Some historical and global examples of tax resistance →
United States →
Vietnam War, ~1965–75 →
Writers & Editors War Tax Protest, 1967 →
Barbara Deming
The time has come, and that time was .
350 Balk at Taxes in a War Protest
Ad in Capital Paper Urges Others to Bar Payment
Washington, — Some 350 persons who disapprove of the war in Vietnam
announced that they would not
voluntarily pay their Federal income taxes, due
. They urged others to join them
in this protest.
The Internal Revenue Service immediately made clear that it would take
whatever steps were necessary to collect the taxes.
The group announced its plans
in an advertisement in The Washington Post.
“We will refuse to pay our Federal income taxes voluntarily,” the
advertisement said. “Some of us will leave the money we owe the Government in
our bank accounts, where the Internal Revenue Service may seize it if they
wish. Some will contribute the money to
CARE,
UNICEF or similar organizations. Some of us
will continue to pay that percentage of our taxes which is not used for
military purposes.”
Joan Baez, Lynd, Muste
The first signature on the advertisement was that of Joan Baez, the folk
singer. Others who signed it were Staughton Lynd, the Yale professor who
traveled to North Vietnam in violation
of State Department regulations, and the
Rev. A.J. Muste, the
pacifist leader.
The advertisement contained a coupon soliciting contributions for the protest.
The ad said that further information could be obtained from Mr. Muste at
Room 1003, 5 Beekman Street, New York City.
Those who placed the advertisement — which bore the heading “The Time Has
Come” — said that those who sponsored it “recognize the gravity of this step.
However, we prefer to risk violating the Internal Revenue Code, rather than
to participate, by voluntarily paying our taxes, in the serious crimes
against humanity being committed by our Government.”
The advertisement mentioned not only the war in Vietnam “against hungry,
scantily armed Vietnamese guerrillas and civilians” but also “the spectacle
of the United States invasion of the Dominican Republic,” an event the
sponsors said “will go down in history alongside Russia’s criminal
intervention in Hungary.”
Cohen Is Determined
The determination of Internal Revenue to collect the taxes the Government is
owed was expressed in a formal statement by the Commissioner of Internal
Revenue, Sheldon S. Cohen.
He said Internal Revenue would take “appropriate action” to collect the
taxes “in fairness to the many millions of taxpayers who do fulfill their
obligations.”
The Government has been upheld in court on all occasions when individuals
have refused to pay taxes because of disapproval with the uses to which their
money was being put, revenue officials said.
Ad Prepared Here
The headquarters of the Committee for Nonviolent Action, 5 Beekman Street,
said that it had prepared the
advertisement carried in the Washington newspaper after receiving 350
responses to invitations it had sent out soliciting participation in “an act
of civil disobedience.”
A spokesman for the committee said that Mr. Muste, the chairman, was out of
town and would return in about a week. The spokesman said that although
monetary contributions in response to the advertisement had not yet begun to
come in, the committee was prepared to mail literature explaining its program
to those who responded to the advertisement.
The spokesman said that the tax protest had been intended to represent “a
more radical and meaningful protest against the Vietnam War.”
The committee announced that members would appear at
in front of the Internal
Revenue Service office, 120 Church Street, to distribute leaflets concerning
the tax protest.
It also said that a rally and picketing would be staged from
, in front of the Federal
Building in San Francisco under the sponsorship of the War Resisters League.
The league also has offices at 5 Beekman Street.
With press coverage like this, including even the address to write to for
more information, Muste hardly needed to pay for ad space in the
Times (assuming they would have printed the ad — many
papers rejected ads like this).
Some other names I recognize from the ad are Noam Chomsky, Dorothy Day, Dave
Dellinger, Barbara Deming, Diane di Prima, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Milton Mayer,
David McReynolds, Grace Paley, Eroseanna Robinson, Ira Sandperl, Albert
Szent-Gyorgyi, Ralph Templin, Marion Bromley, Horace Champney, Ralph Dull,
Walter Gormly, Richard Groff, Irwin Hogenauer, Roy Kepler, Ken Knudson,
Bradford Lyttle, Karl Meyer, Ed Rosenthal, Maris Cakars, Gordon Christiansen,
William Davidon, Johan Eliot, Carroll Pratt, Helen Merrell Lynd, E. Russell
Stabler, Lyle Stuart, John M. Vickers, and Eric Weinberger.
The text of the ad (without the signatures and “coupon”) is as follows:
The Time Has Come
The spectacle of the United States — with its jet bombers, helicopters,
fragmentation and napalm bombs and disabling gas — carrying on an endless war
against the hungry, scantily armed Vietnamese guerrillas and civilians…
this spectacle will go down in history alongside the unforgivable
atrocities of Italy in Ethiopia.
The spectacle of the United States invasion of the Dominican Republic — again
pitting our terrifying weaponry mainly against civilians armed with rifles…
this spectacle will go down in history alongside Russia’s criminal
intervention in Hungary.
But the spectacle of the indifference of so many Americans to the crimes
being committed in their names, by their brothers, and with their tax money…
this spectacle reminds us more and more of the indifference of the
majority of the German people to the killing of six million Jews.
The United States government has not reacted constructively to legitimate
criticism, protests and appeals:
by world leaders including the Pope, U Thant and President De Gaulle —
by United States leaders including Senators Morse, Gruening, Church, Fulbright, Robert Kennedy, Eugene McCarthy and Stephen Young —
by hundreds of thousands of citizens including 2,500 clergymen and countless professors who placed protest advertisements in leading newspapers —
by innumerable students, many tens of thousands of whom have taken their protest to Washington on several occasions —
by celebrated individuals such as the Rev. Martin Luther King, Robert Lowell, Arthur Miller and Dr. Benjamin Spock —
and by leading newspapers, including the New York Times.
We believe that the ordinary channels of protest have been exhausted and that
the time has come for Americans of conscience to take more radical action in
the hope of averting nuclear war.
Therefore, the undersigned hereby declare that at least as long as
U.S. Forces are
clearly being used in violation of the
U.S. Constitution,
International Law and the United Nations Charter…
We will refuse to pay our federal income taxes voluntarily
Some of us will leave the money we owe the government in our bank accounts,
where the Internal Revenue Service may seize it if they wish. Others will
contribute the money to CARE,
UNICEF or similar organizations. Some of us
will continue to pay that percentage of our taxes which is not used for
military purposes.
We recognize the gravity of this step. However, we prefer to risk violating
the Internal Revenue Code, rather than to participate, by voluntarily paying
our taxes, in the serious crimes against humanity being committed by our
Government.
Writers and Editors War Tax Protest
Attention: Gerald Walker
145 West 86th Street
Apt. 7D
New York, N.Y. 10024
Fellow Writers and Editors:
Join us in signing the enclosed statement proclaiming our refusal to let our
tax dollars support the war in Vietnam. Tell us in writing that we may list
your name with ours in ads and statements. Send us your check for $10.00 or
more (payable to Writers and Editors War Tax Protest) to pay for advertising
and other expenses. Ask other writers and editors to join. Mail copies of
this letter and the enclosed statement, “We Won’t Pay” (which will comprise
the substance of ads we plan to run), to your own list of colleagues. Extra
copies available at $1.00 per hundred, plus 25¢ for mailing.
How we will go about tax refusal
Should President Johnson’s surcharge be adopted by Congress, we will
refuse payment. We will not add this extra war tax to our current tax
when preparing our return and we will enclose a letter with our return
explaining why.
Many of us will also deduct from our tax the 23% which represents the
amount currently being spent on Vietnam.
Possible consequences
It is a violation (up to one year in prison and/or up to $10,000 in fines) of
Sec. 7203 of the Internal
Revenue Code willfully to refuse to pay federal income taxes. However, of the
421 signers of a similar no-payment ad in ,
not one has been prosecuted and sentenced; of the estimated 1500 additional
protest non-payers, none has been prosecuted since the war began. The
IRS, so
far, has chosen to exercise the power to collect unpaid tax money by placing
a lien on refusers’ income or attaching their bank accounts or other assets,
when these can be traced. In addition, a penalty of 6% interest is charged
annually on the unpaid tax balance, a rate estimated to be less than the
collection expense.
Vietnam drags on. Casualties rise, $28 billion are wasted yearly,
U.S. prestige and
moral fabric rot away. No solution, political or military, is in view. The
President’s prescription is more of the same — 45,000 new men (for a total of
525,000) and a proposed 10% income tax increase specifically for this
undeclared, unconstitutional, unprofitable, and unjust war.
“The needs of this country’s riot-shaken cities are being neglected to pay
the war bill,” The New York Times has
editorialized. It is time for escalation by those who want peace in
order to focus on our critical domestic dilemma. Peace marches have not
worked; nor have pickets, protest ads, teach-ins, or pleas to the President’s
conscience by public figures here and abroad. We are not consoled by reports
of atrocities committed by the other side; we want to stop those committed by
our side. So we must now go beyond mere expressions of dissent to strong,
affirmative, and dramatic action by responsible citizens.
We, the undersigned writers and editors for publications and publishing
houses large and small, have not had to give our lives in Vietnam — that has
fallen on younger Americans. But we have lent our passive support in the form
of our tax dollars. From now on, we are willing to lay our middle-class lives
on the line in pledging:
That none of us voluntarily will pay the proposed 10% income tax
surcharge, or any war-designated tax increase.
That many of us will also refuse to pay that part of our current income
tax (23%) being used to finance the war.
Many of us, too, will give an equivalent sum to humanitarian organizations.
Even so, this was not an easy decision to make. We have been law-abiding,
tax-paying citizens all our lives, and we are now subjecting ourselves to
possible legal penalties of up to one year in prison and/or up to $10,000 in
fines for willful non-payment of taxes. But we believe our taxes should not
be used to support a war that violates not only our own Constitution but the
Charter of the United Nations.
By this act, we aim to awaken the Administration to the fact that a
significant number of responsible citizens are so fundamentally opposed to
this war that they are willing to go to this extreme. And we wish to show
other Vietnam-haunted Americans that there is a simple, swift, effective way
to vote no-confidence in the Administration’s policy. It can be done
individually or in groups. It cannot wait until the 1968 presidential
election. Your ballot is your next tax return, and other ads such as this
placed in every newspaper in the land.
