as much moral justification for his robbery as does a like assumption, on the part of the government, for taking a man's property without his consent. The government's pretense of protecting him, as an equivalent for the taxation, affords no justification. It is for himself to decide whether he desires such protection as the government offers him. If he do not desire it, or do not bargain for it, the government has no more right than any other insurance company to impose it upon him, or make him pay for it.
Trial by the country, and no taxation without consent, were the two pillars of English liberty, (when England had any liberty,) and the first principles of the Common Law. They mutually sustain each other; and neither can stand without the other. Without both, no people have any guaranty for their freedom; with both, no people can be otherwise than free."
GOVERNMENT, CONSTITUTION, AND LAW
In order for you to choose the best course of action to deal with the economic rape of America, there are more issues you need to resolve. Specifically, you need to clarify your view of, and your relationship to, "government," "constitution," and "law." You need to determine where you stand in relation to these ideas or institutions. It is important that whatever course of action you embark upon is morally and psychologically based on social beliefs you regard as valid.
The views that follow are not presented as "right" or "wrong," "true" or "false." It is up to you to formulate your own views, which may be variations of those here presented - or completely different.
VIEWS ON GOVERNMENT

• Government is a good thing. Government solves problems other people can't solve. (People in government have magical powers). Wherever problems seem to remain unsolved for any significant length of time, government should be expanded to solve those problems. Government should use coercion wherever and whenever necessary to impose the will of the people. It is my patriotic duty to support the government by paying all the taxes requested or demanded by the IRS and other government agencies.
• We need extensive government but not too much. There should be a limited scope for individual initiative and free enterprise. There are many areas - such as legislation, justice, roads, education, defense, police, prisons, currency issue, health, welfare, the "war against drugs," etc - that must be handled by government. (They are the only ones able to handle these matters - they have magical powers.) The American system of checks and balances ensures that the government doesn't overstep its limits. The American government system is based on "rule by law." It is my patriotic duty to support the government by paying taxes according to the letter of the law. Whatever legal means I use to reduce my taxes to the absolute minimum are perfectly in order and do not reduce my patriotism in the least.
• Limited government is a good thing. The function of government should be limited to the protection of individual rights and freedoms. The only areas handled by government should be legislation, justice, defense, police, and prisons - nothing else. The government may not use coercion (the initiation of force or threat of force). The government should collect its income through the voluntary exchange of its services on the free market for payments in return. The government may also collect other voluntary contributions.
• Oscar Wilde said:
  "All authority is quite degrading. It degrades those who exercise it, and it degrades those over whom it is exercised... The form of government that is most suitable to the artist is no government at all. High hopes were once formed of democracy; but democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people."
• Government's real purpose is to cull surplus humans so there is more living room for the survivors. F. Tupper Saussy writes in The Miracle On Main Street:
  "Man has existed for a million years, and he's only had government about 5,600 years. So government has occupied only a very small part of man's natural history. But in those 5,600 years government has done considerable damage. It has done lots toward pruning our species.
  A Norwegian statistician computes that in these 56 centuries man has fought 14,531 wars. This is 2.6 wars per year. More than 600,000,000 men, women, and children have been killed by government. (I dread to compute how many people our own government has exterminated.)"
• In Do Unto The IRS As They Would Do Unto You, M.J. "Red" Beckman repeatedly indicates that throughout history government has been man's worst enemy:
  "... [M]an's worst enemy has always been his own government... Man's worst enemy has not been famine, disease or weather! People are destroyed by their own governments over and over again as history repeats itself again and again.
  ... Abraham Lincoln... said, "the only way this great Nation could be destroyed was from within." ... The people were free and the government was the servant when you went to sleep, but while you slept, the government took your freedom and you are now the servant.
  ... [T]his once-great Nation seems to be deteriorating at a very rapid pace. Government is plundering and looting over half of the wealth being produced by its creative and productive citizens... We are not involved in any declared wars so we must ask ourselves, "are we being destroyed from within by traitors?""
• Government is evil. It is an unnecessary evil. It should be abolished altogether. Government causes crime, chaos, and disorder. In fact, the government is the worst criminal of all. Government is organized violence - organized crime. Governments have slaughtered hundreds of millions of people. Governments cause the very problems they claim they want to solve. Generally, governments produce results that are the opposite of their stated intentions. Laws must be repealed. The state must be smashed.
• The very notion of "government" (so-called) is absurd. There are hucksters who masquerade as "government" and suckers who believe them. It is a giant hoax. People have been duped and brainwashed to believe that there is some kind of entity called "government" that has magical powers to "run the country," "make laws," "solve social problems," etc. We need to shake people to wake them up so they will no longer believe politicians, judges, bureaucrats, and their ilk - and will certainly not obey them. They will simply laugh at their absurd utterances.
• A major part of the power of the individuals who masquerade as "government" stems from the words they use. One way to neutralize some of that power is to use different words. Example: "Territorial gangsters" are individuals who who use fraud, violence, and threat of violence to claim "jurisdiction" (so-called) over an area and the people who happen to be there. Territorial gangsters use fraud, violence, and threat of violence to impose their will upon others and to live like parasites or cannibals off the values produced by others. The term "territorial gangsters" could be used to describe both mafiosi, and the people who masquerade as "government."
• Question: But are there certain things that must be done by government, things that only the government can do? Answer: Government consists of individual human beings, who can only do what humans can do. The fact that they call themselves "government" (or organize themselves into an organization called "government") does not imbue them with magical powers to do what others can't do. Human beings can only do what humans beings can do.
• Question: But if we don't have government there will be chaos, disorder, crime, poverty, illiteracy, homelessness, drug abuse, pollution, etc, etc. Answer 1: How do you know? Answer 2: Such a list almost always consists of problems we already suffer from - in other words, if we have government there will be chaos, disorder, crime, poverty, illiteracy, homelessness, drug abuse, pollution, etc, etc.
• We need separation between church and state.
• We need separation between money and state.
• We need separation between economy and state.
• We need separation between school and state.
• We need separation between health and state.
• We need separation between welfare and state.
• We need separation between police and state.
• We need separation between justice and state.
• We need separation between defense and state.
• We need separation between humanity and state.
• We need separation between civilization and state.
• We need separation between everything and state.
• People who want to play "state" or "government" should be confined to national parks or zoos where they can govern themselves and the other animals. Humans could pay an admission fee to visit the national parks and observe the animals at play. The admission fee could be considered a "tax" to finance the "government" and their "Animal Farm."

