Tax resistance in the “Peace Churches” → Mennonites / Amish → Robert Hull

War tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 1988

The third of Friends Journal’s special issues on war tax resistance came in 1988, and the topic came up in several other issues besides.

An article by Mary Bye in the February issue showed how the arguments for war tax resistance were starting to break the bounds of the tax arena and take hold elsewhere. Excerpts:

In March of 1987 a letter from the collection department of Philadelphia Electric Company demanded payment for a backlog of refused rate hikes. I had withheld the 13.7 percent imposed to cover the construction costs of the Salem and Limerick nuclear reactors. Why did I take this stand?

Looking back over the years for the source of my action, I could see it springing from a long-time insistence upon justice, a small but growing willingness to risk, a perennial sense of grief for suffering, and a blossoming love of the Earth. These are the qualities of the spirit which began to unfold into action during the early days of the Vietnam War. Somewhere along the line, I refused to pay the war tax portion of my federal income tax. Later the Vietnam War ground to a halt when legislation ended financial support for it. Was it just a coincidence that our war tax resistance preceded this legislation? Or did citizens modeling the denial of monies not only support the growing disaffection with the war, but also provide a clue to a way to end it? We had perhaps unwittingly slipped into an old Christian strategy of living as if the Kingdom were here now, and, behold, it manifested a brave, new world, or at least the beginning of one.

War tax resistance seemed an appropriate base upon which to build a new witness of caring for the whole Earth.…

…With crystalline clarity I selected my own utility, Philadelphia Electric, and refused the rate hike for Salem and Limerick. After 1½ years of refusal, accompanied by monthly explanations, I received a warning letter from the collection department, threatening an end of service. The initial fright yielded to a decision to continue resisting and move as swiftly as possible to establish my independence from nuclear power forever.

I faced a new, expensive, complicated simplicity: photovoltaic cells, which produce electrical current when exposed to light, and which could free me from bondage not only to nuclear generators but also fossil fuel-fired reactors. As war tax resistance led me to a lower income, so rate hike refusal was pointing the way to lower energy demands. My living standard may drop, but the quality of my life soars. Meanwhile I have discovered that Philadelphia Electric is experimenting with photovoltaics in anticipation of the coming solar age. If the price is right, I could purchase them there. After all, nuclear power is the enemy, not the electric company.

This is the vision, but it is a dream deferred or rather only partially realized. Philadelphia Electric Company and Solarex, which manufactures photovoltaic cells, want to establish a demonstration project at my home that would provide between one-fourth and one-third of the daily demand here for electricity. The stumbling block is the cost, which would possibly necessitate a 35-year pay-back period. So I am circling the photovoltaic issue in a holding pattern like a plane above an airport. I am searching for answers to hard questions: such as what is the equitable balance between the cost of photovoltaics and the wattage generated? What is a reasonable payback time? If the cost is rock bottom right now, how do we gather funds? How do we secure state and government support? Are churches and meetinghouses able to model this kind of caring for God’s creation? How do we dream this dream into reality? I would welcome your suggestions.

an ad in the February 1988 issue of Friends Journal

That issue also announced a February “Conference for Quaker, Mennonite, and Brethren employers, airing ways to deal with war tax resistance by employees. Sponsored by Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns and New Call to Peacemaking.”

That conference was covered in the May issue in an article by Paul Schrag. Excerpts:

The question of how church organizations can help their employees follow their consciences — and how to deal with the risks involved for both employees and employers — were the issues that 36 Mennonites, Brethren, and Quakers struggled with at the meeting. The church leaders, organizational representatives and lawyers affirmed their support for individual military tax resisters and for efforts to seek a legislative solution by working toward passage of the U.S. Peace Tax Fund bill in Congress. They agreed to organize a peace church leadership group to go to Washington, D.C., to support the peace tax bill and to express concerns about tax withholding. They also agreed to help each other by filing friend-of-the-court briefs if tax resisters are prosecuted and by sharing the cost of tax resistance penalties, if necessary.

People from churches that refuse to withhold federal taxes for employees who oppose paying military taxes shared their experiences with people from churches considering adopting such a policy. The General Conference Mennonite Church and two Quaker groups are in the first category. The Mennonite Church is in the second. The meeting, held at Quaker Hill Conference Center, took place in an atmosphere of excitement generated by a gathering of people from different traditions who share a vision. One conference participant said it was frustrating that many members of historic peace churches are unwilling to witness against financial participation in preparing for war, although they are opposed to physical participation in war. Some said it was disappointing that so many people are unwilling to follow their consciences until the government, through the Peace Tax Fund, might allow them to do so legally. One quoted Gandhi: “We have stooped so low that we fancy it our duty to do whatever the law requires.”

When a church or organization decides to honor employees’ requests not to withhold their federal income tax, it assumes serious risks. Theoretically, a person in a responsible position who willfully fails to withhold an employee’s taxes can be punished with a prison sentence and a $250,000 fine. An organization can be fined $500,000. But such penalties have never been imposed on legitimate religious organizations, nor are they likely to be, said two lawyers at the meeting. The usual Internal Revenue Service response to war tax resistance is to take the amount of tax owed, plus a 5 percent penalty and interest, from the employee’s bank account. However, the IRS has not taken even this action against General Conference Mennonite Church employees who are not having their taxes withheld. They pay the nonmilitary portion of their taxes themselves and deposit the 53 percent that would have gone to the military in a designated account. The IRS has not touched that account since it was established after church delegates approved the policy in 1983. All church personnel who could be subject to penalties have agreed to accept the risk.

Friends World Committee for Consultation, which has had a nonwithholding policy since 1982, has had tax money seized, plus interest and penalties, from its resisters’ bank accounts. Friends United Meeting adopted a non withholding policy last October. Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Society of Friends is considering such a policy.

A representative of the Church of the Brethren said he would use input from the meeting to work toward developing a denominational policy on tax resistance.

Lobbying continues for the Peace Tax Fund bill… The bill would allow people opposed to war taxes to put the portion normally given to the military in a separate fund for peaceful purposes. The rest of that person’s tax money also would be designated for nonmilitary use… Whether or not military tax resistance is effective, participants agreed that people’s moral imperative to follow their consciences must be respected. “No conscientious objector ever stopped a conflict,” said William Strong, a Quaker representative [and treasurer of the Friends Journal Board of Directors]. “But they had to explain what they did, and the vision was kept alive, and those ripples, you don’t know where they stop.”

A postscript noted: “ ‘A Manual on Military Tax Withholding for Religious Employers,’ written by Robert Hull, Linda Coffin, Peter Goldberger, and J.E. McNeil, will be available later this year.”

The March issue was the third special issue on war taxes from the Friends Journal.

It was prompted in part by the fact that the Journal itself had received IRS levies on the salary of its editor, Vinton Deming, who had been refusing to pay income tax since 1979. The Treasurer of the Journal, William D. Strong, explained what was going on in the lead editorial:

The Friends Journal Board of Managers has twice been unable to honor the levy against the wages of our editor, Vint Deming, for unpaid federal taxes. In our most recent reply to the Internal Revenue Service we stated that:

It is not possible for us as a board to separate our faith and our practice: we must live out our faith.

Our earlier letter… refers to our 300-year-old Peace Testimony. To more fully describe that part of our beliefs we enclose copies of two sections of Faith and Practice, the book of spiritual discipline of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. [“The Peace Testimony” and “The Individual and the State,” pp. 34–38, were shared.]

Our position of noncompliance to the requests of the Internal Revenue Service is not an easy one. We do not question the laws of the land lightly, but do so under the weight of a genuine religious and moral concern. We know as well that other religious groups — Mennonites, Brethren, and others — are facing this same difficult dilemma. For this reason, many of us support the proposed Peace Tax Fund bill in Congress.

The board agreed at our meeting in November to make known this continuing witness, both individual and corporate, to you, our readers.

The dilemma is clearly not the Journal’s alone. Many Quaker institutions in the United States, Canada, and England have faced this challenge. Beyond the historic peace churches are Catholics, Methodists, and others who are considering the whole question of taxes and militarism. In February representatives of some 70 institutions came together at the Quaker Hill Conference Center in Richmond, Indiana, for a New Call to Peacemaking consultation on “Employers and War Taxes.” This followed a December 1986 Quaker conference at Pendle Hill considering the same concern.

The Journal board has worked at and reached unity in this matter. We will continue to seek the light in the months and years ahead. For now, however, we would welcome the support and reactions of our subscribers and readers. If you’d like to share in this witness with your moral support, let us know. If you’d like to add practical support, we would welcome it, as we are establishing a Conscience Fund.

We don’t plan extensive legal undertakings at this time, but we know that there can readily be some fees and costs ahead, as well as possible penalties resulting from our refusal to honor the levies from the IRS.

We look forward to the response of our readers. We feel that we cannot host writings in the issues of the Journal on peace and justice, on our testimonies and faith and practice, without, as an employer, living them out to the best of our God-given abilities.

Another article in the March special issue was an extract from J. William Frost’s Tax Court testimony in the Deming case, in which he explained the Quaker war tax resistance practice:

The peace testimony has been a basic part of Quaker religious belief since the 1660s. The testimony has not been static; it has evolved over time as Friends thought out the implications of what it meant to be a bringer of peace.

Some of the most creative actions of members of the Society of Friends have come from the peace testimony. For example, Friends’ primary contribution to world history is that they began and carried through the antislavery testimony. Friends became antislavery advocates in the 18th century, when they realized that the only way one could obtain a black slave was to take him or her captive in war.

Pennsylvania was founded by William Penn for religious liberty. Penn believed, and so did the early settlers, that to create a Quaker colony meant there would be no militia, no war taxes and no oaths. These were conceived to be part of religious freedom, and in the early years of Pennsylvania, there was no militia, and there were no war taxes and no oaths. At first, the Pennsylvania Assembly refused to levy any taxes for the direct carrying on of war. Instead, after 1690 when the British government requested money because it was already beginning its long series of wars with France, the Crown and the Pennsylvania Assembly worked out a series of arrangements. Those arrangements provided that the Assembly (then composed primarily of Quakers) would provide money for the king’s use or the queen’s use, but the laws also stipulated that that money would not be directly used for military purposes; i.e., there would be almost a noncombat status for Quaker money. It could be used to provide foodstuffs to be used to feed the Indians, or it could purchase grain or relieve sufferings. It would not be used to provide guns and gunpowder.

This policy of no direct war taxes, no militia, and no oaths, was followed in Pennsylvania from its beginning in the 1680s until the crisis broke out in France in the 1750s. In 1755, a group of members of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting began the debate on whether Quakers should pay taxes in time of war. At this time, some of the most devout Quakers refused to pay a war tax levied by the Pennsylvania Assembly. And finally the yearly meeting agreed that those whose consciences would not allow them to pay the taxes, should not. So the heritage of Pennsylvania until 1776 was that government accommodated the religion.