There are not enough prisons to hold the millions in this country who,
according to Gallup and other recent polls, strongly oppose this ugly war.
Time now to end our tacit acceptance of what is being done in Vietnam in our
name.
Much of the text of the above declaration didn’t make it in to the final
advertisement (I’m guessing it was cut down to make room for the many names
of signers, but maybe there was more to it than that). Horowitz himself did
not make the list.
I am enclosing a copy of the statement signed, so far, by 220 writers and
editors who pledge to refuse payment of the proposed 10 per cent income tax
surcharge or any tax increase earmarked for the Vietnam War. At this writing,
seven New York Times writers and editors have signed. We plan to run a
full-page advertisement in the Times in
, giving the quote from
Thoreau, the pledge and the list of names. The placing of the ad will
coincide with Congressional debate on the tax surcharge. By that time we hope
to have 500 persons pledged to refuse payment.
If you would be interested in signing the statement, please fill in the blank
and mail it in as soon as possible. And please tell your writer and editor
friends about it and urge them to do the same. As Thoreau said, “If a
thousand men were not to pay their tax bills this year, that would not be a
violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State
to commit violence and shed innocent blood.” During his incarceration for
refusal to pay his war tax, Thoreau was paid a visit by Emerson, who asked,
“What are you doing in here?” To which Thoreau replied, “What are you
doing out there?”
I feel strongly that the collective involvement of writers and editors in the
nation’s politics should not stop with the War Tax Protest. Many of our
colleagues share this view, and are preparing this fall to organize local
chapters of what can become a national writers and journalists association.
An organized and articulate “intelligentsia” can be a political force in
America as it is in France. And it must become a political force if
the increasingly oppressive policies of the present United States government — in Vietnam, in Southern Africa, in Latin America, and here at home — are to
be permanently reversed. Not to organize, not to amplify our voices so that
an ill-informed America may hear alternatives, is to accede, in effect, to
the policies of the present government. For more information, please write me
immediately at 377 Green Street, San Francisco, California 94133.
Included with this letter is a somewhat different version of the proposed ad:
— Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience,
commenting upon American involvement in the Mexican War.
We the undersigned writers and editors, believing that American involvement
in Vietnam is morally wrong, pledge:
None of us voluntarily will pay the proposed 10% income tax surcharge or
any war-designated tax increase.
Many of us will not pay that 23% of our current income tax which is
being used to finance the war in Vietnam.
Following this was a sign-up sheet, asking signers to agree with the statement
“I believe American involvement in the war in Vietnam is morally wrong,” and giving three further options:
“As a writer/editor, I wish to add my name to the Writers and Editors War Tax Protest. I dissociate myself from my government’s actions in Vietnam and I am willing to use my next tax return to vote no-confidence in the present Administration. I enclose a check (payable to Writers and Editors War Tax Protest) for $10.00 or more to help pay for running this statement as a newspaper advertisement and for other expenses.”
“I am in sympathy with what you are doing. Enclosed is my check for $____.”
“I would like more information. Please send me your fact-sheet on tax refusal.”
A number of additional signers had been added to the list by this time:
(Spock was listed out-of-order and in a different typeface in the original.)
Here are a handful of artifacts relating to the American war tax resistance
movement circa .
First, some relics that were filed alongside a letter from Herbert Sonthoff to
W. Walter Boyd (though I think this filing may be arbitrary and that the
letters are not related to each other):
At this late date it is pointless to muster the evidence which shows that the
war we are waging in Vietnam is wrong. By now you have decided for yourself
where you stand. In all probability, if you share our feelings about it, you
have expressed your objections both privately and publicly. You have witnessed
the small effect these protests have had on our government.
By ,
every American citizen must decide whether he will make a voluntary
contribution to the continuation of this war. After grave consideration, we
have decided that we can no longer do so, and that we will therefore withhold
all or part of the taxes due. The purpose of this letter is to call your
attention to the fact that a nationwide tax refusal campaign is in progress,
as stated in the accompanying announcement, and to urge you to consider
refusing to contribute voluntarily to this barbaric war.
Signed:
Prof. Warren Ambrose
Mathematics, M.I.T.
Dr. Donnell Boardman
Physician, Acton, Mass.
Mrs. Elizabeth Boardman
Acton, Mass.
Prof. Noam Chomsky
Linguistics, M.I.T.
Miss Barbara Deming
Writer, Wellfleet, Mass.
Prof. John Dolan
Philosophy, Chicago University
Prof. John Ek
Anthropology, Long Island University
Martha Bentley Hall
Musician, Brookline, Mass.
Dr. Thomas C. Hall
Physician, Brookline, Mass.
Rev. Arthur B. Jellis
First Parish in Concord, Unitarian-Universalist, Concord, Mass.
Prof. Donald Kalish
Philosophy, U.C.L.A.
Prof. Louis Kampf
Humanities, M.I.T.
Prof. Staughton Lynd
History, Yale University
Milton Mayer
Writer, Mass.
Prof. Jonathan Mirsky
Chinese Language and Literature, Dartmouth College
Prof. Sidney Morgenbesser
Philosophy, Columbia University
Prof. Wayne A. O’Neill
Graduate School of Education, Harvard University
Prof. Anatol Rapoport
Mental Health Research Institute, University of Michigan
Prof. Franz Schurmann
Center for Chinese Studies, University of Calif., Berkeley
Dr. Albert Szent Gyorgy
Institute for Muscle Research, Woods Hole, Mass.
Harold Tovish
Sculptor, Brookline, Mass.
Prof. Howard Zinn
Government, Boston University
* Institutions listed for informational
purposes only
P.S. The No Tax for
War Committee intends to make public the names of signers, hence if you wish
to add your signature, early return is desirable. Contributions are needed,
and checks should be made payable to the Committee.
The committee will publish the above statement with names of signers at tax
deadline — .
Send signed statements to: NO TAX FOR WAR COMMITTEE,
c/o
Rev. Maurice McCrackin,
932 Dayton St., Cincinnati,
Ohio 45214.
For additional copies of this form, put number you will distribute and name
and address on the following lines:
No. _____ Name ____________________
Address _________________________
Signers So Far
Meldon and Amy Acheson
Michael J. Ames
Alfred F. Andersen
Ross Anderson
Beulah K. Arndt
Joan Baez
Richard Baker
Bruce & Pam Beck
Ruth T. Best
Robert & Margaret Blood
Karel F. Botermans
Marion & Ernest Bromley
Edwin Brooks
A. Dale Brothington
Mrs. Lydia Bruns
Wendal Bull
Mrs. Dorothy Bucknell
John Burslem
Lindley J. Burton
Catharine J. Cadbury
Maris Cakars
Robert and Phyllis Calese
William N. Calloway
Betty Camp
Daryle V. Carter
Jared & Susan Carter
Horace & Beulah Champney
Ken & Peggy Champney
Hank & Henry Chapin
Holly Chenery
Richard A. Chinn
Naom [sic] Chomsky
John & Judy Christian
Gordon & Mary Christiansen
Peter Christiansen
Donald F. Cole
John Augustine Cook
Helen Marr Cook
Jack Coolidge, Jr.
Allen Cooper
Martin J. Corbin
Tom & Monica Cornell
Dorothy J. Cunningham
Jean DaCosta
Ann & William Davidon
Stanley F. Davis
Dorothy Day
Dave Dellinger
Barbara Deming
Robert Dewart
Ruth Dodd
John M. Dolan
Orin Doty
Allen Duberstein
Ralph Dull
Malcolm Dundas
Margaret E. Dungan
Henry Dyer
Susan Eanet
Bob Eaton
Marc Paul Edelman
Johan & Francis Eliot
Jerry Engelbach
George J. Etu, Jr.
Mary C. Eubanks
Arthur Evans
Jonathan Evans
William E. Evans
Pearl Ewald
Franklin Farmer
Bertha Faust
Dianne M. Feeley
Rice A. Felder
Henry A. Felisone
Mildred Fellin
Glenn Fisher
John Forbes
Don & Ann Fortenberry
Marion C. Frenyear
Ruth Gage-Colby
Lawrence H. Geller
Richard Ghelli
Charles Gibadlo
Bruce Glushakow
Walter Gormly
Arthur Goulston
Thomas Grabell
Steven Green
Walter Grengg
Joseph Gribbins
Kenneth Gross
John M. Grzywacz, Jr.
Catherine Guertin
David Hartsough
David Hartsough
Arthur Harvey
Janet Hawksley
James P. Hayes, Jr.
R.F. Helstern
Ammon Hennacy
Norman Henry
Robert Hickey
Dick & Heide Hiler
William Himelhoch
C.J. Hinke
Anthony Hinrichs
William M. Hodsdon
Irwin R. Hogenauer
Florence Howe
Donald & Mary Huck
Philip Isely
Michael Itkin
Charles T. Jackson
Paul Jacobs
Martin & Nancy Jezer
F. Robert Johnson
Woodbridge O. Johnson
Ashton & Marie Jones
Paul Jordan
Paul Keiser
Joel C. Kent
Roy C. Kepler
Paul & Pauline Kermiet
Peter Kiger
Richard King
H.A. Kreinkamp
Arthur & Margaret Landes
Paul Lauter
Peter and Marolyn Leach
Gertrud & George A. Lear, Jr.
Alan and Elin Learnard
Titus Lehman
Richard A. Lema
Florence Levinsohn
Elliot Linzer
David C. Lorenz
Preston B. Luitweiler
Bradford Lyttle
Adriann van L. Maas
Ben & Sue Mann
Paul and Salome Mann
Howard E. Marston, Sr.
Milton and Jane Mayer
Martin & Helen Mayfield
Maurice McCrackin
Lilian McFarland
Maureen & Felix McGowan
Maryann McNaughton
Gelston McNeil
Guy W. Meyer
Karl Meyer
David & Catherine Miller
James Missey
Mark Morris
Janet Murphy
Thomas P. Murray
Rosemary Nagy
Wally & Juanita Nelson
Marilyn Neuhauser
Neal D. Newby, Jr.