Allow me to repeat that these views are not presented as "right" or "wrong," "true" or "false." It is up to you to formulate your own views, which may be variations of those here presented - or completely different. It is your views that will determine what you will do about the economic rape of America and it is important that whatever course of action you embark upon is morally and psychologically based on political beliefs you regard as valid. You want to be certain that whatever you do, there will be no guilt, shame, or regret.
VIEWS ON CONSTITUTION

• The Constitution must be constantly updated and improved to cater for the changed conditions we now have - very different from the situation over 200 years ago, when the original Constitution was formulated. The Constitution, as extended by the Bill of Rights and other Amendments, and further amended by Supreme Court decisions, is an ideal instrument of government for the greatest nation on earth.
• The Constitution of my country is sacred. Our Founding Fathers created the greatest civilization in history. Politicians, judges, lawyers, and bureaucrats have perverted the Constitution for their own ends. Most of our current societal problems stem from such perversions. We need to return to Constitutional government.
• We need a new Constitution which severely limits the power of government to the protection of individual rights and freedoms. The only areas handled by government should be legislation, justice, defense, police, and prisons - nothing else.
• The Constitution was a betrayal of the Declaration of Independence. Article One, Section 8 gives Congress the power to do practically all the things the Declaration of Independence accused the King of. The American Revolution was fought over 14% tax. Patrick Henry didn't like the Constitution because it gave too much power to the federal government. Two of the New York Representatives refused to sign it and went home. The Bill of Rights was a valiant attempt to correct the atrocities authorized by the Constitution, but it has failed in practice.
• Chief Justice John Marshall said, "The power to tax is the power to destroy." The fact that the Constitution gave politicians the power to tax, also gave them the power to destroy. Its taxing power makes the Constitution a formula for destruction. And that is how it turned out in practice. It was the taxing power - the North taxing the South (see Chapter Eight) - that caused the Civil War and the death of more than 300,000 Americans.
• One of the Ten Commandments states, "Thou shalt not steal." The taxing power of the Constitution effectively states, "Thou shalt steal." Another Commandment states, "Thou shalt not kill." The Constitution grants Congress the power to declare war - including war on Americans, as in the Civil War. It effectively states, "Thou shalt kill." Thus the U.S. Constitution is the work of Satan or the Anti-Christ.
• The Constitution is the charter that authorizes not only the economic rape of America, but also other forms of rape: intellectual, medical, and military. It is an abomination, the destruction of America. We should abolish the Constitution, the state, the government, and the country, and repeal all laws.
• Among the constitutions of the world, the U.S. Constitution has proved to be among the least evil. It has played a pivotal part in bringing about a civilization that has flourished for 200 years.
• The supposed "U.S. Constitution" was signed over 200 years ago by about 70 people, purporting to be "We, the people of the United States." That these 70 odd people were legally empowered to sign the Constitution on behalf of the people then living in the area called by them "the United States," is doubtful. Even if we grant that the "US Constitution" was a valid contract at the time it was signed, there is a further problem: Nothing in the "US Constitution" said that it is a contract binding any descendants of the people living at the time of its signing; that is, the "US Constitution" died with the death of the last person living at the time of its signing. Today, the supposed "US Constitution" is nothing but a hoax foisted upon the gullible. Anyone claiming powers "under the Constitution" is a fraudulent imposter. For a contract to be legal and binding it has to be expressly signed by the parties involved (or by their expressly appointed agents). Similar arguments apply to all other so-called "countries."
• The concept of "constitution" is the shield used by territorial gangsters to justify their parasitic, cannibalistic, destructive existences. (The concept of "law" is the sword.) The territorial gangsters dupe their victims into believing that the so-called "constitution" is some kind of "sacred contract" that empowers them to... ... (do whatever they think they can get away with).
• The real (de facto) constitution of the United States is a phantom called "public policy." This mysterious "public policy" is nowhere defined. It is whatever Congress, judges, bureaucrats, and the President decide it is. The Constitution signed by our Founding Fathers no longer means anything. The oaths sworn by so-called "public officials" to uphold the U.S. Constitution are whispers blown away by the winds.
• In No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority, Lysander Spooner wrote in 1869:
  "... [T]he Constitution is no such instrument as it has generally been assumed to be... by false interpretations, and naked usurpations, the government has... made in practice a very widely, and almost wholly, different thing from what the Constitution itself purports to authorize. ... [T]his much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist."
• Justice Learned Hand said:
  "Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women somehow. When it dies there, no Constitution, no law, no court can save it; no Constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. While it lies there, it needs no Constitution, no law, no court to save it."

VIEWS ON LAW

• Laws are God-given, not man-made. By obeying God's laws we will solve most or all current problems.
• The Constitution is the fundamental law of the land. By legislating additional laws where needed, in accordance with the Constitution, we will solve most or all current problems.
• There are natural laws. These laws are not made; they are discovered. By discovering and acting in accordance with natural law, we will solve most or all current problems.
• Common law has evolved over centuries. Most current problems have been solved ages ago by common law. All we need to do is to apply it. (Common law is law that developed more or less spontaneously over the centuries. It is based on customs that were found to work in practice. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that common law is "the law of the land.")
• "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law" (Aleister Crowley).
• The very notion of "law" (so-called) is absurd. The idea that certain words acquire magical properties that elevate the power of these words into "the law" is archaic and obsolete. The notion that some of the noises and scribbles that emanate from the mouths and pens of politicians, judges, lawyers, and bureaucrats, constitute "the law" (so-called), is simply nonsense.
• The concept of "law" is the sword used by territorial gangsters to wield their parasitic, cannibalistic, destructive power. (The concept of "constitution" is the shield.) The territorial gangsters dupe their victims into believing that certain words are "the law" (so-called). Anyone who "breaks the law" (so-called) can be fined, clubbed, handcuffed, chained, arrested, jailed, shot, hanged, gassed, electrocuted, poisoned, etc... ... (whatever they think they can get away with).
• Question: But if we don't have law there will be chaos, disorder, crime, poverty, illiteracy, homelessness, drug abuse, pollution, etc, etc. Answer 1: How do you know? Answer 2: Such a list almost always consists of problems we already suffer from - in other words, if we have law there will be chaos, disorder, crime, poverty, illiteracy, homelessness, drug abuse, pollution, etc, etc.

