Is U.S. income tax invalid?

The folks in Ohio seem to think they became a state in 1803. Do you have some disturbing news for them?

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When Ohio was preparing to celebrate the 150th anniversary of its admission to the Union in 1953. Researchers looking for the original statehood documents discovered there'd been a little oversight. While Congress had approved Ohio's boundaries and constitution, it had never passed a resolution formally admitting the future land of the Buckeyes. Technically, therefore, Ohio was not a state.

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The XVIth Amendment was ratified by 42 states--remove Ohio, and you still have the necessary number of states for ratification.

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You make a good point, but the proposed amendment had been introduced to Congress by the administration of William H. Taft. Taft had been born in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1857.

The Constitution requires that presidents be natural-born citizens of the United States. Since Ohio was not a state in 1857, Taft was not a natural-born citizen, could not legally be president, and could not legally introduce the 16th Amendment.

(Presumably one would also have problems with anything done by presidents Grant, Hayes, Garfield, B. Harrison, McKinley, and Harding, who were also born in Ohio.)

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Being born in a territory of the United States qualifies one as a native citizen, as well--you're reaching now. At all events, amendments to the constitution are introduced by the Congress, not the President:

Article V reads:

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.

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Ohio congressman George Bender introduced a bill in Congress to admit Ohio to the Union retroactive to March 1, 1803. Congress subsequently passed a joint resolution, and President Eisenhower, after a few more jokes, signed it on August 7, 1953.

Therefore, since Ohio wasn't officially a state until 1953, its ratification of the 16th Amendment in 1911 was invalid, and thus Congress had no authority to enact an income tax.

You may reply: The 1953 resolution retroactively admitted Ohio as of 1803, thereby rendering all subsequent events copacetic.

If so, I would reply: The constitution says the Congress shall make no ex post facto law. That means no retroactive admissions to statehood.

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I may reply that . . . but i wouldn't. I'd just point out, once again, that with 42 states ratifying the amendment, disqualifying Ohio is meaningless.

But you go ahead and send in a letter to the IRS in April. If they have internet access in Federal prisons, let us know how it turned out for you.

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And call Wesley Snipes and see how he is doing these days.

Joe(I bet there is one of these dodges for every State)Nation

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May I take this opportunity to state that once again, the fight for freedom from taxes has been silenced by reason and fact. I on the other hand am not so restricted, and propose moving outside the US to Ohio, and living a luxurious tax free lifestyle.

Try (from the shores of Port Clinton overlooking Lake Erie) Again

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Try, I am interested in this discussion, because I was thinking about the graduated income tax, and wonder at what point it became a part of the 16th amendment of the U.S. Constitution. My way of following this thread.

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Some tax protesters, and others opposed to income taxes cite what they contend is evidence that the Sixteenth Amendment was never "properly ratified." One such argument is that because the legislatures of various states passed resolutions of ratification with different capitalization, spelling of words, or punctuation marks (e.g. semi-colons instead of commas) from the text proposed by Congress, those states' ratifications were invalid.

A related argument is that various states illegally violated procedural requirements of their constitutions when passing their ratification resolutions. Another argument made by some tax protesters regards Ohio, one of the states listed as ratifying the amendment. They contend that because Congress did not pass an official proclamation recognizing Ohio's date of admission (1803) to statehood until 1953 Ohio was not a state until 1953 (and, therefore, could not have ratified the Sixteenth Amendment).

These and similar arguments have been universally rejected by the courts and Setanta.

LATEST: On August 22, 2006 the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled in Murphy v. Internal Revenue Service and United States [Murphy v. United States]) that 26 U.S.C. 104(a) (2) is unconstitutional under the Sixteenth Amendment to the extent that the statute purports to tax, as income, a recovery for a non-physical personal injury for mental distress and loss of reputation not received in lieu of taxable income such as lost wages or earnings.