Miriam Nicholas
Robert B. Nichols
David Nolan
Raymond S. Olds
Wayne A. O’Neil
Michael O’Quin
Ruth Orcutt
Eleanor Ostroff
Doug Palmer
Malcolm & Margaret Parker
Jim Peck
Michael E. Pettie
John Pettigrew
Lydia H. Philips
Dean W. Plagowski
Jefferson Poland
A.J. Porth
Ralph Powell
Charles F. Purvis
Jean Putnam
Harriet Putterman
Robert Reitz
Ben & Helen Reyes
Elsa G. Richmond
Eroseanna Robinson
Pat Rusk
Joe & Helen Ryan
Paul Salstrom
Ira J. Sandperl
Jerry & Rae Schwartz
Martin Shepard
Richard T. Sherman
Louis Silverstein
T.W. Simer
Ann B. Sims
Jane Beverly Smith
Linda Smith
Thomas W. Smuda
Bob Speck
Elizabeth P. Steiner
Lee D. Stern
Beverly Sterner
Michael Stocker
Charles H. Straut, Jr.
Stephen Suffet
Albert & Joyce Sunderland, Jr.
Mr. & Mrs. Michael R. Sutter
Marjorie & Robert Swann
Oliver & Katherine Tatum
Gary G. Taylor
Harold Tovish
Joe & Cele Tuchinsky
Lloyd & Phyllis Tyler
Samuel R. Tyson
Ingegerd Uppman
Margaret von Selle
Mrs. Evelyn Wallace
Wilbur & Joan Ann Wallis
William & Mary Webb
Barbara Webster
John K. White
Willson Whitman
Denny & Ida Wilcher
Huw Williams
George & Lillian Willoughby
Bob Wilson
Emily T. Wilson
Jim & Raona Wilson
W.W. Wittkamper
Sylvia Woog
Wilmer & Mildred Young
Franklin Zahn
Betty & Louis Zemel
Vicki Jo Zilinkas
Following this was a page explaining how to go about resisting:
For those owing nothing because of the Withholding Tax.
Such persons write a letter to the Internal Revenue Service, to be filed
with the tax return, stating that the writer cannot in good conscience
help support the war in Vietnam, voluntarily. The writer
therefore requests a return of a percentage of the money collected from
his salary.
Note: Of course, the
IRS
will not return the money. However, the writer has refused to pay for the
war voluntarily and has put it in writing. This symbolic action
is not to be belittled since anybody who does this allies himself with
those who will withhold money due the IRS.
For those self-employed or owing money beyond what has been withheld from
salary.
Such persons write a letter to be filed with the tax return, stating that
the writer does not object to the income tax in principle, but will not,
as a matter of conscience, help pay for the war in Vietnam. The writer is
therefore withholding some or all of the tax due.
Note: In all cases, we recommend that copies of these letters be sent to the
President and to your Senators.
Remarks:
The Internal Revenue Service has the legal power to confiscate money due
it. They will get that money, one way or another. However, to obstruct the
IRS
from collecting money due (by not filing a return at all, for example)
seems less important to us than the fact that each is refusing to pay
his tax voluntarily. With this in mind, many of us are placing the
taxes owed in special accounts and we will so inform the
IRS
in our letters.
Willful failure to pay is punishable by a fine of up to $10,000 and up to
a year in jail, together with the costs of prosecution. So far, the
IRS
has prosecuted only those who have obstructed collection (by refusing to
file a return, by refusing to answer a summons,
etc.).
Usually, the
IRS
has collected the tax due plus 6% interest and possibly an added fine of
5% for “negligence”. The fact that the
IRS
has rarely, if at all, prosecuted tax-refusers to the full
extent of the law does not mean they will not do so in the future.
Finally, an article from the edition of The Capitol East Gazette:
Two thousand anti-war leaflets on telephone tax refusal were distributed in Capitol East on , by members of CHOICE, a group of local residents who are withdrawing their support for the Vietnam war.
The leaflet explains that the 10% phone tax was enacted in specifically to raise money for the Vietnam war.
According to CHOICE, the phone company will not remove a person’s telephone if he refuses to pay the tax.
The company asks refusers to state why they are withholding the tax and then turns the matter over to the Internal Revenue Service.
According to CHOICE, there are presently 25 known tax refusers in the Capitol Hill area.
Those desiring CHOICE’s leaflet are asked to call LI 6‒9836.
Here’s an excerpt from a letter-to-the-editor by Barbara Deming that was published in the Provincetown [Massachusetts] Advocate :
It was good to read Mr. [Ted] Malcolm’s letter in last week’s Advocate, suggesting that we each ask ourselves what we can do for peace — “rather than merely sitting by while Washington spends about 75 percent of our tax dollars on preparation for war”.…
There is one action which I have decided to take, myself, this year and which I should like particularly to recommend: that is to refuse to pay that percentage of my income tax which goes for preparation for war.
(Anyone wanting detailed information about non-payment of taxes can write to Peacemakers, 15 Elgin St., Stoughton, Mass., and receive a handbook on the subject).
I am not willing to have nuclear weapons used in my name — under any circumstances.
To refuse my small tax will not, of course, stop their production, but it is one way in which I can cast my vote against our present national policy of being willing to use them.
Thoreau wrote in “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience,” “What I have to do is to see, at any rate, that I do not lend myself to the wrong which I condemn”.
In the past I have simply written, “I pay that part of this tax which goes for armaments under deep protest”.
But actions speak louder than words.
While doing some book research today I stumbled on a bunch of documents
concerning the “Writers and Editors War Tax Protest” tax resistance pledge of
. I found the documents at
The Harold Weisberg Archive:
A three-page letter from David Welsh on
Ramparts letterhead dated
“enclosing a copy of
the statement signed, so far, by 220 writers and editors…” and saying
that they hoped to run the ad in the New York
Times (the Times would turn them down).
The letter asks Weisberg to sign on, and includes a couple of Thoreau
quotes. It also says that Welsh sees this as a first step towards
organizing the American “intelligentsia” to be an organized and articulate
political force. The final page lists the signers to that point. Also
included is Weisberg’s response in which he complements the Thoreau
quote, notes that he signed the pledge and sent it in with a donation,
and then goes on for four paragraphs about Kennedy assassination
conspiracy research, which was his specialty.
An undated letter from the Protest to “Fellow Signers” noting that “We
now have over 350 names” and “hope to achieve, or surpass, 500 by
” so they can put
the ad in the Times
“.” The letter notes that the anticipated 10% Vietnam War
tax surcharge has run into snags in Congress, but still expects a
modified version to pass. It also solicits funds, noting that they’re
only about half way to the budget they need to place a full-page
Times ad.
A second page includes the text of a Thoreau quote and of the tax
resistance pledge.
A third page includes a “coupon” that signers can fill out to register
their pledge with the Protest office, and begins the partial list of
signers. The next two pages continue the list, and then the following
page includes “Additional Signers” (including Weisberg).
The last two pages are a “Fact Sheet” explaining the reasoning behind the
protest, the process that resisters can go through to make their
resistance effective, a summary of the possible legal consequences, the
possibility of filing a legal challenge, and the Protest’s willingness to
reach out to other groups interested in taking a similar stand.
Only the first page is interesting. It’s a hand-drawn invitation to a
“Deficit Party” fundraiser “to help pay for our newspaper ad” to be held
on “at Betty Friedan’s
apartment [at] The Dakota”: “Eric Bentley, Betty Friedan, Paul Goodman,
James Leo Herlihy, Larry Josephson, Dwight Macdonald, Gloria Steinem,
[&] Gerald Walker invite you to join them, and all the other signers
of the Writers and Editors War Tax Protest…”
The first page is the last of a three-page list of pledge signers (the
first two pages are missing); the second page is a list of “Additional
Signers” with marginal notes indicating that the number had risen to 309,
and then to 324.
A letter from Lawrence M. Bensky & Gerald Walker of the Protest
to “Fellow Signers” dated . It notes that Congress did not institute the expected 10%
income tax surcharge by tax filing season, and so if people want to
resist, they’ll have to choose the other option, which was to refuse to
pay some portion of their ordinary income tax: “we urge you to do so.
Obviously, the effectiveness of our action hinges on the number of
participants.” It notes that 50 more people have signed the pledge since
the ads appeared “in
Ramparts, The New York
Review of Books of ,
and The New York Post of ”
which brings the total signers up to that desired 500 threshold.
Hundreds of people have written us to request tax-refusal information;
many of these were non-writers and non-editors who were sufficiently
impressed to follow our lead, and these information requests continue to
come in without any sign of tapering off.
The letter notes that contributions have been coming in as well, but
proposes not to spend any more money on advertising, but to keep the funds
in reserve in case the government retaliates against any signer, so as
“to focus publicity on such cases; and where a case offers the
opportunity to press a legal test of the government’s right to ‘draft’
our money for Vietnam, we will contribute to the costs of legal defense.”
The letter then recommends that people look into the newly formed “Tax
Resistance Project of the War Resisters League.”
The next page lists some sympathetic organizations, discusses the
possible government retaliation actions against signers, and includes a
coupon resisters could send to the War Resisters League if they want to
be included in their coordinated tax resistance action.
The next page gives “some facts about tax refusal and its consequences”
including a how-to guide giving several options for how to resist.
The final page announces a protest to be held at the
IRS
headquarters in Washington on :
Join us in an act of collective tax resistance. Bring your completed
tax return, form 1040, or a statement explaining why you’re not filing,
and together we will return forms and statements accompanied by either
no money or an insufficient amount of money. The
action at
IRS
will be preceded by a public meeting nearby.
Dr. Arthur Waskow of the
Institute for Policy Studies and Dave Dellinger, Chairman of the
National Mobilization Committee, will be among the speakers.