The Federal Constitution allows for an affirmation, because certain religious rights are antecedent to the establishment of the government, and the government can and will accommodate itself to religious scruples of those people who are conscientious good citizens.

During the 19^th century there was less opportunity for tax resistance because there was no direct federal taxation. The federal government was financed by tariffs, and the tariffs were used to carry out the full operations of government. (The major exception came during the Civil War, and here the main issues were military service and Quakers’ refusal to pay a substitution tax.)

The main Quaker response to World War Ⅰ was the creation of the American Friends Service Committee. This organization was designed to allow those young men who did not wish to fight (conscientious objectors) to have an opportunity for constructive service (i.e., to provide relief and reconstruction in the war zone). Friends conducted relief activities in France, and then later in Germany, Serbia, Poland, and in Russia. The War Department accommodated itself to Friends. There was no specific provision in the draft law in World War Ⅰ for conscientious objectors. The War Department allowed those Friends who wished to serve in the American Friends Service Committee to be furloughed so that they could go abroad to participate in relief activities.

A second way in which the authorities accommodated Friends at that time was in relief money raised by the Red Cross for Bonds. Much of the Red Cross effort was for military hospitals, and Friends did not wish to support that effort. Therefore in Philadelphia an agreement was worked out whereby Friends contributed money or bonds which would be earmarked for the American Friends Service Committee or for relief activity rather than for direct war activity.

There were instances in World War Ⅱ of individual Friends refusing to pay war taxes, and the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting officially protested against certain war taxes, but the main movement against war taxes has occurred since 1945. During the Cold War and particularly during Vietnam, war tax resistance has become a major theme in Philadelphia Yearly Meeting.

The Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, since the 1960s, has regularly put a discussion of war taxes on its agenda. In many ways the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting position on war taxes is like its position was on antislavery before the Civil War: before 1860, virtually all Friends opposed slavery. Today, virtually all Friends oppose military taxation. The difficulty in 1860 and in 1980 is that Friends are searching for a way to make their religious witness effective. What Friends want to do is somehow change the focus of a policy which they see as destructive of what is basic to their value system.

In summary, the position of Friends is that religious freedoms preceded and are incorporated into the federal government. Pennsylvania was founded for religious freedom, and religious freedom meant no taxes for war, no militia service, and the right of affirmation. Friends think that the federal government incorporated part of that understanding in the affirmation clause in the constitution, in the first amendment, and in the religion clauses in the Pennsylvania Constitution. Friends think that the government has in good faith tried to accommodate us in our position on military service, and what Friends are wanting from the government now is a like accommodation on a subject which is the same to us as conscientious objection: the paying of taxes which will be used to create weapons to threaten and to kill.

Deming represented himself next, in an article describing his “journey toward war tax resistance.” Excerpts:

During a difficult moment [in the discussion over the Philadelpha Yearly Meeting’s response to the Vietnam War] a young Friend stood and spoke with deep emotion; and his words went straight to my heart. It didn’t matter, he said, what older Friends might say in support of him and his generation (though support was needed and appreciated, for sure); what really mattered to him was that Friends look personally at their own lives to see how they were connected to warmaking. If they were too old to be drafted (and most of us were) perhaps they could find other ways to resist the war.

About 20 years have gone by and I don’t even remember the name of the young Friend who spoke in meeting that day, but his words had a profound impact on me. As a result of his ministry I decided to begin to seek ways to resist the payment of taxes for warmaking (what another Friend, Colin Bell, would term the “drafting of our tax dollars” for the military).

I should say that there was another motivating force at work on me as well. My work for Friends in the city of Chester was bringing me into daily contact with poor and black people. I was learning firsthand about a community — a microcosm of other urban areas across the country — that suffered the debilitating effects of chronic poverty, high unemployment, deteriorating housing, inadequate health care, and inferior public schools. I was witnessing the insufficient funding of a so-called War on Poverty in Chester while millions of dollars and human lives were being expended in a war against other poor people in Southeast Asia. I knew I had to do something to end my personal complicity in helping to pay for the war and to redirect these dollars to wage a more life-affirming battle against poverty and injustice here at home.

I soon discovered that it is hard to become a tax resister; there are so many basic assumptions about money and taxes that we have learned. We are expected to do certain things in our society: when we work, we must pay taxes — this pretty much goes without question. How else will programs get funded and bills get paid? And those who don’t pay, well… there’s an institution called the IRS that takes care of such people and will make them pay!

There are so many good reasons for not resisting taxes. Some of the ones I wrestled with are these:

• I can’t get away with it. IRS will eventually get the money from me anyway and I’ll just end up paying more in the end.
• It won’t do any good. The government is too powerful and they’ll not change their policies because of my symbolic act.
• There are better ways to work for peace (i.e. writing letters to Congress, going to demonstrations, etc.)
• There will never be a substantial number who will be tax resisters — it’s simply not realistic.

Well, there’s truth in all of these statements, but I had to start anyway. Not to do so had simply become an even bigger problem for me. So I began looking at the question of taxes for war and decided to start where I could, with the telephone tax. I learned that the federal tax on my personal phone had been increased specifically to help pay for the war. In talking with others who were refusing to pay this portion of their phone bills I learned that the risk was fairly small. No one I knew about had gone to jail or suffered any severe penalties (beyond having some money taken from a bank account or such). So my wife and I began to withhold these few dollars each month and include a note to the telephone company explaining our reasons. This became an educational experience for me. I started to get used to receiving the impersonal letters from the phone company and later from IRS, and I even came to enjoy the process of writing my own letters in response — I felt good about not paying.

In the early 1970s I began to feel more confident. The IRS had not locked me up, or even taken any money from me, as I recall, so I gathered my courage and decided to take the next step — to resist paying a portion of my income taxes. At first I included a letter with my tax form in April and tried to claim a “war tax deduction” and request a return of some of the money withheld from my salary but with no success. The IRS computers were not impressed with my effort, and they routinely informed me that the tax code did not provide for such a claim. So I came to a decision: it would be better to have IRS asking me for the money each year rather than my asking IRS. So beginning in 1973 I began to seek ways to reduce the amount withheld from my regular paychecks. Though some tax resisters at that time accomplished this by claiming all the world’s children as their dependents (or all the Vietnamese children), I decided to reduce the amount withheld by claiming extra allowances (which were authorized for anticipated medical expenses, etc.) and thus reduce the amount withheld.

Beginning in 1976, when I started to work part-time at Friends Journal, and continuing until this past year, I claimed enough allowances on my W-4 so that no money was withheld from my pay. For several years as a single parent raising a young child, I lived very modestly, working just part-time and sharing living expenses in a communal house. During those years I actually got money back from the government when I had paid nothing. Since 1979, however, after I remarried (and later had two more children) I started to owe money to IRS each year. So each year at tax time I would write a personal letter to the president to be sent with a copy of my tax form (not completely filled out, usually just with my name and address) explaining why I could not in good conscience pay any taxes until our nation’s priorities changed from warmaking to peacemaking. I would usually send copies of my letters as well to IRS, my representative in Congress, and friends. Occasionally I would receive thoughtful responses, once from Congressman William Gray from my district, who is one of the sponsors of Peace Tax Fund legislation in Washington.

After a few years of this, IRS began to make some ominous threats and noises, followed by the first serious efforts to collect back taxes from me. I should say that I redirected some of the unpaid taxes to peace organizations and poor people’s groups, some into an alternative tax fund, some into a credit union account to earn interest — and some was spent. On two occasions — once in 1976, again in 1986 — I went to tax court. Each court appearance provided an opportunity to explain my witness more clearly, and to meet others in the community who were tax resisters or who wanted to be supportive.

My first day in court was in Raleigh, North Carolina, and was particularly meaningful. About 30 of my friends went with me to lend support. A local peace group baked apple pies and served small slices to people entering the courthouse next to a large “pie chart” that graphically showed the disproportionately small share of our federal taxes going to human services and the large piece to the military. A local TV station interviewed me and carried a story on the evening news. A wire service picked up on the story as well, and for several days I received phone calls from people throughout the South.

What occurred inside the courthouse was just as important. The judge was very interested in my pacifist views: At one point he ended the hearing and engaged in an extended discussion right in the courtroom of many of the peace issues I had raised. It became a sort of teach-in on the subject of militarism and peaceful resistance. Later both he and the young government attorney thanked me for what I shared and complimented me for effectively handling my own legal defense. (I had elected not to be represented by counsel.) Though the court eventually ruled against my arguments in the case — which did not surprise me — I feel that the whole experience of going to court was a positive one, as well as an educational experience for others. And though I was ordered to pay the $500 or so owed in back taxes, I never did — and no further efforts were made to collect.

IRS has been more aggressive, however, in recent years. Some funds have been seized from a bank account, an IRA was taken, and such efforts are continuing even as I write this article. Most recently IRS has levied Friends Journal for the tax years 1979–1982 for taxes, interest, and penalties totaling about $23,000. I am grateful that the Journal’s board has declined to accept the levies on my salary… and that the board as a Quaker employer both corporately and as individual members supports my witness.

I don’t know what the future will bring, and frankly I try not to think about it too much. In the past two years I have changed my approach some. My wife and I have decided to file a joint return. Beginning this past summer the Journal started to withhold a little money from my paychecks following my decision to complete the new W-4. It seems appropriate just now that I devote my time to working on the earlier tax years and to finding ways to support others who are more actively resisting. I try to stay open as well to seeking other approaches to resistance from year to year.

What are some things that I have learned from all this? Perhaps I might share these thoughts:

• Tax resistance is a very individual thing. Each of us must find our own way and decide what works best for us.
• Resist openly and joyfully, and seek opportunities to be in the company of others along the way. When you go for an IRS audit, for instance, take some friends with you; when you go to court, make the courtroom a meeting for worship.
• Don’t see IRS agents or government officials as the enemy. Look for opportunities for friendliness, address individuals by name, be open and honest about what you intend to do. The IRS will soon recognize that a conscientious tax refuser is different from a tax evader.
• What might work one year may not the next. Be flexible and remain open to trying different approaches.
• Talking about money is hard, and it is discouraged in our society. I remember how embarrassed the grownups in my family were when one of my children once asked at the dinner table, “How much money do you have, grandpa?” Tax resistance helps us to remove some of these barriers, and this is good.
• Sometimes our children can educate us, I should say, and provide simple insights to seemingly complex problems. Just as I was challenged by a young Friend to consider tax resistance 20 years ago, an IRS agent was once set on his heels by my daughter. During a lull in a long conversation about financial figures, Evelyn (only seven at the time) asked the agent, “Why do you make my daddy pay money for killing people?” The poor man shuffled his papers, turned beet-red, cleared his throat, and ended the meeting.