The Court stated:

At the outset, we reject the Government's breathtakingly expansive claim of congressional power under the Sixteenth Amendment -- upon which it founds the more far-reaching arguments it advances here. The Sixteenth Amendment simply does not authorize the Congress to tax as "incomes" every sort of revenue a taxpayer may receive. As the Supreme Court noted long ago, the "Congress cannot make a thing income which is not so in fact."

The Court also stated:

In sum, every indication is that damages received solely in compensation for a personal injury are not income within the meaning of that term in the Sixteenth Amendment. First, as compensation for the loss of a personal attribute, such as well-being or a good reputation, the damages are not received in lieu of income. Second, the framers of the Sixteenth Amendment would not have understood compensation for a personal injury -- including a nonphysical injury -- to be income. Therefore, we hold 104(a)(2) unconstitutional insofar as it permits the taxation of an award of damages for mental distress and loss of reputation.

But, and it is a big but: The Murphy ruling is mandatory precedent only in the District of Columbia. Shocked

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Well, good luck, Bubba . . . but keep your snottiness to yourself. I haven't claimed to be the final, unassailable expert in this matter. If you want to challenge the income tax, help yourself.

And don't expect any sympathy from me, or most other tax payers, if you wind up in prison, or have your assets seized.

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Set, I was so looking forward to your prison visits.

Lies:
Seventeen years ago, socialite Leona Helmsley bragged, "only the little people pay taxes," but then she went to jail for tax fraud. Unfortunately, Helmsley's statement is even more accurate today than it was at the time.

More lies:
Tax fraud is estimated at $311 billion this year, more than the entire budget for Medicare, and more than last year's revenues at Walmart or General Electric. Most cheaters go unpunished. What's worse, the legal tax system is rigged to favor rich people and large corporations at the expense of ordinary citizens and small businesses.

And damn lies:
Even when everybody abides by the law, middle-income households pay more taxes than rich ones. And politicians keep handing out tax favors to their campaign contributors - at our expense.

An enormous percentage of taxes are paid by a minority of Americans:
The Top 1% of taxpayers pay 29% of all taxes.
The Top 5% of taxpayers pay 50% of all taxes.

However, it was not always so:

The nation had few taxes in its early history. From 1791 to 1802, the United States government was supported by internal taxes on distilled spirits, carriages, refined sugar, tobacco and snuff, property sold at auction, corporate bonds, and slaves. The high cost of the War of 1812 brought about the nation's first sales taxes on gold, silverware, jewelry, and watches.

In 1817, however, Congress did away with all internal taxes, relying on tariffs on imported goods to provide sufficient funds for running the government.

In 1862, in order to support the Civil War effort, Congress enacted the nation's first income tax law.

In 1895, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that the income tax was unconstitutional because it was not apportioned among the states in conformity with the Constitution. Which brings us back to 1913, the 16th Amendment to the Constitution which made income tax a permanent fixture in the U.S. tax system.

To quote USA TODAY

State taxpayers are having to spend billions of dollars to prop up public pension plans hit hard by stock market losses, which squeezes state budgets at a time when tax collections are growing slowly.

States will contribute $9.6 billion to the nation's 12 biggest state pension plans this year, a USA TODAY survey found. That's a 35% increase in the past two years, but it is still billions of dollars less than what is needed to fund retirement benefits guaranteed to public employees.

The 123 public pension funds that operate statewide, covering both state and local workers, have $180 billion less in assets than they need to cover their long-term benefit obligations, reports Wilshire Associates, an investment adviser in Santa Monica, Calif.

That amount is almost twice the size of California's annual state budget.