We act because for many verbal opposition to the war in Vietnam is no
longer enough. Resistance has become necessary. Our consciences dictate
it. The young men resisting the draft have shown a way and we who are
not subject to the draft must develop creative parallels. Tax
resistance is such a parallel act because it confronts the
administration directly and challenges it at a vital point. It
liberates the tax resister by showing him that he does have choices.
A Washington Post clipping dated
— “Marchers Protest War
Taxes” concerning a protest of about 40 people at the
IRS
Building. Protesters included Barbara Deming, Dave Dellinger, William C.
Davidon, Arthur Waskow. The article includes a photo of Waskow and of
protesters marching with “Don’t Pay War Taxes” signs, but the copy
quality is low.
A letter dated from Eric
Bentley, John Leonard, Peter Spackman, Gloria Steinem, and Gerald Walker
to “Fellow Signers” about “how best to wind up the group’s affairs.” They
plan to donate the group’s remaining funds to the Civil Liberties Legal
Defense Fund, which has made a reciprocal agreement to give legal
assistance to any Protest signers who run into trouble in the coming
year. “The Writers and Editors War Tax Protest was always a temporary
organization, and its limited goals have now been achieved. We remain
pledged as individuals, however, to the moral and financial support of
any of our number who is prosecuted or harassed because of non-payment or
simple membership.”
WEWTP certainly added its bit to the anti-war clamor which produced the current atmosphere and the many swift changes that have taken place in it. We ended up with 528 signers. And if there were that many strongly anti-war people from one small area of American Life, surely the political computers in Washington were capable of extrapolating that figure to the population as a whole. So [President] Johnson got the message. Thanks for lending your voice and your name to ours.
The “current atmosphere” of changes since the start of the Protest
project included the abandonment of the 10% income tax surcharge plan,
the Tet Offensive, the resignation of Secretary of Defense McNamara,
Johnson’s decision not to run for another term, and the opening of peace
negotiations.
A press release from the Protest dated
. At this time, the Protest
had attracted 437 signers, and “at least one-third” of these had pledged
not only to refuse to pay any war surcharge, but also “not to pay the 23
per cent of their current income tax which is being used to finance the
war in Vietnam.”
The protest was announced today at a press conference in New York’s
Algonquin Hotel, traditionally a gathering place for New York’s
literary world. Three writers and three editors spoke for the group:
Eric Bentley, drama critic, professor of Columbia, and author of
several books on the theater; James Leo Herlihy, well-known novelist
and short story writer; and Sally Belfrage, author of “Freedom Summer.”
Publishers included Richard Grossman of Grossman Publishers; Aaron
Asher of Viking Press; and Arthur A. Cohen of Holt, Rinehart &
Winston.
One of the group’s organizers announced that today’s advertisement had
been rejected for publication by seven major newspapers before being
printed by the New York Post. The New York Times, where ten of the
advertisement’s signers are employed, twice rejected it, the second
time after the advertisement had been changed to meet their earlier
objection. Other newspapers which refused to accept the prepaid
full-page advertisement were The Boston Globe, the Washington Post, the
St. Louis Post-Dispatch,
the Christian Science Monitor, the National Observer, and the Chicago
Tribune. A spokesman for the Writers and Editors War Tax Protest
expressed regret that the nation’s press, “which is so quick to condemn
violent demonstrations, actually encourages them by frustrating
conscientious expression of dissent from our actions in Vietnam.”
A newspaper clipping dated
that, in the form of an article about the ad, essentially
reproduces it, including the complete list of signers. It is unclear what
newspaper the clipping is taken from.
“Writers Vow Tax Revolt Over War” — a news clipping from the
Washington Post. It gives the number of
signers as 448, and explains that the Post
refused to print the ad “on the grounds that it was an implicit
exhortation to violate the law.”
A letter from Lawrence M. Bensky & Gerald Walker to “Fellow Signers”
dated . It gives the
number of signers as 450. “Two months have been spent dickering with the
NY Times (where 11
of the signers work), which has just refused an ad revised to meet
earlier Times objections.” (Harding Bancroft of the
Times eventually said: “the advertisement was
turned down by the Times in accordance with our general policy that we do
not accept advertising urging readers to perform an illegal action.”) The
letter notes that some signers have wondered why the Protest continues to
stress the 10% surcharge which by now is looking less politically viable.
Finally, the letter announces the above-mentioned “Deficit Party.”
New Society Publishers began in to bring out a “Barbara Deming Memorial Series” of books meant to highlight women involved in nonviolent action.
The first book in the series was You Can’t Kill the Spirit by Pam McAllister, which included a chapter on women tax resisters, and another separate section on the Igbo Women’s War, which was also a tax resistance campaign in part.
Here are some excerpts from this book:
Injustice, Death and Taxes: Women Say No!
The world just didn’t make sense to thirty-two-year-old Hubertine Auclert.
On the one hand she was considered a French citizen expected to obey the laws of her country and to pay property taxes.
On the other hand, she was denied the citizen’s right to vote simply because she was a woman.
The male rulers couldn’t have it both ways, Auclert decided.
She began plotting a way to unhinge the system.
On election day in , Auclert and several other tax-paying women of Paris initiated the first stage of the action.
They stomped past a line of startled men and presented themselves for voter registration.
They demanded that they be recognized as full citizens of France with rights as well as responsibilities.
They demanded an end to the injustice of taxation without representation.
The men were amazed: there was nothing wrong with the system’s inconsistencies as far as they were concerned!
The women were turned away.
It was time for stage two.
Taking advantage of the publicity the women had generated, Auclert called for a women’s “tax strike.”
She reasoned that, since men alone had the privilege of governing the people and allotting national budgets, men alone should have the privilege of paying taxes.
“Since I have no right to control the use of my money,” she wrote, “I no longer wish to give it.
I do not wish to be an accomplice, by my acquiescence, in the vast exploitation that the masculine autocracy believes is its right to exercise in regard to women.
I have no rights, therefore I have no obligations.
I do not vote, I do not pay.”
During the tax strike, Auclert was joined by twenty other women — eight widows and the rest, presumably, single women.
When the authorities demanded payment, all but three of the women ended their participation in the strike.
The remaining women continued to appeal the decision.
But when law enforcement officers attempted to seize their furniture, Auclert and the others gave in.
They decided they had done the best they could to call attention to the injustice.
Auclert was not the first woman to organize against the taxation of women without government representation.
Mid-nineteenth-century United States saw a number of women’s rights tax resisters.
In … Lucy Stone decided to publicize the injustice of government taxation of women who, because they were denied the vote, were without representation.
, Henry David Thoreau had spent a night in jail for his refusal to pay the Massachusetts poll tax, an action he had taken in opposition to the U.S. war with Mexico.
Now Lucy Stone decided to use the same tactic to publicly draw attention to women’s oppression as voteless taxpayers.
When she refused to pay her taxes, the government held a public auction and sold a number of her household goods.
Like Lucy Stone, [Lydia Sayer] Hasbrouck’s radicalism led her to become a tax resister, refusing to pay local taxes in protest against the denial of her right to vote.
A tax collector, so the story goes, managed to steal one of Hasbrouck’s Bloomer outfits from her house and advertise it for sale, the proceeds to go toward the taxes she owed.
Abby Kelly Foster had always been an active worker and speaker for women’s rights, but, in , at the age of sixty-three, she was newly inspired.
She had just heard about Julia and Abby Smith, two sisters in neighboring Connecticut, who were refusing to pay the taxes on their farm in order to protest the denial of suffrage to women.
This was just the sort of nonviolent direct action that appealed to Abby.
Her husband, Stephen, agreed.
That year, they refused to pay their taxes on their beloved “Liberty Farm” in order to give voice to the urgency and justice of women’s suffrage.
When they refused again in , the city of Worcester, Massachusetts took action.
The farm was seized and put up for auction to the highest bidder.
Letters of support for the Fosters’ tax resistance poured in from the progressive leaders of the day.
Boston abolitionist Wendell Phillips wrote, “Of course I need not tell either of you at this late day how much I appreciate this last chapter in the lives full of heroic self sacrifice to conviction.”
Lucy Stone and Elizabeth Cady Stanton sent words of encouragement.
William Lloyd Garrison, a pacifist abolitionist, wrote, “I hope there is not a man in your city or county or elsewhere who will meanly seek to make that property available to his own selfish ends.
Let there be no buyer at any price.”
Unfortunately, Osgood Plummer, a politically conservative neighbor, bid $100 for the farm, but he retreated when Stephen Foster chided him.
Later, Plummer wrote a letter to the local newspaper explaining that he had only wanted to teach the Fosters a lesson about obeying the law.
With no other bidders, the deed to Liberty Farm reverted to the city.
For the next few years, Abby and Stephen lived with the fear and uncertainty of losing the farm, but they continued their tax resistance until Stephen’s ill health became an overriding concern.
In , the Fosters ended their protest and paid several thousand dollars to save the farm.
The point had been made.
In , the Women’s Tax Resistance League of London published a little pamphlet entitled Why We Resist Our Taxes… “The government of this country which professes to be a representative one and to rest on the consent of the governed, is Constitutional in its relation to men, Unconstitutional in its relation to women,” wrote Margaret Kineton Parkes, author of the pamphlet.
Parkes did not mean all women, however.
She hastened to reassure the reader that the tax resisters were not in the least radical but only fair-minded, concerned with votes only for women householders, certainly not for all women.
The League, she claimed, was about passively resisting the unconstitutional government ruling England.
Because they had been granted the municipal vote, women tax resisters were more than willing to pay local “rates,” and they promised they’d have equal willingness to pay “imperial taxes” as soon as they were granted the parliamentary vote.
The London tax resisters devised a new way to reach beyond those already enlightened members of the public who attended suffrage meetings.
They began making suffrage speeches at public auctions, a tactic that had unexpectedly good results.
Many people were converted to the suffrage cause once they had the chance to hear the argument from the resisters themselves.
The auctioneers not only permitted the women to make their speeches, but sometimes actively invited the speeches and even addressed the cause in their own words.
One auctioneer who openly supported the tax-resisting suffragists ended his remarks by saying: “If I had to pay rates and taxes and had not a vote, I should consider it a great disgrace on the part of the Government, but I should consider it a far greater disgrace on my part if I did not protest against it.”