There were several responses to the March special issue on war tax resistance that were printed as letters-to-the-editor in the June issue:

• Jim Quigley wrote in to express his “admiration for the act of courage and faith represented by the war tax resisters.”
• Karl E. Buff wanted to “encourage Vinton Deming to continue to resist” in the hopes that “[w]ithout easy access to huge sums of money our government would surely have to curtail its war-making propensities.” He also put in a plug for the Tax Resisters Penalty Fund.
• Eddie Boudreau suggested that someone set up a “Conscience Fund” that people could contribute to and that would help defray the legal expenses of folks like Vinton Deming.
• Susan B. Chambers wrote in about her technique, which was to consult with a tax expert in order to get into the “zero tax bracket” and to contribute 30% of her income to charity. “I am pleased not to inconvenience my friends in taking this stand,” she wrote, in what I read as something of a rebuke to those resisters, like Deming, whose resistance becomes an agenda item for their employers (though she didn’t make this explicit).
• Robin Greenler wrote to support the Journal’s resistance to helping the IRS collect from Deming. “The decisions are neither easier nor less important on corporate levels than they are on a personal level.”
• Ben Richmond wrote that, for him, the question of whether a tax resister would just end up paying more in the end (with penalties and interest added to the unpaid tax) was the one he found the most difficult. “I have never found it satisfying to think that the point of the witness was simply to satisfy my personal need for moral purity.” But he looked into the early Quaker resistance to mandatory tithes for the establishment church and found that Quakers were willing to suffer having property seized worth several times the resisted tithes rather than pay voluntarily. He notes also that the Quakers eventually won that battle, which is to say there are no longer government-enforced tithes that everyone must pay to an established church. So, Richmond wrote, “I do not resist military taxes in the expectation or hope that I will succeed in keeping particular dollars from the hands of the military. But I do expect and hope that, insofar as my resistance is in obedience to the leadings of God, it will play its small part in breaking down the legitimacy of the warmaking machinery, as the early Friends broke down the legitimacy of taxation on behalf of the state church. I believe that in the end, Christ’s way is not only right but effective, and will prevail. Our sufferings are small in the overall scheme of things, so I don’t wish to be melodramatic. But, it seems to me that we cannot afford to follow Jesus for the short haul because in the short run, all that appears is the cross (which, after all is simply shorthand for suffering at the hands of a pagan empire). Yet, it is the cross which led to the resurrection.”

In March, the Friends World Committee for Consultation held their annual meeting. They decided to retire their “Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns” and establish in its place a “Committee on Peace Concerns.”

On 1 September 1987 Brian Willson had been run over by a train while blockading the Concord, California Naval Weapons Station in protest against American wars in Central America. A few days later, while recovering from his injuries, which included a fractured skull and the amputation of both of his lower legs, he issued a statement reasserting his continued commitment to nonviolent activism, which was reprinted in part in the March issue, and which included this section:

If we want peace, we can have it, but we’re going to have to pay for it… Our government can only continue its wars with the cooperation of our people, and that cooperation is with our taxes and with our bodies. Our actions and expressions are what are needed, not our whispers and quiet dinner conversation.

In the May issue, Jonathan Lutz gave an overview of the situation of Quakers in Scandinavia that included this parenthetical aside: “(To my knowledge, only one Scandinavian Friend is a war-tax resister, but then, the very different political climate must be taken into account.)”

That issue also included this historical note, which it sourced to “the newsletter of Friends World Committee for Consultation, Section of the Americas”:

According to a Canadian publication, For Conscience Sake, Russia was the first nation to establish legislation exempting pacifists from paying war taxes. “In 1820, thirty British citizens were invited by Czar Alexander Ⅰ to establish a cotton mill in Tamerfors, which is now in Finland. James Finlayson, the manager, submitted a petition to the Czar signed by the employees from Britain, some of whom were members of the Society of Friends. The petition asked for freedom of conscience and religion to practice their own religion, and for exemption from military service, war, church taxes, and the taking of oaths.” The Czar agreed to free Quaker manufacturers from taxes and support of the military.

This is the closest I’ve been able to get to a citation for this claim, and as you see, it’s third-hand and doesn’t refer to an original source. I have seen references to Finlayson’s getting a charter from the Czar to set up his mill that included some tax incentives, but I haven’t gotten any closer to finding a clear and authoritative indication that the Czar explicitly honored the conscientious objection to military taxation of Quakers at this mill.

A note in the June issue read:

John Stoner, executive secretary of Mennonite Central Committee, U.S. Peace Section, writes: “That little Scripture passage on rendering to God and Caesar has been misused for too long, giving people an excuse for going the wrong way on important questions of ultimate loyalty.” So John has created a lovely poster with the following words on it: “We are war tax resisters because we have discovered some doubt as to what belongs to Caesar and what belongs to God, and have decided to give the benefit of the doubt to God.” The posters are available for ten cents per copy (a real bargain, Friends, we can learn something from our Mennonite friends about good prices).

An excerpt from Pearl C. Ewald’s letter to the IRS was included in the June issue. Excerpt: “my conscience will no longer allow me to cooperate with any plans by our government to prepare weapons for mass annihilation. I know that such weapons of war are under the condemnation of God. Therefore, I am not sending in an income tax report. I am prepared to accept the penalty for this action, and I will try to maintain a spirit of love and consideration toward you.”

The July issue brought an article by Eleanor Brooks Webb in which she described her family’s telephone tax resistance, and damned it with faint praise. Excerpts:

Since March of 1967, my husband and I have refused to pay the federal tax on our phone bill. This is an unheroic and inconsistent witness to our conviction that participation in war is wrong and that paying for war preparations and for others’ participation is likewise wrong. The singular virtue of this small witness is that it is something we can do.

…The payment of federal taxes was the place where other thinking people could not evade their own complicity. We had long been convinced by such reasoning as Milton Mayer’s: “If you want peace, why pay for war?”

But nonpayment of taxes was difficult. My husband was the breadwinner, and his salary was subject to withholding; the Internal Revenue Service usually owed us money at the end of the income-tax year. Nonpayment of tax was also illegal, and we’re very law-abiding people; we try to stay within the speed limit, and we calculate our income taxes scrupulously.

When I first heard of phone tax resistance, I thought it was a foolish idea. The pennies of the phone tax were so trivial against the amount of the income tax! But discussion in Congress about the re-imposition of the phone tax made it explicit that the reason for this “nuisance” tax was the cost of war — the war in Vietnam — and the tax was all tidily calculated for us on each phone bill. The penalties for so trivial a flouting of the Internal Revenue Service would not likely be unendurable. This was something we could do!

The Webbs wrote a letter to the phone company with each bill (sending a copy to the IRS) explaining their resistance. They tried to redirect the resisted taxes to the UN (but the UN turned down the donations), and then to the Friends Committee on National Legislation. The phone company responded appropriately, by “notifying the Internal Revenue Service of what we are doing and giving us credit for the unpaid tax.”

In the early years of this saga, IRS made some effort to collect the unpaid tax. We received notices of unpaid tax, and replied that we didn’t intend to pay it. We received notices of intent to collect, and several times liens were issued against my husband’s salary (for sums along the order of $4.73). We would get notices from the payroll supervisor that such a lien had been issued and they had no alternative but to pay it; and we would write back saying we were sorry they had been bothered with the matter, but we had no intention of paying the tax voluntarily, and we gave the reasons — it was another opportunity to say what our convictions were. A number of times we received notices of tax due that we couldn’t reconcile with our carefully kept records, and we would write IRS to that effect and ask for an explanation of the assessment. This often stopped them cold. At least once when we were due an income tax refund, a few dollars were deducted from it for “other unpaid taxes,” or something like that, which we assumed was derived from the unpaid phone tax. In the last few years we have heard nothing from IRS except an occasional, apparently random “notice of tax due,” which we wearily ignore.

She complained of the annoyance of all of the letter writing involved — “we have probably eight inches of file folders filled with telephone bills and carbon copies of letters.”

My husband and I aren’t consistent in our witness. We haven’t made the effort to get our MCI [long distance] service arranged so that we have control of paying the tax (instead of American Express, through which we are billed). I can’t handle any more letters!

But if this is all we have energy and grace to do, then I’m glad we’ve followed the leading this far.

The September issue brought news of a new war tax resistance organization — “the Colorado War Tax Information Project” — associated with the Rocky Mountain Peace Center. This project ran an alternative fund that redirected $3,500 in war taxes to social programs between 1986 and 1987. An obituary notice for Louise Benckenstein Griffiths in the same issue noted that she “refused to pay federal income tax toward American military efforts.”

War tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 1989

There were several references to tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 1989, but many of them referred to some other time or country or religious denomination, and those that referred to American Quakers in the here-and-now lacked much urgency or enthusiasm.

Journal editor Vinton Deming marked the passing of Colin Bell in his opening editorial in the February issue, and noted:

One spring at yearly meeting he spoke very movingly in support of young Friends faced with the draft. He challenged some of us over draft age to consider that not only our young people were being drafted; our federal taxes were being conscripted for the war as well!

I visited him once at Davis House in Washington with a friend whose house was threatened with IRS seizure for unpaid war taxes. Colin was keenly interested, shared a generous amount of time from his busy schedule, and was very supportive. As we left he walked us to our car. I still hear the cheerful sound of his words (and see the twinkle in his eye) as he leaned in the car window, shook our hands, and said, “Good bye, Friends. Take care of your spirit!”

In a letter-to-the-editor in the September issue, Carole Hope Depp split hairs over whether or not war tax resistance is civil disobedience — claiming that since the Constitution, the highest law in the land, protects freedom of religion, then a law that purports to force people to violate their religious scruples by paying for war must be void, and so those who resist it are not being disobedient at all.

In the October issue, Paul Zorn took issue with “some traditional Quaker attiudes and institutions,” including war tax resistance, as representing “an attitude that somehow Quakers are different from the bulk of society, and that much of our institutional effort should go to maintaining that difference… [and] that maintaining certain aspects of our uniqueness is more important than finding a larger consensus in society.” Excerpt:

…Philadelphia Yearly Meeting is resisting an IRS levy on salaries of two employees to recover unpaid federal taxes because those funds would be used for military purposes. The more I have talked with individuals and attended large and small groups, both in my monthly meeting and in the yearly meeting’s Representative Meeting, the more troubled I am with the policy, although I realize it has been fashioned with much care and concern for the Spirit over 15 years or more.

As I understand it, a tax refusal contest with the federal government usually ends with the government getting the money. The main result of refusing taxes is to make a public witness, and to ease a conscience that is troubled by voluntarily supporting the military. I am troubled that part of the public witness consists of breaking the law and attempting to justify it, especially when tax refusal is as likely to reduce funds for low-cost housing, etc., as it is to reduce funds for the military. Regarding voluntary support of the military, I think it is part of the irony, tragedy, or reality of modern life that despite our best efforts, institutions to which we belong act on our behalf in ways that we consider wrong, evil, or disastrous. At the present time, we cannot effectively separate ourselves from all such institutions, and we would lose some of our humanity if we did.

