🚀 go-pugleaf

john@dhh.gt.org wrote in message <87yaqlppmn.fsf@hasler.dhh>...
>Larry Elmore writes:
>> Do you have a specific reference for that? I was under the distinct (but
>> possibly incorrect) impression that the Supreme Court has never, in fact,
>> ruled one way or the other on the income tax, and that it simply refuses
>> to look at any real case involving it or the IRS as a whole (individual
>> agents being another matter).
>
>Have you ever actually read the Constitution?  In the 19th century the
>Court ruled the income tax unconstitutional.  In the early twentieth
>century the States amended the Constitution to reverse that decision.
>Since the amendment was written to address the Court's specific complaints,
>there is no point in them looking at the issue again.

You're right, of course. I realized that shortly after posting/inserting
foot in mouth (after pulling an all-nighter, I should know better than to
reply immediately :-(  ). An income tax is of course constitutional, thanks
to the 16th Amendment (in 1913) that very foolishly overturned the original
framers' explicit prohibition against direct taxation by the federal
government (what they feared would happen _has_ happened).

The Supreme Court has never ruled on a number of questions directly related
to the income tax, most importantly the manner in which it is collected by
the IRS, especially when that agency _thinks_ you're cheating and you are
essentially guilty until you prove yourself innocent in _their_ court, while
they're seizing your assets and driving you towards bankruptcy.

Larry