Since the granting of suffrage, women’s tax resistance has most often been undertaken to protest a government’s military spending or its involvement in a specific war — such as the U.S. war in Vietnam.
For part of her life, Barbara Deming was a war tax resister.
In her essay “On Revolution and Equilibrium,” she explained the rationale for this form of nonviolent noncooperation.
Words are not enough here.
Gandhi’s term for nonviolent action was “satyagraha” — which can be translated as “clinging to the truth…” And one has to cling with one’s entire weight… One doesn’t just say, “I don’t believe in this war,” but refuses to put on a uniform.
One doesn’t just say “The use of napalm is atrocious,” but refuses to pay for it by refusing to pay one’s taxes.
At , Juanita Nelson threw on the new white terry cloth bathrobe she’d recently ordered from the Sears-Roebuck catalog and answered her door.
Two U.S. marshals informed her that they had an order for her arrest.
What a way to start the day.
Juanita and her husband Wally, who was out of town that day, had not paid withholding taxes nor filed any forms for , so it was, in one sense, no big surprise that the government wanted to see her.
“But even with the best intentions in the world of going to jail,” she later wrote, “I would have been startled to be awakened at 6:30 a.m. to be told that I was under arrest.”
She explained to the bright-eyed government men that she would be glad to tell the judge why she was resisting taxes if he’d care to come see her.
Then she proceeded to explain why she would not willingly walk out of her door to appear in court.
I am not paying taxes because the overwhelming percentage of the budget goes for war purposes.
I do not wish to participate in any phase of the collection of such taxes.
I do not even want to act as if I think that anyone, including the government, has a right to punish me for an act which I consider honorable.
I cannot come with you.
The government men were not moved.
They called for back-up assistance while Juanita considered her situation.
Should she get dressed?
Would getting dressed be a way of cooperating?
Quickly she called a friend on the phone to let others know what was happening to her, and just as quickly she was surrounded by seven annoyed law enforcement officers.
There was a brief exchange about her still being in her bathrobe, and one uncomfortable officer asked her whether or not she believed in God.
She answered in the negative.
(“He did not go on to explain the connection he had evidently been going to establish between God and dressing for arrest,” Juanita later reported.)
Suddenly, a gruff, no-nonsense officer said, “We’ll just take her the way she is, if that’s the way she wants it.”
He slapped some handcuffs on her and lifted her off the floor.
In maneuvering her into the government car, he apparently tried his best to expose the nakedness under her bathrobe while another officer tried to cover her.
As the car carried her into the heart of Philadelphia, she tried to think.
“My thoughts were like buckshot,” she wrote of her experience, “so scattered they didn’t hit anything or, when they did, made little dent.
The robe was a huge question mark placed starkly after some vexing problems. Why am I going to jail?
Why am I going to jail in a bathrobe?”
The only thing she was sure of at that moment was that, until her head cleared, she would refuse to cooperate with her jailers.
When the car stopped, she was yanked from the back seat, carried into the federal court building, dragged up a flight of stairs, and thrown behind bars.
[S]everal friends stopped by to visit her.
(Her phone call had been a good idea.)
The first visitors were two men, tax-refusing pacifists like herself.
They thought it best, for the sake of appearances, to go to court in the proper clothes.
They offered to get some clothes for her, and she agreed — just in case she decided she’d feel more at ease in them.
After the men left, a woman friend stopped by.
“You look like a female Gandhi in that robe!”
she said.
“You look, well, dignified.”
Juanita grinned.
When they finally came for her, Juanita, still refusing to walk, was wheeled into the courtroom in her bathrobe.
The clothes the men had brought were left behind in a brown paper bag.
The judge gave her until to comply with the court order that she turn over her financial records or be subjected to a possible fine of $1000, a year in jail, or both.
Juanita Nelson went home.
came and went.
Many Fridays came and went.
The charges were dropped and she heard nothing more.
Every now and then, the Internal Revenue Service sends her a bill or tries to confiscate a car, but so far the government has met a wall of nonviolent noncooperation.
They should have known when they saw Juanita in her bathrobe: nothing will make her pay for war.
Most people who take any notice of my position are appalled by my lawbreaking and not at all about the reasons for my not paying taxes.
Instead of trying to make me justify my civil disobedience, why do they not question themselves and the government about a course of action which makes billions available for weapons, but cannot provide decent housing and education for a large segment of the population?
Like the ascetics of old, Eroseanna (Rose or Sis) Robinson was singularly unburdened by material possessions.
She had no bank account, owned no real estate, and when the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) tried to seize her personal property, they found that all she had was an ironing board, a clock, a quilt, and some clothes.
Robinson took seriously her membership in Peacemakers (an organization founded in to promote radical, nonviolent direct action).
She had been a war tax resister since the early fifties, filing no statements of income and ignoring the various notices and certified letters sent by the IRS.
In , thirty-five years old, single and black, Robinson was a skilled artist and athlete; creative, too, in finding ways to live in the United States without paying for the U.S. military.
She tried to keep her earnings below the taxable level and for a period managed to spend less than $3 per week for food.
She also arranged to earn a withholding-free income from several different work situations.
Even with the little money she made, Robinson regularly sent sums greater than the taxes she owed to groups that worked for peace and social justice.
On , federal marshals descended on Robinson at a community center in Chicago and demanded she come with them.
When she refused, they carried her bodily out of the center and to the district court where she was seated on a bench before a judge.
She refused to accept the services of a lawyer and asked instead that they lay aside their roles as judge and defendant and speak to each other as two people with genuine concerns.
When the judge agreed, Robinson talked.
“I have not filed income taxes,” she said, “because I know that a large part of the tax will be used for militarization.
Much of the money is spent for atom and hydrogen bombs.
These bombs have a deadly fallout that causes human destruction, as it has been proved.
If I pay income tax, I am participating in that course.
We have a duty to contribute constructively to life, and not destructively.”
After making this statement, she was handcuffed, put in a wheelchair because she refused to walk, and taken to jail.
The next day she was wheeled into court again, where she encountered a different judge.
This judge ridiculed her and her supporters who were standing in a vigil in front of the courthouse.
He accused her of having an attitude of “contumacious criminal contempt.”
He committed her to jail until she would agree to file a tax return and show records of her earnings.
Not only would she not agree to file a tax return, she also would not agree to cooperate in any way with the prison system.
She would not walk.
She would not eat.
She did agree to see one visitor one time — her friend Ernest Bromley, a radical pacifist and member of Peacemakers, who had come to see her in Cook County Jail.
He wrote while she dictated a message for all her supporters on the outside:
I see the military system and jail system as one thing.
I don’t want to give up my own will.
I will not compromise by accepting a lawyer or by recognizing the judge as judge.
I would rather that no one try to make an arrangement with the judge on my behalf.
I ask nothing from the court or the jail.
I do not want to pay for war.
That is my main concern.
Love to everyone.
On , Robinson was again wheeled into court.
It was clear that she would not compromise her principles to spare her own discomfort.
The judge sentenced her to jail for a year and added an extra day for “criminal contempt.”
On , she was moved to the federal prison in Alderson, West Virginia.
There she continued her fast, though prison officials began to force-feed her liquids through a tube inserted into her nose.
She refused to cooperate in any way with her own imprisonment nor did she try to send letters through the system of prison censorship.
Ten members of Peacemakers, including long-time activist Marjorie Swann, set up their tents just beyond the gates at Alderson and issued a press release on .
They explained that they were there to show support for Robinson and that most of them intended to fast just as she was fasting.
They invited anyone who wanted to talk to stop by the gate where they were camping.
The pacifists propped up signs along the stretch of dusty road — “No Tax for War,” “Peace Is the Only Defense,” “Thou Shalt Not Kill,” and “Rose Won’t Pay Income Tax.”
After fasting for , Robinson was suddenly and unconditionally discharged from prison on .
The judge who ordered her release said Robinson had become a burden to the prison medical facilities, adding that he felt she had been punished sufficiently.
He didn’t mention the picketers camped outside.
When Robinson was released from prison late afternoon, the first thing she saw was a huge banner held high by her friends — “Bravo Rose!”
A number of women have become war tax resisters in reaction to a specific war.
Mary Bacon Mason, a Massachusetts music teacher, became a war tax resister in after World War Ⅱ.
She told the government she would be willing to pay double her tax if it could be used only for aid to suffering people anywhere, but would accept prison or worse rather than pay for war.
The only possible defense, she said, is friendship and mutual help.
Of World War Ⅱ she said:
I paid a share in that cost and I am guilty of burning people alive in Germany and Japan.
I ask humanity’s forgiveness.
In , Caroline Urie of Yellow Springs, Ohio, bedridden and elderly, gained national attention and inspired many people to consider war tax resistance when she withheld 34.6 percent of her tax.
She sent an equivalent amount as a donation to four peace organizations and wrote an open letter to President Truman and the IRS
Now that the atomic bomb has reduced to a final criminal absurdity the whole war system, leading quite possibly to the liquidation of human society, and has involved the United States in the shame and guilt of having been the first to exploit its criminal possibilities, I have come to the conclusion that — as a Christian, Quaker, religious and conscientious objector to the whole institution of organized war — I must henceforth refuse to contribute to it in any way I can avoid.
Eighteen years later, and in response to a new war, another woman from Yellow Springs, Ohio, Doris E. Sargent, wrote to the Peacemakers newsletter with a new war tax resistance tactic.
She noted that the government had reintroduced a federal tax attached to telephone bills.
The money was earmarked specifically for U.S. military expenses.
Sargent proposed a radical response — that all those who demanded an end to the fighting in Vietnam ask the phone company to remove their phones in protest.
If everyone who opposed the war were willing to make such an extreme sacrifice, real pressure could be put on the government.
Then Sargent suggested a less extreme idea — that people keep their phones and pay their bills but refuse to pay the federal tax.
Phone tax resisters could send a note with their bills each month, stating that the protest was not directed at the phone company but at the government which was using the phone tax to support war.
The idea caught hold, and phone tax resistance became a popular way to protest the war in Vietnam.