He suggested that Friends consider “rethinking how much corporate energy we should put into tax refusal as an aspect of our peace testimony” and instead “trying to deal directly with some of the major problems of society rather than trying to insulate ourselves from them.”

The October issue also described the war tax resistance of Sharon Bienert, who wrote letters to the IRS, agitated for a legal peace tax fund, and meanwhile split her resisted taxes between a Quaker-run peace tax fund and an escrow account. That issue also mentioned that war tax resistance was “strongly supported” by the Lafayette, Indiana, Mennonite Fellowship. Fellowship member Ken Nagele redirected a military-percentage of his income taxes to a low-income loan program; Mary Ann Zoeller redirected hers to Amnesty International; other families have donated income to the church to keep their income low and resist taxes that way.

That issue also brought news of a peace tax fund legalization campaign in Australia which “would allow conscientious objectors to pay 10 percent of their income taxes into a fund to be used for nonmilitary purposes” but which had only gained the support of eight of the 76 Australian Senators thus far.

In the November issue, Carolyn Stevens reviewed two books published by the Friends World Committee for Consultation’s Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns: Handbook on Military Taxes & Conscience and Fear God & Honor the Emperor which were collaborative efforts edited by Linda Coffin, Peter Goldberger, Robert Hull, and J.E. McNeil.

The first of these books concerned “the history of military tax refusal among Friends and biblical teachings on the subject[,]… personal stories of military tax resisters, one about international war tax refusal campaigns, and another that chronicles efforts to enact Peace Tax Fund legislation. The book concludes with a series of study questions and a resource list.”

The second “tackles the difficult question of how religious employers may be called to corporate witness of military tax refusal, either organizationally or in support of staff members who are conscientious objectors. There is a survey of minutes, resolutions, and guidelines adopted by church bodies, Quaker and otherwise. A chapter on legalities, co-authored by Peter Goldberger and J.E. McNeil, calmly raises and responds to difficulties, real and imagined, that employers face when supporting a witness against military taxes. Robert Hull’s chapter on discernment blends a secular management perspective with traditional religious concerns.”

Stevens was enthusiastic about the first book (a “high level of sincerity and scholarship [that] gives us wonderful assistance”), less so about the second, which she described as “awkward,” “clumsy,” and “defensive” though “rich in necessary information.”

The December issue brought an update on Canadian war tax resister Jerilynn Prior’s test case in which she was trying to get conscientious objection to military taxation legalized under the freedom of conscience portion of the (relatively) new Canadian Constitution. She wasn’t having any luck in the courts. The article claimed that “[m]ore than 500 Canadians withhold the portion of their federal taxes that would otherwise go toward military expenditures. Many instead allocate the money to Conscience Canada’s Peace Tax Fund.”

Beit Sahour

The story of the nonviolent tax resistance campaign against the Israeli military occupation of Palestine in Beit Sahour got some coverage in the Journal. Editor Vinton Deming wrote an article for the July issue that was hopefully subtitled: “Nonviolent strategies may help to bring an end to the Israeli occupation.” It was based on his conversations with Mubarak Awad and Nancy Nye.

Awad founded the Palestinian Center for the Study of Nonviolence in 1985 and published a blueprint for nonviolent resistance to the Israeli occupation. “At first, people thought we were a bit crazy, that perhaps I had come back from my time in the U.S. with some strange notions. We started with just five people. We would sometimes go to a public place and carry a sign that said ‘Down With the Occupation,’ or, ‘Don’t Pay Taxes.’ People at first would laugh and make fun of us.”

The Center later advocated a set of tactics, including “a boycott among the Arab population of all Israeli-made products; refusal to pay taxes or to work for Israelis; insistence that all mail be addressed to people by using the Palestinian language, not Hebrew; and the initiation of many self-help projects.”

Beit Sahour was an example of where Palestinians decided to try out some of these ideas in service of the intifada. “People there,” said Mubarak, “to show their support for the uprising, decided they would refuse to pay taxes to Israeli authorities — no taxes at all. The Israelis wanted to punish them so they came and confiscated the ID cards of a number of the business men.”

So what was the community’s response? “Well,” Mubarak continues, “without your ID card you are stuck, you cannot go any place. When people in the village heard about this, they said, ‘If they are going to take the ID cards of these businessmen, we are going to turn in our ID cards too.’ And they did. So the Israelis called a curfew in the village and they said, ‘Here, please take your ID cards;’ they gave them all back!”

And the news of this incident spread to other communities? “Yes,” Mubarak says, “everybody began thinking it was a good idea to do it. You say, ‘OK, I’m not going to hurt the Israelis, but this is what I’m going to do.’ And people will get together and say, ‘Let’s do it.’ Palestinians are what I would call ‘trial and error’ in their approach. Like, if this works, well, we’ll try it and continue to do it; if it doesn’t, it’s all right, we’ll do something else!”

This is the twenty-sixth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today I’m going to try to cover 1979.

Preparing for the Minneapolis Conference

In early 1979, there was a special general session of the Mennonite General Conference especially to discuss war tax resistance, and in particular, to decide whether the Conference would support its tax-resisting employees by refusing to withhold taxes from their paychecks.

In our last episode, the heat was rising, with opinion pieces and study guides and letters to the editor addressing the issue. Now, with the session approaching and the decision imminent, things really began to boil.

The 30 January 1979 issue hosted a long letter to the editor from Albert H. Epp (dated the previous month) in which he accused The Mennonite and the Commission on Home Ministries of putting their thumbs on the scale in favor of war tax resistance. Excerpts:

Some of us… are part of the “silent majority” that feels inundated by the tax-resistance mail arriving almost daily.

The Kauffman-Harder profile (1975) stated, “A member of our churches ought not to pay the proportion of his income taxes that goes for military purposes.” Only 15 percent of our denomination agreed; and no more than 8 percent among the Mennonite Brethren and Brethren in Christ. Even fewer actually withheld tax. Eighty-five percent disagreed!

Now Minneapolis looms ahead. Many of us feel we are being swept helplessly downstream toward an ill-advised showdown. I was one of the 453 delegates at Bluffton (77) who voted “no” on resolution 11. But it carried. There seems to be a wide gap between delegate-action at conference and constituency-opinion at home. How did “the few” persuade “the many” to agree to a February session that will cost about $100,000?

We are witnessing one of the strongest attempts at shaping conference-opinion in 20 years, and possibly our entire history. Long-held views on civil responsibility are being challenged by brethren who are crusading for tax resistance and civil disobedience. Neither Scripture nor history are normative in the ways they used to be. “We have something new,” we are told, “in the present nuclear threat.”

Behind this ideological shift stands our Commission on Home Ministries. Three years ago CHM began publishing a war-tax newsletter, God and Caesar. In the fifth issue they report on a two-day war tax conference they conducted at Kitchener, Ontario. “The evidence suggests that most Anabaptists did pay all their taxes willingly…,” the report avers; but CHM leaders pledged themselves “to raise consciousness about war tax and militarism issues…” Highly significant is the fact that two scholars. Miller and Swartley, emerged at that session as men willing to say that the Scripture does not give us a clear command to pay taxes used for military purposes.

It is my impression that Mennonite stalwarts of recent decades, H.S. Bender, Guy F. Hershberger, Erland Waltner, and John C. Wenger, to name just a few, all taught the full-paying of taxes on scriptural grounds. Their general view agreed with Paul, who taught the paying of taxes in Romans 13 and was fully aware that Rome had crucified Christ, had subjugated many nations, and was now ruled by the despot Nero.

H.S. Bender, writing on “Taxation” in 1959, claims that “few if any Mennonites” were presently refusing to pay the portion of income tax calculated to go for military purposes, which he estimated to be about two-thirds of the total.

Guy F. Hershberger, in his classic on nonresistance, discusses the answer of Jesus in Matthew 22: “…the situation here is almost precisely like that in Romans 13. Jesus’ questioners were not men who would be interested in service in the Roman army. If anything, they would be interested in a military rebellion against the Roman authority. There Jesus says, ‘Give to Caesar that which is Caesar’s.’ That is, do not rebel against him, not even to the extent of refusing to pay the tax.”

The current tax-resistance movement requires a major shift in biblical interpretation. This is something new.

It appears to me that today’s tax-resisters are hard put to proof-text their views. Swartley admitted to Kitchener (1975) “…there is no New Testament text which either explicitly or clearly implicitly tells us not to pay taxes.” Yet some go from text to text progressively untying the knots of normal interpretation. But the knot of Romans 13. will not easily yield. Donald Kaufman (What Belongs to Caesar, page 48) chides Oscar Cullmann for “his lack of moral discernment” when he insists that disciples of Jesus pay tax, no matter to what government. John Howard Yoder, well-known for his personal tax-withholding procedure, nevertheless, in his oft-reprinted masterpiece The Politics of Jesus (page 211), approvingly quotes C.E.B. Cranfield, “taxes and revenue, perhaps honor, are due to Caesar, but fear is due to God.” In sketching the limits of subordination, Yoder stops short of using Romans 13 for tax resistance. Not so Larry Kehler in The Rule of the Lamb. Using his stature as editor-writer, Kehler seems to infer that Paul supports our tax resistance. The truth of the matter is that for every scholar who teaches tax resistance from Romans 13, there might be 50 competent professors who teach otherwise. A tax protest based on Romans 13 is an exegesis not easy to defend.

The method of promoting the new idea also deserves comment. Basic to good human relations is the concept that issues are best discussed without the injection of personalities. When Cornelia Lehn’s speech at the Bluffton conference was programmed into the civil-disobedience debate by conference officials, it almost gave the appearance of being a psychological pressure tactic to sway votes. After all, who can speak against womanhood? Who can deny that Nellie’s stand is courageous? But someone has to venture the tough question “Is it fair to ask thousands of Mennonites to approve civil disobedience because of one person’s convictions?”

Is it possible that CHM has moved ahead too quickly on this issue — even out of earshot? Take their suggestion that the General Board no longer honor tax-withholding laws for some employees (The Mennonite, 2 November 1976, page 648). On 1 August 1977 the constituents turned back Resolution 12 (yes — 336, no — 1,190) on this issue. Bluffton delegates later gave the mandate for a midtriennium conference, but even this decision process was interlaced with CHM influence. The delegates, caught in the euphoria of the moment, unable to confer with churches at home, approved the surprise resolution. Most surprising of all, Larry Kehler, as recent as 5 December 1978, wrote, “I have not yet been able to discover any tax resisters in Canada…” Little wonder CHM’s promotion is so voluminous.

When churches in the Midwest ask CHM for a clarification of issues, men are readily available to give excellent thought-out defenses for tax resistance and civil disobedience. But no one seems willing and/ or permitted to present the traditional biblical-Anabaptist stance and say, “That’s my view.” So we, the silent majority, feel like people with no representation. While we collect thousands of dollars for conference coffers, no one pleads our case — the case of the majority.