To the question, "But what do we replace government, constitution, and law with?," I offer several possible views. Again, I invite you to formulate your own:

• God's law.
• Natural law.
• Common law.
• Competing contracts - social, political, and legal issues have to do with how people interact. People can make contracts on how they agree to interact. There will be competition between contract types. The best contract types - those that result in the greatest values being created and the least value destruction - will prevail.
• Competing constitutions - anyone, so inclined, draws up his or her own constitution. People sign the constitution of their choice. People are only subject to a constitution they have expressly signed. There will be competition between constitutions. Nobody will be forced into - or automatically born into - a constitution he or she doesn't agree with. The best constitutions - those that result in the greatest values being created and the least value destruction - will prevail.
• Nothing - the question is absurd; it's like asking, "But what do we replace cancer with?"
• There is nothing to be replaced. Words like "government," "constitution," and "law" really represent nothing. They involve projection and abstraction - even hallucination. People project or hallucinate "government," "constitution," and "law" where there is really nothing. There are hucksters who masquerade as "government" and suckers who believe them.
• What needs to be replaced are people's beliefs about "government," "constitution," and "law." These beliefs are a substitute for independent thinking. They stifle individual thinking.
• People who are reasonably conscious and have developed the ability to think for themselves don't need any "government," "constitution," or "law" to tell them what to do. They know that actions produce consequences. They learn to distinguish between actions that are beneficial and produce values and actions that are harmful and destroy values.
• Territorial gangsters force children into "schools" (concentration campuses for mind destruction?) in order to render them as unconscious and unable to think for themselves as possible. This is called "compulsory education." It is intellectual rape. Do you want to subject your children to such a fate?
• Objection: All the above views, if applied, will result in chaos, disorder, crime, poverty, illiteracy, homelessness, drug abuse, pollution, etc, etc. Answer 1: How do you know? Answer 2: Such a list almost always consists of problems we already suffer from - in other words, if we don't apply the above views there will be chaos, disorder, crime, poverty, illiteracy, homelessness, drug abuse, pollution, etc, etc. In his superb classic, How I Found Freedom In An Unfree World, Harry Browne describes what might happen if there were no government to restrain the mafia. There would be:
  
  1. Protection rackets - companies would have to pay tribute or be put out of business.
  2. Extortion - individuals would have to pay tribute for the right to work.
  3. People would have to pay the mafia for the right to just stay on their own property.
  4. The mafia would tell people where they may or may not work.
  5. The mafia would use the profits from their protection rackets to compete with their victims.
  Browne then describes how the government does all these things. And in addition it enslaves people in its army and kills them. The notion that slavery and involuntary servitude were abolished by the Thirteenth Amendment is quite absurd. The government can enslave Americans at any time in their army and kill them. They call it "the draft."

Again, let me repeat that these views are not presented as "right" or "wrong," "true" or "false." It is up to you to formulate your own views, which may be variations of those here presented - or completely different. It is your views that will determine what you will do about the economic rape of America, and it is important that whatever course of action you embark upon is morally and psychologically based on your beliefs about lawfulness, legality, and legitimacy. You want to be certain that whatever you do, there will be no guilt, shame, or regret.
But whatever you and I believe about "government," "constitution," and "law," there are billions of people out there who believe the versions disseminated by politicians and bureaucrats (territorial gangsters?), preachers, teachers, television, newspapers, and radio - and there are millions of armed police (more territorial gangsters?) to take care of "unbelievers." To fight or attempt to change the system may be futile - and dangerous. I suggest that, even if you are passionately committed to changing the system, that you consider your personal interests first. It might take 20, 100, or even 1,000 years before any meaningful change occurs...
If you want to make any changes, consider that it is much easier to change your own thinking and behavior than those of others. Changing yourself may empower you; while attempting to change others may rob you of your power. If you focus on what you can do to maximize your own values first, you can reap and enjoy the rewards very quickly - while also empowering yourself to influence others - even if only by example.