It is still used as a form of war tax resistance.
The war in Vietnam turned many people into war tax resisters.
Pacifist folksinger Joan Baez set an example as a tax resister early in the war years by withholding 60 percent of her income tax.
She was instrumental in persuading countless others to follow her example.
In , she explained:
We talk about democracy and Christianity — and we try out a new fire-bomb.
We talk about peace and we move thousands more men and weapons into Vietnam.
This country has gone mad.
But I will not go mad with it.
I will not pay for organized murder.
I will not pay for the war in Vietnam.
In , life-long Quaker Meg Bowman wrote a letter to the IRS to explain why she had decided once again not to pay her federal income tax.
“Do you carefully maintain our testimony against all preparations for war and against participation in war as inconsistent with the teachings of Christ?”
― Query, Discipline of Pacific Yearly Meeting, Religious Society of Friends (Quakers).
The above quotation is from the book that is intended to give guidance to members for daily living.
The book repeatedly stresses peace and individual responsibility.
It is clear to me that I am not only responsible for my voluntary actions, but also for that which is purchased with my income.
If my income is spent for something immoral or if I allow others to buy guns with money I have earned, this is as wrong and offending to “that of God in every man” as if I had used that gun, or planned that bomb strike.
When I worked a five-day week it seemed to me that one-fifth of my income went to taxes.
This would be equivalent to working one full day each week for the U.S. government.
It seemed I worked as follows:
Monday for food.
I felt responsible to buy wholesome, nourishing items that would provide
health and energy, but not too much meat or other luxuries, the world supply of which is limited.
Tuesday for shelter.
We maintain a comfortable, simply furnished home where we may live in
dignity and share with others.
Wednesday for clothing,
health needs and other essentials and for recreation, all carefully
chosen.
Thursday for support of causes.
I select with care those organizations which seem to be acting in such a
way that responsibility to God and my brother is well served.
Friday for death,
bombs, napalm, for My Lai and overkill.
I am asked to support a
government whose main business is war.
Though the above is oversimplified, the point is clear.
I cannot work four days a week for life and joy and sharing, and one day for death.
I cannot pay federal taxes.
I believe this decision is protected by law as a First Amendment right of freedom of religion.
If I am wrong it is still better to have erred on the side of peace and humanity.
Sincerely, Meg Bowman
“The only thing of which I’m guilty is financially supporting the war in Southeast Asia against my better judgment until ,” said Martha Tranquilli when she was charged with the criminal offense of providing false information on her income tax forms.
At , Tranquilli stood on the steps of the state capitol building in Sacramento, California and addressed the 100 supporters who had gathered.
After a short Unitarian service held on her behalf, the aging white woman with a long gray braid told them in her calm, soft voice that she envisioned the day when scientists and workers would join in refusing to pay war taxes or do war work.
I was very much afraid of going to prison, but I think I have overcome that fear.
I plan to read, write letters, and meditate as much as possible.
I’m going to try my best to make an adventure out of this thing.
One after another, friends and strangers attending the rally came up to embrace Tranquilli and offer words of encouragement.
After some spirited singing, they accompanied her to the federal building where she turned herself in to the federal marshals.
Hers was a media image made to order.
“63-Year-Old Tax-Resisting Grandma Goes to Jail” shouted the headlines, and the war tax resistance movement didn’t mind the national publicity Martha Tranquilli generated.
Tranquilli was opposed to the Vietnam War and all the suffering the war was inflicting on the people of Vietnam, the people of the United States, and on the earth itself.
She had therefore decided to withhold the 61 percent of her income taxes (amounting to approximately $1,100) which she believed would go to pay for the war.
It was in Mound Bayou, Mississipi that Martha was tried and sentenced for tax fraud in .
Like other war tax resisters, Tranquilli withheld her taxes by listing unusual dependents.
Tranquilli listed seven peace organizations as dependents, including War Resisters League, the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the American Friends Service Committee.
(Another war tax resister in claimed 3 billion dependents, explaining to the IRS that he felt the population of the earth depended on him and on others to refuse to pay war taxes.
That case went to court and the tax resister was acquitted by a court of appeals of the charge of willfully filing a false and fraudulent W-4 form.)
Tranquilli was found guilty of tax fraud, but the judge was reluctant to send her to jail and indicated he’d give her a suspended sentence if she would only apologize and promise not to do it again.
When Tranquilli refused this offer she was sentenced to nine months in prison and two years probation.
The Mississippi Civil Liberties Union helped her appeal the case and, while the appeal was pending, she moved to California.
Both the Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear her case.
On , after making national headlines and being cheered on by supporters, Tranquilli began her stay at Terminal Island Prison in San Pedro, California.
She quickly got involved in the life of the prison community…
After her release, Tranquilli wrote to a friend: “Be sure to say that I did not suffer in prison.
It was a learning experience.”
Tranquilli continued her tax resistance as well as her work for peace and justice until her death in .
For Mason and Urie it was the Second World War.
For Baez, Bowman, and Tranquilli it was the war in Vietnam.
it is the U.S.-backed war against Nicaragua that motivates many new war tax resisters.
In in Brooklyn, New York, tax resister Donna Mehle wrote an open letter to the IRS which was published in the local newspaper.
She cited a religious basis for her tax resistance, protesting the war against Nicaragua.
The decision to come into conflict with the laws of my country is very difficult, but it is a decision rooted in my Christian faith.
As a Christian, I am called to affirm life and reject violence… My commitment to tax resistance deepened in the past year when I travelled to Nicaragua.
There I saw first hand the effect of my tax dollars ($100 million in Contra Aid ).
I vowed to myself and to the Nicaraguan people I met that I would not be complicit in the U.S. backed Contra war, a war which targets innocent civilians and children.
Mehle informed the IRS that she intended to redirect the money she would have owed in taxes to an alternative fund “which supports life-affirming projects in New York City.”
In , some women in the United States proposed a specifically feminist perspective on war tax resistance.
In New York City, the Women’s Tax Resistance Assistance distributed a brochure which read in part:
We can’t keep working for disarmament, for women’s rights, including an end to lesbian oppression, and for racial equality while paying for a male-dominated government which impoverishes and exploits us now and threatens to eliminate the world’s future.
On , this group performed street theater on the steps of Federal Hall.
Some of the women dressed up as pieces of the federal budget “pie” while others, dressed as waitresses, explained the military menu to passersby and handed out leaflets.
In Canada in , sixty-eight-year-old Edith Adamson made headlines with her tax resistance.
A lifelong pacifist and the coordinator of the Peace Tax Fund Committee of Canada, Adamson was one of approximately sixty Canadians who hoped to prevent the government from using their money to make war.
Not that Adamson and the others wanted to keep the money for their own use: they wanted to redirect their dollars into a peace tax fund.
With the adoption of the new Charter of Rights in the Canadian Constitution, there was a guarantee of freedom of conscience.
“This means,” Adamson explained for news reporters, “that the government should provide a legal alternative to war taxes for those who object to killing on religious or ethical grounds.”
Since , Canadian war tax resisters — who call themselves “Peace Trusters” because they trust in peace, not war — have petitioned their government to develop a peace tax fund which would allow citizens the option of directing their money away from the military budget.
They asked for a simple tax form which would allow taxpayers to check whether they want a portion of their taxes to go for warmaking or peacemaking.
In , Edith Adamson explained her involvement:
In a nuclear war, you wouldn’t have a chance to be a conscientious objector.
And, being an old lady, I wouldn’t be drafted, so it seemed the peace tax fund idea was a sound way to get at the root of the problem.
I not only want to exempt myself from the killing, but I want to try to influence the government to look at this problem — and other people as well to examine their consciences.
A nuclear war would involve everybody and mean total destruction and I couldn’t just hide under my little exemption and stay alive.
This peace tax would be an extension of conscientious objector status for the military.
It’s more appropriate today because war now depends more on money than on personnel; it only took twelve men to drop the bomb over Hiroshima, but it took millions, perhaps billions of taxpayers’ dollars in Canada, Britain, and the United States to develop that bomb.
By there were approximately 440 Peace Trusters in Canada who were withholding a portion of their taxes and putting that money into a peace tax fund.
They had agreed to waive the interest on this money in order to pay the court fees involved in taking on a test case to establish the legality of the peace tax fund.
The claimant Jerilynn Prior, a physician and Quaker originally from the United States where she was also a tax resister, now lives in British Columbia.
In a press release, Prior said that paying for war violates her freedom of conscience and religion.
This deep conviction rises from my commitment to work for peace.
I try to live my life that way — as a mother, a physician, a teacher, a woman, a citizen of this world community.
It would be hypocrisy to voluntarily allow my tax contribution to be used for war or the military or pamphlets about bomb shelters…
Each of us can work for peace in our own life, with our own resources, and in our own way.
This tax appeal is the way I must work for peace.
Nigerian women used song in to ridicule, protest, and pressure a man and, by extension, the system he represented.
In , women streamed into Oloko, Nigeria from throughout Owerri Province.
Word had been sent via the Ibo (Igbo) women’s network that it was time to “sit on” Okugo, the arrogant warrant chief of the Oloko Native Court.
“Sitting on a man” was the figurative expression given a traditional process of punishment during which women gathered in front of a man’s home to sing songs which outlined the women’s grievances or insulted the offender.
The women would dance and sing all day and all night, and sometimes, for the most serious and unrepentant offenders, give added impetus to their words by dismantling the roof of the hut until the man promised to cooperate.
On , the women prepared as their mothers and grandmothers before them had prepared for the traditional settling of grievances: they bound their heads with ferns, smeared their faces with ashes, and put on the short loincloths tradition ordained.
Each woman picked up a sacred stick wreathed with young palm fronds.
These sacred sticks were necessary for invoking the spirit and power of their female ancestors.
Thus attired, they massed on the district office to “sit on” Okugo until he got the message.
Just days before, the women had met in the market to discuss the new taxation rumors.
They remembered that , after promises to the contrary, the British had taken a census and begun collecting taxes from the men.
The women were worried that taxes would soon be imposed upon them as well, especially since a district officer had ordered a new census in which they and their property would be counted.