Any protest, it seems to me, needs keen discernment. Picketing a tax office, withholding income tax, or balking at withholding laws may all be misdirected efforts. The Internal Revenue Service is only a collecting agency. Do we punish the newspaper boy, refusing to pay when we dislike an editorial? No, we phone the editor. Why not spend our energy on the decision makers?

A hope seems to flicker in some minds that a domino reaction, “me too, me too,” will bring out an avalanche of Mennonite tax resisters. Then, some aver, a frustrated government might negotiate. However, worse things may accrue. Attorney J. Elwin Kraybill says that evading tax is a felony (26 USC 7201) and can result in a fine (maximum $10,000) and/or prison (maximum 5 years). At the least most Mennonites would be subjected to the harassment of an annual audit. At the worst they could be accused of spawning anarchy — a trend already evidenced in teachers’ strikes and police strikes.

I wonder if tax resistance won’t trap us in a blind alley — in a stance too negative. Why curse the darkness? Let’s plant a light. In past decades our conscientious objector position was transformed by creative service in refugee camps, mental hospitals, and mission schools. Today we again need positive solutions. Could Mennonite Central Committee possibly establish a research center with departments like peace, pollution, and world hunger? When our scholars really tackle these complex problems, our governments will knock at our door. In retrospect, I was proud when President John F. Kennedy turned to MCC for advice on the Peace Corps.

I am a Mennonite, both by birth and by choice. I deeply appreciate our Anabaptist theology. As a pastor I can affirm with my parish CHM’s conviction of (1) the limited nature of Caesar’s power; and (2) the lethal character of its weaponry. However, we do not feel it biblical or Anabaptist to rob government of its right to taxation, or even some national defense. Where government abuses this right we wish to exhaust every legal channel of protest before we engage in illegal maneuvers.

In my congregation one brother is reducing his income; another has enclosed a protest letter with his tax return. Many of us have increased contributions to reduce taxable income. But not one, to my knowledge, is refusing to pay taxes. As one brother put it, “Can we be harsh on Uncle Sam while our financial stewardship level is so low in Mennonite circles?”

A final word. I tested this letter with my Board of Deacons. All seven present, to the man, encouraged me to send it. Editor, thanks for letting us speak.

Richard K. MacMaster addressed the history of war tax resistance among American Mennonites in an article that appeared in the 9 January 1979 issue:

I read with great interest your articles about the forthcoming discussion of war taxes at Minneapolis.

I’ve had a great concern to write some few lines on one small aspect of this large question, but generally put it off as a nit-picking historical footnote. Observing that “historical perspective” will play a role in the consultation next February, I thought I should take time to clarify what might possibly lead to misunderstanding.

Mennonite conscience about taxes

A number of recent discussions on the war tax issue have stated that Mennonites and Brethren paid their taxes in obedience to the biblical injunction of “taxes to whom taxes are due.” The reader might reasonably conclude that, unlike Friends, neither Brethren nor Mennonites were troubled in conscience about payment of taxes levied for any purpose. The point would be too insignificant to raise in even some nitpicking scholarly review, if it did not have consequences for our understanding of our own heritage in regard to a current issue of great importance.

In 1968 Peter Brock published his monumental Pacifism in the United States from the Colonial Era to the First World War. The scope of his subject precluded his searching into every manuscript collection that might bear some relation to it, and he relied heavily on printed sources. The limited number of published works on Mennonite history is reflected in his footnotes and bibliography. Walter Klaassen leaned heavily on Brock for his interpretation of the American scene, since his own scholarly work has been in the European Anabaptist sources. There is a danger in this process that, in spite of passing through the hands of two very distinguished modern scholars, the material is no better than the sources available to Mennonite historians 50 or 75 years ago.

The danger of allowing this recycled history to determine our understanding of our own heritage is compounded by the fact that Brock made assumptions that went beyond his somewhat limited sources in describing the position held by Mennonites on key issues, notably on the payment of taxes. The first mention of any Mennonite attitude on this question involved Mennonite settlers in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia in the 18th century. Brock noted that they “were able to obtain exemption by the payment of militia fines, against which — unlike the Quakers — they had no deep-seated scruples of conscience,” but that they petitioned in 1773 (sic) for relief from militia fines, “not because of any fundamental objection to this alternative to service (for was it not merely rendering Caesar his due?), but on account of their poverty as frontiersmen eking out a bare subsistence.” He cited as his only source Harry A. Brunk’s History of Mennonites in Virginia, but Brunk does not make any of the statements I have quoted; he is quite clear in his statement that conscience was involved.

Virginia Mennonites petitioned the authorities in Williamsburg for relief from militia fines in 1769 and again in 1772. No copy of these petitions is known to be extant and we know of the contents only from the brief minutes entered in the Journal of the House of Burgesses. Since the Virginia lawmakers exempted Quakers from payment of militia fines for the first time in 1766, it is not surprising that Mennonites sought the same privilege, which was granted them by the House of Burgesses in 1772.

Their motives in petitioning for exemption were explained in a Mennonite petition of 1785, which asked that the earlier privilege be restored. Militia bills passed during the Revolutionary War had taken it away and enrolled conscientious objectors in the militia, once again making them subject to fines. This petition, signed by 73 “members of the Menonist Church in behalf of themselves and their religious Brethren,” declared that their forefathers had come “to America to Seek Religious Liberty; this they have enjoyed, except by the Infliction of penalties for not bearing Arms which for some time lay heavy on them. But on a representation, and their situation being made known to the Honorable the Legislature, they were indulged with an exemption from said penalties until some few years past, when by a revisal of the Militia Law they were again enrolled and are now subject to the penalties aforesaid.” (The original petition is in the Virginia State Library.)

This 1785 petition and one offered the previous year by Rockingham County Mennonites and Brethren did not succeed in changing the law, and the payment of fines was the subject of occasional petitions from all three of the peace churches. What is significant about the 1785 Virginia petition is its statement that payment of militia fines violated the liberty of conscience that Mennonites otherwise enjoyed and that this was true under the king as well as during and after the Revolution. It would appear to me impossible to square this contemporary Mennonite document with the interpretation that Mennonites paid militia fines as merely rendering Caesar his due!

The conscientious objection to payment of a fine or equivalent to militia duty in Virginia on the eve of the Revolution might help us in understanding the position of Pennsylvania Mennonites. There was no compulsory militia law in Pennsylvania prior to 1777, so no question of fines or other equivalent would have arisen as early as it did in Virginia.

In 1775 Pennsylvania authorities requested voluntary contributions from those who scrupled against bearing arms and the Continental Congress itself made a similar appeal. Records of the county committees entrusted with collecting this money suggest that it had a mixed reception. Objections were heard very early, however, against levying contributions from conscientious objectors on a purely voluntary basis. In October 1775 the Pennsylvania Assembly debated imposing a set amount as a special tax on non-associators. They read petitions from the Quakers and from the Mennonites and some members of the Church of the Brethren. The meaning of these petitions seems perfectly clear. A well-known military historian understood them to mean that “not a few Quakers and Mennonites joined to oppose not only the Association but any tax levied in lieu thereof.” (Arthur J. Alexander, “Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, ⅬⅩⅨ, January 1945, page 16.) This would follow logically from the position taken by Virginia Mennonites, who were closely related to the Pennsylvania congregations.

When a Militia Law was enacted in 1777 in Pennsylvania, no provision was made for the exemption of conscientious objectors, and a special tax was imposed on them in lieu of military service. It was this tax that was under discussion among Franconia Mennonites when a majority of the preachers opposed Christian Funk’s contention that it ought to be paid. I am well aware that Pennsylvania Mennonites felt uneasy with the new revolutionary regime and declined sending a formal petition to the legislature in 1778 since it would involve addressing them as “the representatives of the freemen of Pennsylvania.” Hostility to the new government may well have colored the attitude of Funk’s opponents, but it does not explain why they opposed payment of this particular tax and not of all taxes levied by the new state. There is no hint in any official document, newspaper, letter, or other contemporary source that any Mennonite in Pennsylvania refused payment of any other tax. Surely there would be some notice taken by someone of tax resistance, particularly if it were on the quasi-political ground that the new government had no legitimate authority. On the other hand, reluctance to pay a tax levied in lieu of military service would square with the Virginia documents, the obvious sense of the 1775 petition, and the minutes of the Church of the Brethren annual meetings that refer to persons with conscientious objection against paying for substitutes and paying the tax (singular).

I do not know that this leads us very far on our present quest. But it is sufficient, I hope, to indicate that Mennonites have expressed “deep-seated scruples of conscience” and “fundamental objection to this alternative to military service.”

The 16 January 1979 edition included this op-ed from Harold R. Regier:

Reflections before Minneapolis

The sovereign Lord and the sovereign nation will be in tension at Minneapolis 9–10 February when the General Conference, in official session, will be “In Search of Christian Civil Responsibility.”

Will we be ready at Minneapolis to decide issues related to paying those taxes required of the state used for death-threatening militarism and weapons building? Much depends on how adequately congregations study and discuss The Rule of the Sword and The Rule of the Lamb prior to Minneapolis. Much depends on adequate congregational representation. And much depends on an openness to hear each other and the leading of God’s Spirit.

What are specific questions we must answer at Minneapolis?

1. What is the biblical teaching on civil responsibility and civil disobedience? Are Christians ever called to civil disobedience?
2. If civil disobedience may at times be a Christian response to government, what conditions or principles guide that response? Is the payment of taxes used for war purposes one such condition?
3. If “war tax” resistance is a Christian response to a government’s militarism and to the nuclear arms race, to what extent and in what ways should that response be encouraged and initiated? Is conscientious objection to paying for war in today’s context equivalent to conscientious objection to physical participation in war in the past?
4. Should General Conference and other Mennonite institutions honor employees’ requests that the portion of taxes used for military purposes not be withheld from their paychecks? Should Mennonite employers even go beyond this and refuse to be “war tax” collectors for the state for any of its employees?

Is the bottom line for the Minneapolis conference the question of tax withholding? Not necessarily. Other options for faithfulness and witness may be discovered. Our search for Christian civil responsibility must be open-ended rather than locked into the consideration of only one kind of action. However, the withholding question is a very important one on which we are committed to making a clear decision.

The withholding question is significant, but not because this is the only alternative for the employee. There are other ways to have less tax withheld. Possibilities include refiling a tax form to include allowances for expected (“war tax”) deductions, forming an alternative employing agency, or contributing up to 50 percent of salary to charitable causes. The withholding issue’s greatest significance lies with the questions of corporate responsibility and the issue of church as an agent of the state.

I would suggest five reasons for the conference to consider honoring requests from persons asking that their taxes not be withheld. (1) Honoring these requests would eliminate the discrimination between ordained and nonordained employees. In the U.S., ordained employees are considered “self-employed” by the tax department and are exempt from withholding regulations. Nonordained persons have to follow a more difficult procedure to enable resistance. Currently at least four ordained employees of the General Conference offices are not voluntarily paying the military portion of their taxes. (2) Honoring nonwithholding requests would represent a corporate peace witness rather than leaving such witness and action solely to the individual. (3) A corporate conference voice and action would make a much stronger witness for peace and justice than lone voices here and there. (4) Nonwithholding would be one appropriate way to initiate a test of the constitutionality of requiring church agencies to collect taxes for the state. (5) This corporate action builds on our Anabaptist theology of peace and takes seriously the way our financial resources contribute to warmaking.