The Economic Rape of America - Chapter Five: THE SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND

The Economic Rape of America - Chapter Five

THE SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND

Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come and not the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered year after year, make perfect those who approach.
Hebrews 10, verse 1

[EXTRACTS FROM] THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
in Congress, July 4, 1776 [Emphasis added]
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and, accordingly, all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government and to provide new guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government.
Specific Charges against the King
The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world:
... He has dissolved representative Houses repeatedly for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
... He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
... He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies, without the consent of our Legislatures.
He has affected to render the military independent of, and superior to, the civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution and unacknowledged by our laws, giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us;
For protecting them, by a mock trial, from punishment for any murders they should commit on the inhabitants of these States;
For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world;
For imposing taxes on us without our consent;
For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury;
... For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province...
... He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
... In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people...
Conclusion and Declaration
... And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.
John Hancock
"When all government, domestic and foreign, in little as in great things, shall be drawn to Washington as the center of all power, it will render powerless the checks provided [in the Constitution] of one government on another and will become as venal [capable of being bought] and oppressive as the government from which we separated."
-- Thomas Jefferson, 1821
[EXTRACTS FROM] THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
[Emphasis added]
PREAMBLE
We the people of the United States in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
THE LEGISLATIVE DEPARTMENT
Article I
SECTION 1. All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consists of a Senate and House of Representatives...
SECTION 2. ... Representatives and direct taxes [taxes laid directly on individuals, to be paid directly to the federal government] shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three-fifths of all other persons...
SECTION 7. All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with amendments as on other bills...
POWERS GRANTED TO CONGRESS
SECTION 8. The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises [indirect taxes on things], to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian tribes;
To establish an uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;
To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;
To establish post offices and post roads;
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
To declare war... and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
To exercise exclusive legislation, in all cases whatsoever, over such district (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular States, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States; and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the Legislature of the State in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings; - and
To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.
POWERS DENIED TO FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
SECTION 9. ... The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it.
No bill of attainder [extinction of civil rights] or ex post facto [retroactive] law shall be passed.
No capitation [uniform tax on each person; poll tax] or other direct tax shall be laid, unless in proportion to the census or enumeration hereinbefore directed to be taken.
No tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from any State.
No preference shall be given by any regulation of commerce or revenue to the ports of one State over those of another; nor shall vessels, bound to or from one State, be obliged to enter, clear, or pay duties in another.
No money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in consequence of appropriations made by laws; and a regular statement and account of the receipts and expenditures of all public money shall be published from time to time.
No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States; and no person holding any office of profit or trust under them shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, price, or foreign state.
POWERS DENIED TO STATE GOVERNMENTS
SECTION 10. No State shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts, or grant any title of nobility...
THE EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT
Article II
THE PRESIDENT AND VICE PRESIDENT
SECTION 1. The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his office during the term of four years, and together with the Vice President, chosen for the same term, be elected as follows:
THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE
Each State shall appoint... a number of Electors equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress... The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by ballot for two persons... The person having the greatest number of votes shall be the President... after the choice of the President, the person having the greatest number of votes of the Electors shall be the Vice President...
... OATH OF THE PRESIDENT
... Before he enter on the execution of his office, he shall take the following oath or affirmation: "I solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States."
THE JUDICIAL DEPARTMENT
Article III
THE FEDERAL COURTS...
SECTION 1. The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time ordain and establish...
JURISDICTION OF FEDERAL COURTS IN GENERAL
SECTION 2. The judicial power shall extend to all cases in law and equity arising under this Constitution, the laws of the United States...
JURISDICTION OF SUPREME COURT
In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a State shall be party, the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.
TRIAL BY JURY
The trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be by jury...
THE CONSTITUTION, THE SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND
Article VI
... THE SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND AND THE OBLIGATION OF STATE JUDGES
This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.
FEDERAL AND STATE OFFICERS BOUND BY OATH TO SUPPORT THE CONSTITUTION
The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by oath or affirmation to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States...
[EXTRACTS FROM] THE AMENDMENTS TO THE CONSTITUTION
The first ten Amendments to the Constitution, known as The Bill of Rights, were adopted by the first Congress, called to meet in New York City, March 4, 1789. They were later ratified by the various States, and on December 15, 1791, were made a part of the Constitution.
Amendment I
FREEDOM OF RELIGION, SPEECH, AND THE PRESS; RIGHT OF ASSEMBLY AND PETITION
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peacefully to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Amendment II
RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS
A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
Amendment III
QUARTERING OF SOLDIERS
No soldier shall in time of peace be quartered in any house without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
Amendment IV
REGULATION OF RIGHT OF SEARCH AND SEIZURE
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 no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized.
Amendment V
PROTECTION FOR PERSONS AND THEIR PROPERTY
No person shall be held to answer for a capital or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Amendment VI
RIGHTS OF PERSONS ACCUSED OF CRIME
In all criminal prosecution, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.
Amendment VII
RIGHT OF TRIAL BY JURY IN SUITS AT COMMON LAW
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of common law.
Amendment VIII
PROTECTION AGAINST EXCESSIVE BAIL AND PUNISHMENTS
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Amendment IX
CONSTITUTION DOES NOT LIST ALL INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS
The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Amendment X
POWERS RESERVED TO THE STATES AND THE PEOPLE
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Amendment XIII
ABOLITION OF SLAVERY (1865)
SECTION 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
SECTION 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Amendment XIV
GUARANTEE OF PROTECTION TO ALL CITIZENS (1868)
... No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws...
Amendment XVI
POWER TO LEVY INCOME TAXES (1913)
The Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without any regard to any census or enumeration.
Note: Income tax is an excise or an indirect tax on a thing (income). The Sixteenth Amendment confers no new taxing power. It uses legal sophistry to define the income tax as an indirect tax, rather than a direct tax - see Chapter Seven. The Supreme Court has found:
"... [T]he Sixteenth Amendment conferred no new power of taxation, but simply prohibited the previous complete and plenary [absolute] power of income taxation possessed by Congress from the beginning from being taken out of the category of indirect taxation to which it inherently belonged and being placed in the category of direct taxation... ", Stanton v. Baltic Mining Co., 240 U.S. 112 (1916).
COMMON LAW IS THE LAW OF THE LAND
Webster's defines Common Law as "the body of law developed in England primarily from judicial decisions based on custom and precedent, unwritten in statute or code, and constituting the basis of the English legal system and of the system in all of the U.S. except Louisiana." Common law developed out of customs that were found to work in practice. It is based on common sense and reason. Much of English Common Law is rooted in the Magna Carta, signed by King John in 1215. The Magna Carta limited the powers of the King (government), and guaranteed the liberties of the people.
"It [The U.S. Constitution] must be interpreted in the light of Common Law, the principles and history of which were familiarly known to the framers of the Constitution. The language of the Constitution could not be understood without reference to the Common Law." U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 18 S. Ct. 456.
"Law of the Land" means "The Common Law." Taylor v. Porter, 4 Hill. 140, 146 (1843) - Justice Bronson; and State v. Simon, 2 Spears 761, 767 (1884) - Justice O'Neal.
The U.S. adopted the Common Laws of England with the Constitution. Coldwell v. Hill, 176 S.E. 383 (1934).