At the marketplace meeting the women had agreed to spread the alarm and act if any of them were approached for information.
And could anyone doubt their cause for alarm now?
Just Warrant Chief Okugo had approached Nwanyeruwa, a married woman.
He had asked to count her goats and sheep.
She had spat back an insult, “Was your mother counted?”
In anger, Okugo had attacked Nwanyeruwa who had immediately set in motion the women’s network.
Now the women were ready to act.
Nwanyeruwa’s name became the watchword, Nwanyeruwa herself the catalyst.
Carrying their sacred sticks high, thousands of women marched on the district office.
They danced.
They sang songs of ridicule and protest, they chanted, and they demanded Okugo’s cap of office, taking from his head the symbol of his authority over them.
A British officer who witnessed the event claimed that the cap, tossed into the crowd of women, “met the same fate as a fox’s carcass thrown to a pack of hounds.”
After several days of such protest, the women secured written assurances that they were not to be taxed.
They also succeeded in having Okugo arrested, tried, and convicted of physical assault and of unnecessarily worrying the population.
When the news of this victory spread through the women’s networks, thousands of other women throughout the region organized to “sit on” their local warrant chiefs.
The protest spread to Aba, a major trading center along the railway.
The women in Aba, like those in Oloko, dressed in their traditional ferns, ashes, and loincloths and carrying the sacred sticks to invoke the mothers, gathered to dance, sing, and demand the cap of the warrant chief.
The FBI
was nice enough to take careful notes at a war tax resistance protest that took
place in Washington,
D.C. on
, and write up what they
saw. Seems that the government does sometimes pay attention to protests.
An advertisement in the ,
issue of “Village Voice,” a weekly newspaper concerning activities in
Greenwich Village, and other sections of New York,
N.Y., was captioned “Tax
Resistance Action in Washington,
D.C.” It
stated the Catholic Worker, Resist, Writers and Editors War Tax Protest, and
the War Resisters League would sponsor the activity at
, at the Internal Revenue Service, Washington,
D.C.
(WDC).
This advertisement indicated the peaceful action at the Internal Revenue
Service would be preceded by a public meeting in Judiciary Square, Fourth and
E Streets, N.W.,
WDC,
at
Dr. Arthur Waskow of the
Institute for Policy Studies; Dave Dellinger, Chairman of the National
Mobilization Committee (to End the War in Vietnam); Harold Tovish of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Barbara Deming, an author; and
Professor William C. Davidon of Haverford College would be among the speakers
at this public meeting.
On , a confidential source,
who has furnished reliable information in the past, made available a flyer
published by the Tax Resistance Project, War Resisters League, 5 Beekman
Street, New York, N.Y.,
calling for support of the activity on . This flyer asks participants to bring their completed income tax
return or a statement explaining why they are refusing to file a return. It is
stated that these returns and/or statements, accompanied by an insufficient
amount of money or no money at all, will be turned in to the Internal Revenue
Service
(IRS),
WDC, at
.
A copy of this flyer is attached.
The publication, “Washington ’68” describes the Institute for Policy Studies,
1520 New Hampshire Avenue, N.W.,
WDC,
as an institution created to serve as an independent center of research and
education on public policy problems in
WDC.
The National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam was formerly known as the Spring Mobilization Committee (SMC).
The SMC
is described in the publication entitled “Communist Origin and Manipulation
of Vietnam Week (),” a
report by the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives.
On page 53, the report states in part, “Communists are playing dominant roles
in both the Student Mobilization Committee and the Spring Mobilization
Committee.”
A second source, who has furnished reliable information in the past, as of
, identified Arthur Waskow as
a member of the Steering Committee of the Washington Mobilization to End the
War in Vietnam, an outgrowth of the SMC.
A third confidential source, who has furnished reliable information in the
past, reported on , that during
a symposium in New York City on , David Dellinger, editor of Liberation magazine, identified
himself as a pacifist, advocated a communist society, and said, “I am a
communist.” However, he pointed out that he was not a “Soviet-type” communist.
On , Professor William C.
Davidon was a participant in a program on Radio Station
WEAU, Chicago, Illinois, concerning
“Peace Walks.” During this program he admitted being a sponsor of the
Committee to Secure Justice for Morton Sobell (Committee to Free Morton
Sobell) (CFMS).
A characterization of the CFMS is attached.
An article appearing in the issue of the “Cape Cod Standard-Times,” a daily newspaper,
Hyannis, Massachusetts, stated that Barbara Deming returned to the United
States the previous day after spending eleven days in North Vietnam. She
accused the United States of waging a war of terror against a civilian
population.
On , Special Agents of the
Federal Bureau of Investigation observed approximately fifty-five people
gathered in Judiciary Square, WDC.
At approximately ,
Professor William C. Davidon, acting as master of ceremonies, opened the
program by stating that a large number of people are not paying taxes because
their money is being used to kill in Vietnam. He estimated that four thousand
people are not paying the telephone tax.
Professor Davidon then introduces Arthur Waskow as a representative of Resist.
Waskow described Resist as a group encouraging and supplying funds to those
who refuse to kill. Waskow said they were assembled to uphold the law. He said
that the war in Vietnam is illegal, and that the crime is in the White House
and executive offices, not in the streets. He claimed that the President and
the Secretaries of State and Defense are the ones violating the law.
Waskow further stated that the President has helped wreck the dollar with the
war in Vietnam. He urged those present to uphold the economy and the law by
withholding that portion of their income tax that is paying for the “obscene”
war. Waskow also felt it is illegal for
IRS to
collect money to pay for that war.
The next speaker, Harold Tovish, stated the Johnson Administration has
alienated the youth of today with lies and a foul war. He said that the youth
of America wants a life that is worth living, and he was not certain that life
today is worth living. Tovish also said they had gathered in WDC
to show that they cannot tolerate the type of life that has been formed for
Americans today.
At approximately , the majority of the group left Judiciary Square and walked to the
Constitution Avenue entrance of the
IRS
building. About fifteen carried posters reading, “Don’t Pay War Taxes.”
Beginning at about , Barbara Deming
spoke to the gathering. She said she believes in government of, by, and for
the people, and stressed how little tax money is spent for people. She claimed
the United States is saying to the Vietnamese — let us self-determine you or
we will have to destroy you. Deming stated the lives of the Vietnamese do not
belong to the Government, and that she refuses to pay her taxes to deliver
these lives “up to Caesar.”
An individual identified as Wally Nelson stated that in
he affirmed that no human being should be
killed and indicated he has refused to pay taxes since that date. He said that
rational people should not pay for slaughter, and should not allow a portion
of their taxes to be used for that purpose. Nelson stated that any government
that prides itself on killing people owes its people an apology. He indicated
he will continue to refuse to pay taxes.
James Leo Herlihy, a novelist, spoke briefly about the inflated cost of
killing people you do not really hate. He said that at one time it cost
$14,000. to kill a person during a war, but that now that cost has risen to
$234,000.
David Dellinger spoke of refusing to pay taxes to a government that tortures,
kills, and maims people. He stressed the need for door to door contact to ask
people how long they are going to be willing to pay for killing.
Professor Davidon then read what he said was a telegram from three doctors in
Cambridge, Massachusetts, supporting their action against
IRS.
At approximately
, a delegation of seven of the demonstrators was admitted
to the
IRS
Building to meet with
IRS
officials. This delegation said they were prepared to deliver “thirty
envelopes” to
IRS.
Whle waiting outside the entrance one ⸺ ⸺ of Connecticut state an associate
has been harassed by
IRS
since for not paying taxes, and that he,
Hayworth, is now suffering the same harassment. [Probably Neil Haworth―♇]
A ⸺ from the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania area, and ⸺ of Princeton, both spoke
briefly against paying taxes to support the illegal war in Vietnam.
The demonstrators passed out literature of the War Resisters League. One
leaflet captioned, “Resist Vietnam War Taxes,” states that about 67 percent of
taxes collected by the Government go for war and preparations for war, and
that about 23 percent goes for the war in Vietnam. Another captioned, “Hang Up
on War! — Telephone War Tax Refusal Campaign,” urges refusal to pay the ten
percent telephone tax.
The delegation that had been admitted to the
IRS
Building at about
left the building at approximately ,
and the demonstrators dispersed shortly thereafter. There were no arrests or
incidents during this demonstration.
On , Mr. Ray Brennan,
Internal Security Division, Office of the Assistant Commissioner, Inspection,
IRS,
advised that the following were admitted to meet with Deputy Assistant
Commissioner Leon C. Greene and a representative of the
IRS
Baltimore District Office:
David Hartsough
Arthur Waskow
Barbara Deming
William Davidon
Wallace Nelson
Harold Tovich
David Dellinger
A copy of an
IRS news
release dated , concerning
the activity on that date is attached.
The attached flyer announcing the action was a typewritten sheet with a
crudely-drawn headline:
Tax Resistance Action in Washington,
DC
Internal Revenue Service Headquarters, 12th
St. & Constitution
Ave.
Join us in an act of collective tax resistance. Bring your completed tax
return, form 1040, or a statement explaining why you are not filing, and
together we will return forms and statements accompanied by either no
money or an insufficient amount of money. The action at
IRS will
be preceded by a public meeting at Judiciary Square,
4th & E
St.
N.W.,
Dr. Arthur Waskow of the
Institute for Policy Studies and Dave Dellinger, Chairman of the National
Mobilization Committee, will be among the speakers.
We act because for many verbal opposition to the war in Vietnam is no longer
enough. Resistance has become necessary. Our consciences dictate it. The young
men resisting the draft have shown a way and we who are not subject to the
draft must develop creative parallels. Tax resistance is such a parallel act
because it confronts the administration directly and challenges it at a vital
point. It liberates the tax resister by showing him that he does have choices.
Total refusers, partial tax refusers, and telephone tax refusers will all be
there. Join us.