My hope for Minneapolis is that the General Conference Mennonite Church will act to do something together about our nations’ militarism. This could be corporate action regarding withholding “war taxes.” This could be a commitment to a large-scale symbolic resistance to “war tax” payment (e.g. “each” Mennonite withholding $10 and explaining why). As a conference we could send a strong message to our governments regarding militarism and the taxation which supports it. We could issue a “war tax” statement to be shared with the larger church (other denominations) as well as to our governments. We could make a stronger effort to promote the World Peace Tax Fund Act in the U.S. and instigate other alternatives in Canada.

These are only suggestions. Delegates need to think of other options.

Minneapolis will be a failure if we conclude that “everyone do what is right in their own eyes.” Minneapolis will be a success if we take some large or small step toward corporate responsibility and action.

Andrew R. Shelly also chimed in with his perspective in that issue.

He began by noting the paucity of charity by American Mennonites is devoted to “the crucial urgency of tragic situations in the Third World” compared to how much is spent domestically. “It appears our dedication somehow is absorbed in our words which seem to psychologically liberate us to expand lavishly on the home front.”

While I respect individual conviction, I am cool toward the effectiveness or the witness of withholding taxes. (In recent months I have been going over old magazines and clipping articles related to war taxes. There has been a rash of articles on this subject every 6–10 years in the past decades.)

In the 1966–76 decade, the U.S. federal budget increased 48 percent for defense, space, and foreign affairs (probably not even keeping up with inflation). The human-resources part of the budget jumped 378 percent during the same decade. Not all these programs are effective, yet they represent an attempt to cope with areas of great need.

When we criticize government expenditures, let us remember that we Mennonites have been increasing our budgets in North American institutional and church developments rather than for that part of the “one in Christ” where poverty is indescribably great.

In short: “Until we have done what we ought we should not say too much to other segments of society.”

Furthermore, Shelly felt that there was an overemphasis on war as a source of violence. Alcohol, reckless driving, and abortion, were also examples of violence that deserved at least as much attention.

Finally, the way to peace, he felt, was not through civil disobedience or protest or peace witnessing, but simply through spreading the gospel and getting more people to adopt Christian values. For example: “during the massacre in Uganda almost all Christians refused to shoulder guns.” So Mennonites should stop arguing about taxes and rededicate themselves to missionary work.

Kenneth G. Bauman penned an op-ed for the 23 January 1979 edition, from the point of view of “some of us”.

Bauman thought the Bible offered little or no support for war tax resistance. Jesus did not counsel it, even when pitched a softball. Paul explicitly said Christians should pay their taxes to Rome and the Roman Empire wasn’t exactly peaceful. Those examples of civil disobedience found in the Bible never touch on war taxes or on conscientious objection to government spending. Mennonites, he felt, shouldn’t just skip over this on the way to making their own independent moral judgments about war taxes.

Bauman also challenged the view articulated in Richard K. MacMaster’s essay that war tax resistance had strong footing in historical Mennonite practice:

A good historical development of this issue is found in Walter Klaassen’s pamphlet Mennonites and War Taxes. A summary is found on pages 40–41 in The Rule of the Lamb. The only groups that refused taxation were the Hutterites and the Franconia Conference in Pennsylvania during the Revolutionary War. The issue was probably not “war taxes” but rather who was the legitimate government, the British or the United States? Recent Mennonite scholars hold the traditional view. Check the writings of Guy Hershberger in War, Peace, and Nonresistance (page 369), Harold S. Bender’s “Taxation” in The Mennonite Encyclopedia, and Robert Kreider’s “Anabaptists and the State” in The Recovery of the Anabaptist Vision. Kreider states, “The Anabaptists agreed unanimously that the Christian owes obedience to the civil authorities insofar as the prior claims of God are not violated in those duties. The Christian gives this obedience freely and not grudgingly. He pays taxes, tithes, interest, and customs as required by the magistracy. No evidence can be found to substantiate the frequently made accusation that the Anabaptists refused to pay these obligations” (page 190).

The new threat of nuclear war, Bauman thought, was not a reason to rethink this established wisdom. After all, the murder of one person and the obliteration of millions are both terrible sins: “Is the biblical teaching on the sacredness of life on a sliding scale or is even one person’s life sacred?”

Some of us respect the individual conscience as we want our conscience to be respected, but we are not convinced that those who believe in withholding taxes have seriously considered all the options. Several alternatives are (1) filing suit against the government to recover taxes, (2) setting up a subsidiary corporation, and (3) greater efforts toward a World Peace Tax Fund. We are grieved that in this hour when we need a united witness against militarism, with selective service a real possibility (which will also include women), we are divided. We object to our peace position being questioned because we do not see withholding taxes as being biblical or Anabaptist-Mennonite.

Some of us are waiting for open dialogue on the tax issue. The other side has not been formally presented in the General Board, nor was it given adequate representation at the Consultation on Civil Responsibility at Elkhart, nor has it been given a fair presentation in The Mennonite. We question whether the midtriennium conference will change the situation.

Marie J. Janzen, in a 23 January 1979 letter to the editor, wrote that she thought Bauman was “attempt[ing] to find a letter of the law that would justify us not to refuse taxes.”

It is true, for instance, that Peter was referring to the Jewish leaders and not to the state when he said we must obey God rather than men, but the principle would be the same in either case, wouldn’t it?

It seems to me that the Christian gospel speaks to the needs of each age, and different things need to be done in different ages. There would have been no need to warn early Christians to drive carefully lest someone’s life might be taken in an accident. But today there certainly is. When Jesus said to his disciples that they would do greater things than he had done, didn’t he imply that there would be a need for greater things in later ages than there was in the time of the early church? The common person at that time had no rights, no influence on government. In a democracy we Christians have responsibilities the early Christians did not have. I don’t have to pay income tax; I don’t know whether I would have the courage to refuse if I did. But I certainly admire the ones who do refuse to pay taxes for conscience’ sake.

…Of course, there may be other alternatives which are more effective than the refusal to pay taxes. For instance, as my sister suggested, if we would deluge the government with letters and with telephone calls and insist that this arms race must stop — or at least that they give us the right to have a peace tax — that might do more good.

On the other hand, David A. Somner wrote in to praise what he called Bauman’s “clear, biblical, historically accurate” statement.

A letter from Gary Martin, written on 26 January 1979 but not published until well after the conference, thought that the war tax issue was overshadowing the fact that Mennonites had lost their way and were neglecting some of the foundations of their faith and practice. This was followed by a letter from Don Kaufman, in which he related an anecdote from a repentant soldier and thought it “could be instructive for us too as we wrestle with the implications of the Christian gospel concerning war taxes.”

A letter from David C. Janzen, dated 30 January 1979, published in the 3 April edition, said that “[b]ased on our congregational meeting on the issue, it would appear that the [war tax] protesters are a small but very vocal minority.” He thought the conference was a waste of time trying to relitigate an issue that had been decided by Jesus way back when.

A letter from Eugene Klassen, dated 30 January 1979 but also not published until after the conference, also took the line that the Bible was black-and-white about taxpaying: “Romans 13 clearly tells us to pay taxes to whom taxes are due. Yet we allow the use of our conference time, money, and publications to debate both sides of the issue.”

An advertisement in the 30 January 1979 edition announced the publication of Donald Kaufman’s The Tax Dilemma: Praying for Peace, Paying for War.

The Conference and its Aftermath

Drumroll please. The conference was held, and all of these years of kicking the can down the road and avoiding a decision came to an end as a general assembly of the Mennonite General Conference, after lengthy study and debate, concluded:

Moved that we request the General Board of our conference to engage in a serious and vigorous search to use all legal, legislative, and administrative avenues for achieving a conscientious objector exemption from the legal requirements that the General Conference withhold income taxes from the wages of its employees. If no relief can be found within a three-year period, they shall again bring the question to the attention of the conference.

So… the can kicked another three years further down the road. Well, what were you expecting?

The 20 February 1979 edition put it this way:

We found some things

Seven hundred persons came to the bitter cold and deep snow of Minneapolis, 9–10 February, “in search of Christian civil responsibility.”

…Would our General Conference grant an employee’s request to no longer withhold from her salary that portion of the income tax which goes toward military expenditures?

Many predicted a collision course. Minneapolis would be a showdown.

The drama has happened. And the unexpected far outdid the expected.

A month prior to the assembly only a few hundred people had registered. Polarized positions surfaced in many congregations. There was talk of maneuvering, boycott, and schism.

The annual Council of Commissions met at Minneapolis on 6–8 February to do the usual review and projection of GC program and budget. Hardly a session went by without reference of concern about the midtriennium.

By Thursday evening it became obvious that God’s Spirit was again among us in unusual ways.

In faith, space had been reserved for 500 people. Over 700 came.

We found the issue is not “yes-no” “either-or” regarding war taxes. It includes our lifestyle. Do we live in ways that share Christ’s salvation, love, and justice to all. This is not just for a few brave radicals. Each of us needs to choose again and again to let our light shine.

We found the issue is not Cornelia Lehn and civil disobedience. It is obedience to Jesus in today’s world.

We found the issue is of deep concern to our youth. About 100 persons present were under 25. And they spoke up. Their generation most directly faces the nuclear shadow. If we want to leave them a heritage of peace we must address our faith to this global threat.

The main resolution (above) passed 1,218 to 134.

The following issue expanded on that first draft of history. It included the details that delegates from 176 churches were represented at the midtriennium, that the 700 attendees included “almost 500 delegates and more than 200 visitors” who at one point broke up into “78 small groups”, and further noted:

Following the… conference the General Board set up a six-person task force to implement the decision of the delegates. The persons for this committee have been appointed and upon acceptance their names will be released.

A later article named them as Delton Franz, Duane Heffelbower, Bob Hull, Heinz Janzen, Ernie Regehr, and Ben Sprunger, and noted that “[t]he task force had its first meeting 26 March in Columbus, Ohio.” Later Stanley Perisho, Chuck Boyer, Winifred Beachy, Janet Reedy, and Gordon Zook were added to the list.

Though the conference officially started Friday morning, 9 February, most people arrived Thursday evening in time to watch a group from the Mennonite Collegiate Institute in Gretna, Manitoba, present The Blowing and the Bending, a musical drama highlighting the themes of wartime intolerance for conscientious objectors and Mennonite struggles with the war spirit.