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From "Idiot Legal Arguments" http://www.adl.org/mwd/suss6.asp

Quote:

that Ohio was not a state for ratifying the 16th Amendment: Bowman v. Govt of the US (ED Penn 1995) 920 F.Supp 623 (discusses 1953 act); Riley v. US (D Kan unpub 7/5/90); McKenney v. Blumenthal (ND Ga unpub 2/23/79) 43 AFTR2d 960, 79 USTC para 9346; US v. Stahl (9th Cir 1986) 792 F2d 1438 cert.den 479 US 1036; Ric. Davis v. CIR (WD Okl unpub 4/13/78) 41 AFTR2d 1376, 78 USTC para 9478; Lorre v. Alexander (WD Tex unpub 8/8/77) 40 AFTR2d 5677, 77 USTC para 9672; Ivey v. US (ED Wisc unpub 8/31/76) 38 AFTR2d 5909, 76 USTC para 9682; Tiffany v. CIR (3/28/78) TC Memo 1978-122; Baker v. CIR (2/14/78) TC Memo 1978-060 (lists cases upholding ratification of 16th Amendmt and statehood of Ohio); US v. Foster (7th Cir 1986) 789 F2d 457 cert.den 479 US 883;: US v. Golden (6th Cir unpub 2/25/86) 786 F2d 1167(t); Tickel v. CIR (ED Tenn unpub 9/10/85) 56 AFTR2d 5969, 85 USTC para 9761 ("Every court that has considered this argument has rejected it.") aff'd (6th Cir 1986) 810 F2d 203; Sisk v. CIR (6th Cir 1986) 791 F2d 58; Knoblauch v. CIR (5th Cir 1984) 749 F2d 200 cert.den 474 US 830; Selders v. CIR (WD Tex unpub 2/14/78) 41 AFTR2d 1088, 42 AFTR2d 5736, 78 USTC para 9295; {This nonsense arises from the fact that Ohio was admitted to the Union circa 1802 but different landmark events in attaining statehood are recorded for different dates, e.g., the statehood convention was held from 1-29 Nov 1802, Congress evidently recognized the statehood on 29 February 1803, its elected officials took their posts on other dates, etc., so that, on the occasion of Ohio's presumed 150th anniversary of statehood, in 1953, the US Congress settled retroactively on the date of 1 March 1803; Act of August 7, 1953, 67 Stat 407 and see 1953 USCCAN page 453 and 2124 (true to form, Congress managed to set the date after the anniversary was passed!) Without examining the Joint Resolution or the legislative history, some nitwits have jumped to the conclusion that Ohio was not a state until 1953 and therefore could not have ratified the 16th Amendment, etc.}

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Thank you Parados, it would appear it has all been said before. However, that is the problem with history; somebody has always got there first.

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Tryagain wrote:

Ohio congressman George Bender introduced a bill in Congress to admit Ohio to the Union retroactive to March 1, 1803. Congress subsequently passed a joint resolution, and President Eisenhower, after a few more jokes, signed it on August 7, 1953.

Therefore, since Ohio wasn't officially a state until 1953, its ratification of the 16th Amendment in 1911 was invalid, and thus Congress had no authority to enact an income tax.

You may reply: The 1953 resolution retroactively admitted Ohio as of 1803, thereby rendering all subsequent events copacetic.

If so, I would reply: The constitution says the Congress shall make no ex post facto law. That means no retroactive admissions to statehood.

Tryagain,
I find your reasoning interesting, but you left out an important part. "....the Constitution of the United States which provide that neither Congress nor any state shall pass an ex post facto law; these provisions have been held applicable only to criminal statutes." Also do you not find it odd that William Taft never wanted to become President. He wanted to be Chief Justice. His wife along with Roosevelt (after he retired) arranged for Taft's Republican nomination. Roosevelt came out of retirement out of exasperation (he told me Smile

) because of Taft's unwillingness to lead, to run against him in the election of 1912. Both lost and Taft did become Chief Justice of the US just what he always wanted to do until he died in 1930.

Also, your answer to another question that relates kind of to this is right, but your reasoning is wrong. Owe taxes is right (without a penalty) but not for your reason. If you really want to know the real reason tryagain.
Smile

Different place, different time.

No offense Setanta, but Tryagain, I would visit you in prison. :wink:

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I realize this isn't the topic, but in memory of President Gerald R. Ford, the
only President that was never elected by the USA.
What is cell block H?

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I absolutly refuse to pay US income tax.

I've never paid it before and I dont intend to start!

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Is U.S. income tax invalid?

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