That flyer then listed the sponsors (Catholic Worker, Writers & Editors Tax
Protest, Resist, and War Resisters League) and included a tear-off section that
could be returned to War Resisters League headquarters for people who wanted
more information or transportation options. It encouraged recipients to also
sign this pledge: “I dissociate myself from my government’s actions in Vietnam
and therefore I am not paying all or more portion of my
income taxes. Signed:…”
The IRS
press release, also attached to the FBI
report, was mostly uninteresting. It snidely contrasted the protesters with
“[t]he overwhelming majority of taxpayers [who] carry out this obligation of
citizenship in a conscientious manner” and also suggested that the protesters
were part of a tiny movement, most of whom would ultimately buckle: “In a
relatively few cases,
IRS has
had to enforce collection against tax protestors. Most have paid when asked and
some who failed to pay voluntarily notified the
IRS where
the taxes could be collected from their bank accounts.”
from the edition of
Cycle
The edition of Cycle,
a student paper from Fitchburg (Massachusetts) State College, gives us a good
peek into the rhetoric and tactics of the war tax resistance movement at that
time:
In , the United States government spend $103
billion to pay for present and past wars and to be prepared in case of future
wars. This was 66% of the entire federal budget of $156 billion. One hundred
and three billion dollars exceeds the gross national product of all but six
nations.
Of this $103,198,100,000, $29 billion was spent on the Vietnam war, to
continue a conflict whose brutality, immorality, and illegality have sickened
most Americans and the vast majority of the people of the world. Already, this
war has brought death to more than 42,000 Americans and more than two million
Vietnamese. It is a spur to the arms race and continually threatens world
peace.
Almost $20 billion will be invested this fiscal year in making more frightful
our nuclear missile and bomber arsenal, weapons already so destructive that
they can deliver ten tons of explosive power for every person on the globe.
$330 million will be spent on chemical and biological weapons that are
polluting the environment and endangering the people in the United States and
other countries without even being used; simply by being improperly stored.
$7.5 billion will go toward research on new and yet more fearful weapons.
$1.2 billion has been authorized for the Anti Ballistic Missile
(ABM)
system in .
$500 million to $1 billion is the estimated budget of the
CIA.
Vast sums will be paid to the corporations and research institutes that design
and build the weapons. In , the following companies, a handful of the biggest among thousands
engaged in war production and research, enjoyed these military contracts:
General Dynamics
$2.2 billion
Lockheed Aircraft
$1.8 billion
General Electric
$1.4 billion
United Aircraft
$1.3 billion
McDonnell-Douglas
$1.1 billion
AT&T
$777 million
The following amounts were spent in
for projects that
seem to have little to do with primary human needs:
For moon and other space exploration $3.4 billion.
For farm subsidies to wealthy landowners $3.1 billion.
In comparison to the enormous expenditures for acts and instruments of
military violence, luxury space programs, and subsidies to the wealthy, and at
a time when city governments are crying for more funds, the United States
government spent these sums on improving the health, education, and general
welfare of the people within this country.
Slum rebuilding $1.9 billion.
Other poverty programs $7.2 billion.
Health programs $1.8 billion.
Educational programs and subsidies $3.7 billion.
Direct, nonmilitary foreign aid to underdeveloped countries totaled about $1.6
billion.
The U.S.
appropriation to the United Nations was $109 million, about the cost of one
Polaris submarine.
In , the total of all
non-military expenditure was approximately 34% of the military expenses.
Throughout the United States, young people by the hundreds of thousands are
rebelling in disgust and anger against this squandering of resources on war,
and neglect of the day-to-day practical needs of the people. They are not
alone in seeing only massive social disruption and probably nuclear war as
eventual consequences. They are risking their freedom, careers, and often
their lives to protest and resist what they see to be wrong.
In the face of this shameful and alarming situation and in solidarity with the
youth resisting it, we, as participants in War Tax Resistance, are resolved to
confront our own complicity in war, waste, and callousness. We resolve to end
to the extent we can our cooperation in a federal tax program geared to death
more than life. The least measure of our resistance will be not to pay
voluntarily $5 of federal taxes due.
We are prepared to bear the consequences of our actions, be these criticism
and unpopularity, financial penalties, confiscation of our bank accounts and
property, and, perhaps, imprisonment. These seem to us small inconveniences
beside the agony of those killed or bereft by war, and the numb hopelessness
of those crippled by poverty.
We invite all Americans to join us in some form of tax refusal. War tax
resistance is not always easy, particularly for those whose taxes are withheld
from their wages, but for most there is some variety of tax refusal that they
can conscientiously adopt. It may be by not paying part or all of a balance
“owed,” or by not paying federal telephone tax. War Tax Resistance has
prepared literature and is setting up counseling services designed to help
each individual find the best way of tax refusal and resistance for him. A
list of Methods of War Tax Resistance follows this statement of purpose.
We also are developing a war tax resistance promotional program that will
include advertisements, demonstrations, meetings, a bulletin, and other
literature distribution. If you become a war tax resister, we hope you will
allow yourself to be publicly identified with the movement and permit your
name to be used on tax resistance literature.
War Tax Resistance will do more than concentrate on the weeks just before
April 15. We are planning a year round educational and resistance program. If
you agree with conscientious tax resistance as a means for opposing war, we
hope you will communicate with us now. The included coupon is for your
convenience.
Methods of Refusal
Refuse to pay at least $5 of your tax
The first goal of War Tax Resistance is to convince as many people as
possible to refuse at least $5 of some tax owed the government. Nearly
everyone can do this by refusing their federal telephone tax or part of
their income tax. If hundreds of thousands refuse to pay $5, they will
establish mass tax refusal. Besides having the burden of collecting the
unpaid amounts, the government will be faced with the political fact of
massive noncooperation with its warmaking policies.
Better yet, refuse to pay all the taxes you can
Even if some of your taxes are withheld, you can refuse to pay the balance
and other taxes. These might include: taxes on additional income, the 10%
surtax, and the telephone tax.
You can refuse to pay that percentage of your tax that goes for war
Two thirds or more of the federal budget pays for wars past, present, and
future. To protest against war, a person can refuse that percentage of his
tax. He can base his refusal on the percentage of the total national
budget used for war, on the cost of the war in Vietnam, or on other
calculations. Some people pay part of their tax and contribute the rest as
a peace tax. Some give to the
UN, or a
relief agency, or some other organization engaged in peaceful,
constructive work.
You can refuse to pay the 10% surtax
This surtax was imposed in to help pay
for the war in Vietnam. Refusing to pay it is a direct protest against the
war.
You can refuse to pay the federal telephone tax
The federal telephone tax was revived in
to help pay for the war. Thousands are already not paying it. In all cases
known to us but one, the telephone companies have continued service and
referred the tax collection to
IRS.
To Reduce or Eliminate the Withholding of Your Taxes You Can
Claim additional dependents
If you claim a sufficient number of dependents on your W-4 form you can
reduce the amount of taxes withheld from your salary to zero. The law
reads that a dependent has to live in your household and be supported
by you. The fact is that many people, particularly draft age young men
and the Vietnamese, depend on you. So long as you declare at the end of
the year that by the government’s standards you owe so much and are
refusing to pay it, the moral point is made
The law reads that it is illegal — fraudulent — to state on a tax form
that someone claimed as a dependent falls within that category, as
defined by the
IRS,
when he does not. But no fraud appears to be involved if the people
claimed as dependents are identified as being outside the
IRS
categories. The issue has not been tested in the courts.
Make your employer an ally
Although the law reads that it is illegal not to withhold taxes from an
employee’s wages, your employer may be sympathetic to your protest and be
willing to assist — and make a protest of his own — by not withholding
from your salary. It is always valuable to raise the question.
Organize an employment agency
Have your agency hire you and then have your present employer hire the
agency to supply him with you. Naturally, an agency that you control will
not withhold taxes from its employees. Getting organized is complicated,
but if you and a few friends get together you can work out the problem.
Write us for information.
Also You Can
Demand a refund
There are four ways to do this:
You may request a refund right on the 1040 form and stand a good
chance of receiving it. Ask for a tax credit on Part Ⅴ of the
form.
You may file form 843 for a refund.
If the above demands are refused, go to the Income Tax Board of
Appeals. If the Board turns you down, sue.
You can also sue the government to refund all your taxes on the
grounds that the taxes have been used for illegal and immoral
purposes.
Protest by letter or in person
Any protest to
IRS
or other government officials will help express opposition to the war and
to militarism. If you are unable to refuse taxes, protest them as
vigorously as you can.
Maximize the Impact
Talk about your tax refusal with friends, neighbors, co-workers. This sort of
direct contact changes many minds. Distribute tax refusal literature.
Inform the newspapers and other mass media in your neighborhood that you are
resisting war taxes and why. Start a war tax resistance group in your
community.
Organize or join demonstrations at your local
IRS
office.
Inform yourself thoroughly and become a tax refusal counselor. Let your
community know through ads, leaflets,
etc. that a
counseling service is available.
Keep the War Tax Resistance Clearinghouse informed by writing or phoning about
your activities. Communication is the lifeblood of any movement.
We invite war tax resisters to send War Tax Resistance the first $5 or more
refused the federal government. This money will be used to publicize and
expand the war tax resistance movement.
Until now, the government has not imprisoned anyone for conscientious tax
refusal. A few have been given short sentences for refusing to reveal
information about their incomes. In general, the
IRS has
been content to take money from tax refusers’ bank accounts, garnishee part of
their wages, or, on rare occasions, seize and auction property.
![No Income Tax For War! Now Particularly the U.S. War in Vietnam. Statement: Because so much of the tax paid the federal government goes for poisoning of food crops, blasting of villages, napalming and killing of thousands upon thousands of people, as in Vietnam at the present time, I am not going to pay taxes on 1966 income. Name ___. Address ___. [In order to withdraw support from war, particularly the savage and expanding war in Southeast Asia– Some are refusing to pay their total tax, or some portion. ☐ Some have in advance lowered their income so as to owe none. ☐ (for our information, would you like to check which form of nonpayment you are following?) NOTE: There are laws which (although not usually applied to principled refusers) cover possible fine and jail term for non-payment of a legally-owed amount.]](noIncomeTaxForWar.png)