Some of the themes played out in the small groups and by the symposium were the following:

• the gospel is first, pacifism is secondary.
• it is important to be legal.
• it is better to be faithful.
• a witness for peace has to have the integrity of an appropriate lifestyle.
• the government is more willing to accept conscientious objectors than the church.
• there are other social and political issues which need to be spoken to.
• a corporate witness is/is not the route to go.
• militarism today is a qualitatively different problem than anything civilization has had to face before.
• the response to militarism is a theological and faith issue.

When one delegate called for a show of hands to indicate who had done some protest against nuclear proliferation and militarism about 20 percent of the assembly said they had.

Though most of the delegates who spoke during the afternoon plenary session admitted they were troubled by worldwide military expenditures over one billion dollars daily, they nevertheless said the church as a corporate body should not engage in illegal activities in its witness against war preparations. Instead speakers urged alternatives.

A sentiment often expressed, however, was that the church, while avoiding illegal actions, should actively support its members who engage in civil disobedience on the basis of conscience.

Roy Vogt, economics professor from Winnipeg, Manitoba, berated the assembly for loading the responsibility for witness upon isolated individuals. “It is morally reprehensible,” he said, “to give only moral support. We must provide financial and legal support for those prophets who have arisen from our middle-class ranks.”

In contrast to the social activists at the conference Dan Dalke, pastor from Bluffton, Ohio, castigated the social activists for making pacifism a religion. “We will never create a Utopia,” he said. “Jesus didn’t come to clean up social issues. Our job is to evangelize the world. A peace witness is secondary.”

Some of the statements were personal. A businessman confessed that while he could easily withhold paying military taxes on the basis of conscience, he was frightened. “I am scared of being different, of being embarrassed, of being alienated from my community. Unless I get support from the Mennonite church I will keep on paying taxes.”

Alvin Beachy of Newton, Kansas, said the church seemed to be shifting from a quest to being faithful to the gospel to being legal before the government.

By Friday evening the small groups were into serious wrestling with these open-ended statements: (1) The biblical teaching on obedience to God and its relation to civil responsibility is… (2) Civil disobedience may be a faithful Christian response when… (3) With respect to whether the General Conference should withhold the taxes of employees who would rather practice war-tax refusal, we urge that… (4) With respect to the threat of militarism in North America, we feel that the General Conference as a Christian body should now…

By 9:00 p.m. the groups were supposed to have their consensus ready for the findings committee. Many of the statements came later in the evening, and the findings committee of six began to sift through the material. They spent a good part of the night at it, got up again early on Saturday, had it typed (three pages, single spaced), and by midmorning Saturday 800 copies were being distributed.

Action on the floor did not, however, center on the findings committee statement. Immediately after the Saturday morning Bible lecture a ballot was distributed to the delegates. It asked for a “yes” or “no” vote on this question: “Shall the General Conference Mennonite Church refuse to withhold from salaries and refuse to remit to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service a portion of the federal tax due in those cases in which this is requested by employees on the grounds of conscience, even though such action on the part of the conference is against the law?”

There was a flurry of action on why the midtriennium conference organizers had brought this question to the assembly so early in the day. Conference president Elmer Neufeld replied that the intention was to bring the question to the delegates in a clear and forthright manner. The General Board executive committee had decided to present the main question of the midtriennium in ballot form as a way of helping the decision-making process. After some discussion on the procedure Kenneth Bauman of Berne, Indiana, moved the ballot. It was seconded and discussion began.

Shortly after the midmorning break David Habegger of Wichita, Kansas, brought in a substitute motion. It stated: “Moved that we request, the General Board of our conference to engage in a serious and vigorous search to use all legal, legislative, and administrative avenues for achieving conscientious objection exemption from the U.S. legal requirement that the conference withhold income taxes from the wages of its employees. If no relief can be found within a three-year period they shall proceed to a constitutional test of the First Amendment by whatever means appear most appropriate at the time, including the option of honoring employees’ requests that their tax not be withheld.”

This sparked a miniprocedural debate. Was a substitute motion the same as an amendment? Checking their judgment against Robert’s Rules of Order, the three-man procedural committee said it was. There was some objection to the ruling.

It was a key ruling. From the tenor of discussion, and from the statements which 75 churches brought to the midtriennium, it was apparent that most GC congregations were not willing to vote “yes” on the first motion. If the first motion had come to a vote the decision would likely have been against those in favor of not paying war taxes.

Hence the substitute motion was debated first. In short order it was also amended by Herman Andres of Newton, Kansas. The amendment carried by a vote of 906-to-458. The amendment changed the second sentence to read: “If no relief can be found within the three-year period they shall again bring the question to the conference.” The vote was taken just prior to the noon break.

Gordon Kaufman, professor at Harvard Divinity School in Boston, probably made the key speech of the morning, thereby paving the way for delegates to be sympathetic to the substitute motion.

Kaufman said he was puzzled by all the concern about legality. He commented, “The early church was illegal. The Anabaptists were illegal. Illegality is not a Christian question. We talk as if we are concerned about a massive illegality. We are not asked to sign pledge cards. The question is are we willing to test the law that asks the church to collect taxes? We need to test the law of separation of church and state, and freedom of religion. In this country it is a matter of civil responsibility to test the law.”

After a rushed noon break — “Here they come,” said one restaurateur — the final session of two hours began. A vote was taken on the substitute motion and it passed by a plurality of nine-to-one, 1,218-to-134 votes.

A miracle had happened. It was essentially a consensus. Longtime peace advocate Henry Fast of Newton, Kansas, called it “an historic moment.”

At this point people made editorial comments about the findings statement. As a summary of what people at the conference thought it attempted to cover the spectrum of conviction. Most comments were affirmative and on a voice vote the conference adopted it. It noted that the world is “caught in a tragic system of threat and counter-threat, violence and counterviolence.”

“We want to be obedient citizens, but even more we want to be obedient to Jesus Christ… We are convinced that citizens of Christ’s kingdom must choose ways to speak and act against this suicidal race to universal destruction.”

During the afternoon session various people made capsule comments and appeals.

One of the appeals was to take an offering to assist those who are resisting the payment of war taxes.…

The offering realized $3,030.

The magazine helpfully tallied the delegates by district. Curiously, I thought, the Eastern District was the most well-represented, with 81% of their votes represented by either delegates or proxies. I saw some evidence in our last episode that the Eastern District might be particularly conservative on this issue. The least well-represented of the United States districts was the Pacific, with only 46% of its voters represented. Canada turned up to a greater extent than some had worried, with 57% of voters from the Conference of Mennonites in Canada voting.

The 27 February 1979 edition gave a summary of the report of the findings committee. Excerpts:

What we found in Minneapolis

Never in our history have so many engaged their energies so extensively in preparation for a conference decision.

We want to be obedient citizens, but even more we want to be obedient to Jesus Christ. In this quest we are aware that the Bible and our people’s experience do not give us fully explicit answers on the tax issue. At this moment, therefore, these are our best discernments.

As Christians we must speak and act. We hope that Mennonites will support sons and daughters in their leadings to witness for Christ — even in such acts as refusing to pay taxes destined for war. This means prayerful, moral, and financial support. Our tradition has been to be a quiet people. We yearn to act and to witness in sensitive ways which exhaust every acceptable legal process available to the constituency.

We encourage the General Board to work at developing alternative possibilities for the handling of tax withholding and to work in collaboration with other church bodies and institutions in seeking to extricate itself from the role of being a tax-collecting agency.

It is easy to call governments and conference offices to faithfulness. Perhaps the most urgent call proceeding from this conference is a call to each other — to individual church members, to families, and to congregations — a call to renewed faithfulness. What are we prepared to do in revising our style of life as affluent witnessing against the powers of darkness in this world? How does my life vocation fulfill the claims of Christ for this age?

We yearn for unity in our churches. We want to proceed together in our pilgrimage of obedience but don’t want to tarry long in fear and indecision. We want to affirm those individuals whose consciences are sensitive on issues not fully shared by all.

Reactions continued to reverberate through the letters-to-the-editor column and op-eds:

• Mary Gerber, on 2 March told the Mennonites who weren’t resisting taxes that they were in the right and shouldn’t feel guilty about it.

  [S]everal of the church statements and many individuals expressed a feeling of guilt that they were not following in the steps of those “prophets” who were refusing to pay a portion of their tax. In order to compensate for their personal unwillingness to break the law they enthusiastically offered to provide moral and financial support for those who did.

  …[P]aying someone else to perform what is also my moral duty is blatant hypocrisy.

  If we… honestly wish to follow Christ in all, we will respond as he did in similar circumstances. We will love and correct that brother, not aid and abet him.

• Ralph A. Ewert, on 8 March, suggested that people (in the U.S. anyway) who did not want to pay a percentage of their income taxes should figure out how much they would have to donate to charity in order to reduce their taxable income enough to eliminate that much tax and then donate away.
• Mark Penner, on 13 March related the temple tax and render-unto-Caesar episodes from the Bible as slam-dunk reasons to oppose tax resistance, as though nobody had thought of that before.
• Jack L. Mace, on 16 March found that the Bible suggested a possible new if counterintuitive technique of tax witness:

  While I would like to stop warring uses of my taxes by refusing to pay, and giving instead to peaceful purposes, I know the IRS will collect the money — in spades — and my witness will be just to the collectors and their supervisors. The government will not prosecute such tax resistance, because that would draw too much public attention.

  I want to witness to the policy enactment levels of government. My study of the issue brought me to the words of Jesus in Matthew 5: “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, do not resist one who is evil, but if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also; and if anyone would sue you and take your coat, let him have your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.”

  These words speak of positive responses to negative problems, and of a method to make a tax witness virtually impossible to be ignored by even the most recalcitrant legislator; a “second mile theology of witness.” Taking these words seriously led me to decide that with a letter of protest to the IRS I will pay my full taxes. Then I will send an amount hopefully equal to the “war taxes” to my senators and/or representative in a check made out to the government along with a letter of witness.

  I will try to find a way to give the money so that disposition on the congressional floors might be expected — if that be possible — but even if the legislators send the check back they have had to come to grips with its existence and its accompanying witness. The returned check would then call for another letter containing the check, which again could not be ignored.

  The letter will contain a brief statement of my conscientious objection to killing and its implications to the use of my tax dollars for war. Then it will turn to the disposition of the check. Explaining respectfully that since they are acting against my will as a provider for the military machine with my tax dollars, I will ask as diligent action on my behalf for the use of the money enclosed for the proliferation of peace. The money is to be used by the government within the framework of not doing violence to my conscience. I will list some uses of the money which would violate my conscience, and why — being careful not to suggest specific uses I would desire. The whole idea is to get legislators to dialogue with their conscience on this issue.

  I will actually split the check, sending at least two letters. Our new Kansas senator, Nancy Kassebaum, needs to be made aware of our faith early on. On the other hand, Robert Dole is one of the most recalcitrant senators at the point of military spending. He had the temerity to come to our Mid-Kansas MCC relief sale in his campaign last year and speak on the “need” for increased military spending. It may even be advantageous for my congressman, Dan Glickman, to receive a letter with part of the money. He is a Democrat, and with Dole and Kassebaum being Republicans he might just act as political conscience to the others. In each case of a split check, all recipients will be told that there are others and the total amount of the checks written.