In contrast, legislated law - like the laws of Congress - are written mostly by attorneys to further their own self-interest or to favor special-interest groups with big bucks - exactly as Thomas Jefferson predicted in 1821.
TRIAL BY JURY
In 1852 in his book Trial By Jury, attorney Lysander Spooner wrote as follows:
"For more than six hundred years - that is, since Magna Carta, in 1215 - there has been no clearer principle of English or American constitutional law, than that, in criminal cases, it is not only the right and duty of juries to judge what are the facts, what is the law, and what was the moral intent of the accused; but that it is also their right, and their primary and paramount duty, to judge of the justice of the law, and to hold all laws invalid, that are, in their opinion, unjust or oppressive, and all persons guiltless in violating, or resisting the execution of, such laws."
Among checks on government, trial by jury is the final say. We the people have the final say on the validity of any law. Whatever jury instructions are given by an ignorant or corrupt judge, the jury has the final vote. One member of a jury says, "not guilty." That's it. Jury nullification. In this respect the individual jury member has more power than Congress, Supreme Court judges, and the President. Congress can pass a law, the President can sign it, and the Supreme Court can rule it constitutional - but one jury member can nullify the law, at least in a specific case, by voting "not guilty." The jury vote is by far the most important vote in the American political system.
In 1789 Thomas Jefferson wrote:
"But we all know that permanent judges acquire an Esprit de corps; that being known, they are liable to be tempted by bribery; that they are misled by favor, by relationship, by a spirit of party, by a devotion to the executive or legislative power... It is in the power, therefore of the juries... to judge the law as well as the fact."
Jefferson regarded jury nullification as the most important check on government.
Judge Leventhal's ruling for the District of Columbia Court of Appeal - U.S. v. Dougherty, 473 F. 2d 113 (1972) - includes:
"[A] prosecutor disposed by unworthy motives could likely establish some basis in fact for bringing charges against anyone he wants to book, but the jury system operates... so that the jury will not convict when they empathize with the defendant, as when the offense is one they see themselves as likely to commit, or consider generally acceptable or condonable under the mores of the community...
The existence of an unreviewable and unreversible power in the jury, to acquit in disregard of the instructions on the law given by the trial judge, has for many years co-existed with legal practice and precedent upholding instructions to the jury that they are required to follow the instructions of the court on all matters of law. There were different soundings in colonial days and the early days of our Republic. We are aware of the number and variety of expressions at that time from respected sources - John Adams; Alexander Hamilton; prominent judges - that jurors had a duty to find a verdict according to their own conscience though in opposition to the direction of the court; that their power signified a right; that they were judges both of law and of fact in a criminal case, and not bound by the opinion of the court...
The fact that there is widespread existence of the jury's prerogative... as a 'necessary counter to case-hardened judges and arbitrary prosecutors,' does not establish as an imperative that the jury must be informed by the judge of that power... " [Emphasis added]
Judge Leventhal expresses his own corruption. In effect he states that judges should deliberately mislead juries by not informing them of their power to nullify unjust law.
It is important to realize that where the Constitution says "trial by jury," it means trial by jury as understood by the framers of the Constitution. It is even more important to realize that the duty of judges, including of the Supreme Court, is to uphold the Constitution, not to interpret it. In Columbia University's Charpentier Lectures in 1968, Justice Hugo Black said:
"The public welfare demands that constitutional cases must be decided according to the terms of our Constitution itself, and not according to judges' views of fairness, reasonableness, or justice. I have no fear of constitutional amendments properly adopted, but I do fear the rewriting of the Constitution by judges under the guise of interpretation."
Judge Leventhal's corrupt ruling is a violation of his oath to uphold the Constitution. Whenever a judge - deliberately or unwittingly - fails to inform a jury of the jury's right and duty to judge both fact and law, that judge is violating his or her oath to uphold the Constitution.
"I consider trial by jury as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution."
-- Thomas Jefferson, 1789
"Throughout the United States, then, jurors have the power to nullify by bringing in a verdict in the teeth of both law and facts." Horning v. District of Columbia. 254 U.S. 135 (1920).
"Maryland and Indiana are the only states which instruct the jury in criminal trials that they may judge law as well as fact, although the jurors are also urged not to make arbitrary decisions."
-- Steven E. Barkan, 1983
"Prior to the late 1800's, our courts permitted the jurors to decide the law and the facts, which means they could defeat a law by voting "not guilty," called "jury nullification.""
-- Donald W. MacPherson, Attorney, 1989
Lysander Spooner also makes the following points:

• "The Trial by jury... is a trial by the country - that is, by the people - as distinguished from a trial by the government."
• "... [I]t is indispensable that the people, or "the country," judge of and determine their own liberties against the government; instead of the government's judging of and determining its own powers over the people."
• "To secure this right of the people to judge of their own liberties against the government, the jurors are taken, (or must be, to make them lawful jurors,) from the body of the people, by lot, or by some process that precludes any previous knowledge, choice, or selection of them, on the part of the government. This is done to prevent the government's constituting a jury of its own partisans or friends; in other words, to prevent the government's packing a jury, with a view to maintain its own laws, and accomplish its own purposes."
• "... [I]f the government may dictate to the jury what laws they are to enforce, it is no longer a "trial by the country," but a trial by the government... "
• "The jury are also to judge whether the laws are rightly expounded to them by the court."
• "The jury must also judge of the laws of evidence." "... [I]f the government can dictate to a jury any law whatever, in a criminal case, it can certainly dictate to them the laws of evidence. That is, it can dictate what evidence is admissible, and what inadmissible, and also what force or weight is to be given to the evidence admitted."
• "... [T]he jury must judge of and try the whole case, and every part and parcel of the case, free of any dictation or authority on the part of the government."

Trial by jury, as understood by our Founding Fathers, is in my opinion, the single most important aspect of the U.S. Constitution - the supreme law of the land.

You shall not follow a majority in wrongdoing: when you bear witness in a lawsuit, you shall not side with the majority so as to pervert justice.
Exodus 23, verse 2