PeaceSigns is a publication of the U.S. Mennonite Church’s Peace & Justice Support Network. The latest issue focuses on war tax resistance, and includes:
Here is the text of Clare Hanrahan’s great speech that she delivered at a rally in Asheville, North Carolina.
Her speech repulsed the contemptible vampire liberals of MoveOn (they withdrew
from the rally when they heard a war tax resister would be addressing it)
better than if she had been wearing a garlic wreath, holding up a silver
cross, and shooting holy water from a super-soaker.
“The greatest changes in history have only come when people are willing to
put everything on the line.” Julia Butterfly Hill
Environmental activist and tree-sitter Julia Butterfly Hill took direct
action when the
IRS
claimed she owed them $150,000 from a court settlement. Instead of aiding and
abetting war, Julia redirected this money to education, arts and cultural
programs, community gardens, programs for Native Americans, alternatives to
incarceration, and environmental protection.
When war is illegal, isn’t paying war tax a crime?
I have refused to pay war taxes .
That’s the year I took the pledge. That’s when I decided to break the deadly
habit of paying for war.
It’s not just our federal taxes that fuel war, but our lifestyles of waste
and habitual consumption, this privilege that we maintain on the backs of the
destitute of the world, is upheld by the Pentagon and its deadly force.
I’m one of thousands of people around this country who openly identify
themselves as War Tax Resisters. Some file and refuse to pay. Some refuse to
file or cooperate in any way. Some refuse a portion of federal taxes, some
refuse to pay any at all.
Most War Tax Resisters are also Peace Tax Payers, redirecting refused war-tax
dollars to fund community needs. Local alternative Funds throughout the
U.S. each year
deliver more than $50,000 in refused war taxes to support constructive
projects.
As we gather here today to call out Bank of America, to demand that they stop
participating in this business of death — to demand that they stop funding
mountain top removal coal mining enterprises, stop facilitating the buildup
and modernization of nuclear weapons, and stop loaning millions to criminal
enterprises like Eric Prince and Blackwater/Xe, the largest mercenary
operation in the world.
As we say to Bank of America and its shareholders: Stop!
Are we willing to risk our own economic privilege to obstruct this business
of death?
Who will block the doors to the post office today when most Americans will
voluntarily submit taxes on the demand of the
IRS — the
taxes that fuel the Pentagon!
When war is illegal — I ask you — isn’t paying for war a crime?
Whatever the risk to property or privilege, career or liberty, we must stop.
We must stop supporting this system of destruction. Not merely because it is
immoral and unjust, but because it is illegal — according to International
Law.
The Pentagon and media are aligned in their efforts to hide the costs: the
maimed soldiers, the battlefield carnage, the grieving widows, the broken
souls, the poisoned Earth — funded with nearly one-half of every tax dollar
obediently submitted under threat.
The mandate of the Nuremberg War Crime Tribunal of
is clear:
Individuals have international duties which transcend the national
obligations of obedience. Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to
[refuse to obey] domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity
from occurring.
We cannot say we did not know.
We who refuse to cooperate with the Internal Revenue Service in its coercive
efforts to collect the funds to wage illegal wars, are in fact upholding
International Law and treaties that compel citizens to refuse to cooperate
with the crimes of their government.
Each citizen has a responsibility to ensure that their own personal conduct
does not breach international law.
According to the International Criminal Court a person is criminally liable
who “aids, abets or assists” in the commission of such a crime “including
providing the means for its commission.”
Governments cannot wage war without the money to buy weapons, pay troops or
purchase supplies. Without the support of taxpayers and moneylenders war
would be impossible.
When war is illegal, isn’t paying war tax a crime?
Look around. The crime scene is everywhere. Let’s just talk about what we
harbor here in these ancient mountains — weapons of mass and indiscriminate
destruction — weapons that violate all the criteria for acceptable weapons of
war, including: “Distinction” (between combatants and non-combatants),
“Proportionality” (causing excessive loss of civilian life); “Protection of
Environment” (causing “widespread, longterm & severe damage”).
In Jonesboro, Tennessee, weaponized uranium in the form of armor-piercing
bullets is manufactured at AeroJet. It contaminates, kills, and deforms for
generation after generation. In Erwin, Tennessee, Nuclear fuel Services
manufactures the fuel for Trident Nuclear Submarines — the first strike
nuclear submarines, themselves a violation of International law, and in Oak
Ridge at the Y-12 nuclear bomb factory where billions more are being spent to
upgrade the
U.S. nuclear
weapons arsenal for generations.
The United States is the number one military spender and arms exporter in the
world.
U.S. war crimes
include “crimes against peace” such as the “planning, preparation, or
initiation of a war of aggression.” “Crimes against humanity,” (both
civilians and soldiers). Violations of the rules as to the “means and manner
by which war is to be conducted once begun.” These include the following
prohibitions: “killing of civilians, indiscriminate bombing, the use of
certain types of weapons, killing of defenseless soldiers, ill treatment of
POWs and attacks on non-military
targets.”
We can’t say we didn’t know.
Any violation of these two sets of laws is a war crime — when done on
purpose, as the
U.S. has done,
they are grave breaches — Nazis and Japanese following World War Ⅱ were
hanged for such grave breaches.
The United States and its leaders have committed international crimes. As
global citizens, under International law, we are complicit in these crimes
against humanity, these war crimes.
When war is illegal, paying for war is a war crime.
How long, I ask, will it take those of us who know the futility of the
Pentagon’s wars, how they rob us of our brightest and best, how they kill and
rape and maim, tear apart families, lay desolate the land, leave orphans and
widows and broken and discarded veterans wandering our streets, filling our
jails, or bringing the violence of war back home?
How long, war-tax payers, will you persist in this deadly submission?
We can’t say we didn’t know.
When war is illegal, isn’t paying war tax a crime?