  After sharing this idea on the conference floor, there was sufficient informal response between sessions that I decided to share more in this letter and to invite anyone else who wishes to join me in this effort. It would be desirable to make a coordinated effort so that the letters arrive within a relatively short time for the greatest impact. It might even be good to split up the amount into quarterly payments to be sent at strategic times throughout the congressional year.

  If you are interested in dialogue on this idea or if you plan to try it with me, I would appreciate hearing from you and receiving your input.

• Stanley E. Kaufman, on 23 April expressed his disappointment at the timidity of the “too-reluctant” Minneapolis resolution. He urged The Mennonite to publish frequent updates on the work of the task force searching for a “legal alternative” along with suggestions for how people could help that work, and that people who do independent outreach to officials keep The Mennonite informed of their actions. He also said that while the institutional church dithers, “each of us individuals [should] consider stronger forms of witness”.

  Direct tax resistance should not be forgotten for three years but should be actively debated in our congregations and experimented with in our lives. One of the biggest barriers to this is not knowing who and how many others are currently engaged in tax resistance. I am refusing to pay voluntarily my telephone tax (being a student, I have no income), but I’m finding even this relatively simple stance rather difficult because I feel I’m standing alone. I suggest that The Mennonite could provide a forum — perhaps through a special column — in which all those resisting taxes could find each other and communicate experiences they’ve had, arguments they’ve encountered, statements of the bases of their actions, etc.

  In our efforts to be faithful to God in this matter — to attempt to change U.S. military policy through tax witness — we need to be “wise as serpents and harmless as doves.” We need to refine our strategies, improve our communication, and support each other’s involvements.

• Fred Suter, in the 24 April edition, wrote:

  It appeared that our over-politeness got in our way to deal effectively with the issue at hand. It appeared as though the issue at hand was put on the back burner to simmer to give us Mennonites more time. More time for what? It will give a few people more time to pursue other legal alternatives to the specific tax issue. It will also give many of us grass-roots people in the church more time to remain silent and not be directly faced with a Mennonite stand on the issue. It is those long, noncommitted silent periods which trouble me… A firm and committed voice by the Mennonite people needs to be heard in our world now.

• Gaynette Friesen, on 13 September, wrote that though “we still have nearly 2½ years to resolve ourselves, hopefully as a unified body, to the question of war taxes,” that’s no reason to slack off.

The 21 August edition gave another update on the activities of the “task force”:

Task force concentrates on legislative route

Two meetings of the task force on taxes have been held. The task force has been expanded to include representation from the Church of the Brethren, the Friends, and the Mennonite Church. This group of 11 is expected by the participating churches to establish the legal, legislative, and administrative agenda of a corporate discipleship response to military taxes.

The Minneapolis resolution mandated the task force to seek “all legal, legislative, and administrative avenues for achieving a conscientious objector exemption” for the GCMC from the withholding of federal income taxes from its employees. (About 46 percent of U.S. federal taxes are used for the military.)

At their second meeting (June 28–29) the task force members rejected administrative avenues. Within the scope of U.S. Internal Revenue Service or Revenue Canada regulations this would involve extending ordination, commissioning, or licensing status to all employees of church institutions. It was a consensus of the task force that this would be an administrative loophole. It would not develop a conscientious objector position in response to military taxes.

However, both the judicial and legislative options will be pursued simultaneously. Plans for the legislative option are the more developed.

For the legislative route to work, says Delton Franz, director of the Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section office in Washington, D.C., the problem of conscience and taxes will have to be defined carefully. Currently a paper focusing on the reasons the General Conference has a major problem of conscience with collecting taxes from its employees is being drafted. After it has been reviewed and okayed it will be sent along with cover letters by leaders of the historic peace churches to congresspersons representing major constituency concentrations and those on key subcommittees. Later on church members will also be asked to write letters. It is important, says Franz, to define the problem of conscience in such a way that it will motivate congresspersons to work vigorously for the bill.

Another follow-up to these initiatives will be a visit to Washington of the most influential peace church leaders to solicit support from selected members of Congress and to obtain a sponsor for an exemption bill.

In preparation for the next meeting of the task force in November law firms are being contacted for advice on optimum judicial procedures should the task force decide to initiate a case as plaintiff. However, there is doubt that a judicial process would be productive.

There is a possibility that a parallel task force will emerge in Canada. Ernie Regehr, director of Project Ploughshares, Waterloo, Ontario, notes the necessity of defining the question of militarism in Canadian terms for Canadians. Regehr is attempting to gather a Canadian task force.

This mirrored a growing enthusiasm for the Peace Tax Fund legislation in many organizations and congregations of the General Conference. This would ultimately allow Mennonites to pass their well-worn buck all the way to Washington, D.C., and let Congress take the blame for further delays.

New Call to Peacemaking

The New Call to Peacemaking initiative continued in 1979.

• Tax resistance was on the agenda at the follow-up meeting for churches in the central United States in March 1979.

• 

  In November, a hundred participants, mostly Mennonites, but also Quakers, Brethren “plus several Catholics and a Presbyterian” came to the fourth Mid-America New Call to Peacemaking. “Conscription of Youth and Wealth” was the theme, and tax resistance was again high on the agenda:

  In the workshop on conscription of wealth Bob Hull, secretary for peace and social concerns of the General Conference, suggested some alternatives to paying war taxes. Others offered their own suggestions. It was decided that resisting war taxes is a complicated affair and that each person should decide according to their conscience. Several expressed the desire to pay taxes for education, welfare, and other social services, and wished there was an alternative such as the World Peace Tax Fund. [Richard] McSorley, who has had contacts on Capitol Hill, responded by saying that until there is a large grass-roots movement of tax resistance the WPTF doesn’t stand a chance.

  The latter half of the workshop included sharing by Bruce Chrisman, Carbondale, Illinois, who is involved in a federal criminal case, one of two in the U.S. involving tax resistance. His case is significant because it will provide a precedent either for or against tax refusal on the basis of conscience and religious convictions.

  In 1971 Chrisman received draft counseling from James Dunn, pastor of the Champaign-Urbana (Illinois) Mennonite Church. He made a covenant with God to only pay taxes for humanitarian purposes. Since that time he has paid no federal income taxes. It wasn’t until this year, however, that the government prosecuted him, charging that he willfully failed to disclose his gross income in 1975. “Willful” is the key term, because Chrisman claims he conscientiously chose not to disclose his income. He feels the government has purposely waited to build its case.

  “The government wants to establish a precedent in order to prosecute other tax resisters.” But Chrisman is confident. “We’re going to win and establish a precedent the other way,” he said. He believes he has a strong case. Part of that strength comes from his affiliation with the General Conference Mennonite Church. He read from a statement from the 1971 triennium which opposes war taxes and supports those who resist paying them. “That’s a beautiful statement!” he exclaimed, explaining that it has important legal implications for his case.

  In a moving conclusion to his talk Chrisman said that when he first appeared in court October 1 this year he was “scared to death.” “Today,” he said, “I have no fear in me. God has given me an inner peace. I know I’m doing what he wants me to do.” No one disagreed.

  • Chrisman would lose his court case. On 3 December 1979 he was convicted of failure to file (he filed, but the government contended the information on the filing was not sufficient to make it legal).

    During the pretrial hearings Judge J. Waldo Ackerman allowed Robert Hull, secretary for peace and social concerns of the General Conference, and Peter Ediger, director of Mennonite Voluntary Service, to testify about Mennonite witness against war and conscription of persons and money for war purposes. But the testimony was disallowed at the trial.

  • Chrisman would ultimately be sentenced to pay the taxes and court costs, to do a year of Mennonite Voluntary Service, and to probation. He spun this as a victory of sorts:

    “I’m amazed… I feel very good about the sentence. The alternative service is probably the first sentence of its kind for a tax case. I think it reflects the testimony in the trial and its influence on the judge.”

    Chrisman’s attorney filed an appeal of the conviction, which was heard in November 1980, with the Mennonite General Conference filing an amicus curiae in Chrisman’s behalf.

Miscellany

• A 3 January letter to the editor from Jacob T. Friesen described how he withheld a symbolic $13 from his income taxes “to gain attention and create opportunity to ‘dialogue for peace.’ ”
• The 23 January issue covered a tax dispute between the Canadian government and some Hutterite colonies. The colonies refused to pay on the grounds that they were churches; the government disagreed and went after them for “about $37 million in back income taxes and interest”
• The 6 February issue told of the Manitoba Alliance Against Abortion, whose bank accounts had been frozen by the Canadian tax agency to pay for the taxes the organization’s president, Joe Borowski, had been refusing to pay for several years. The organization disputed that the funds belonged to the organization’s president and could thereby be seized, saying that the funds were meant for a legal battle against legal abortion. A letter-writing campaign by supporters of the group was credited for pressuring the government to abandon the seizure.
• Chris Dueck, in the 21 March edition, called Mennonites out for complaining about Caesar’s war taxes while hoarding Caesar’s currency. “For us to refuse payment of taxes is to say ‘we want to keep the money we get through your military-economic policies, but we don’t want any of the guilt.’ The war tax issue is shedding guilt without shedding the selfish heart.”
• On 26 March, members of the St. Louis Mennonite Voluntary Service unit announced their refusal to pay the telephone excise tax and its redirection to the MCC.
• Robert V. Peters hoped that “seeking ways to resist the military machine (e.g. war tax resistance)” would be on the agenda at the Mennonite World Conference, in the 27 March edition.
• In the 1 May edition, Gordon Houser looked into the New Creation Fellowship intentional community — which “was born more than six years ago out of the concern of a small group of people about the sad state of our society [and] a common involvement in simple living, war tax resistance, and prison reform.”
• In July, twenty people “from the General Conference Mennonite Church, the Mennonite Church, the Conservative Conference, and the Beachy Amish” met “to air trends within the Mennonite church and to share concerns.” Among those concerns, as expressed in a jointly-framed statement:

  According to the direct command to pay taxes (Romans 13:6,7) and according to the specific word of Christ on the payment of taxes to “Caesar” (Matthew 22:15–22) we believe we are under obligation to pay taxes levied by the law. We regard taxation as the power of the state to collect monies needed for its budget and not as voluntary contributions by citizens.

• The February Minneapolis conference was given credit for encouraging peace-minded clergy to come together and discuss the arms race and peace advocacy.
• William Stringfellow addressed the Church of the Brethren Symposium and suggested that the contemporary urban church should renounce its tax-exempt status. “since present tax privileges curtail the church’s freedom to speak out on important matters and keep it from engaging in tax resistance.”
• The South Seattle Mennonite Church issued a letter of support for war tax resisters, saying in part:

  [G]ood citizenship does not imply that we should obey our government without regard for Christian conscience. Rather, good citizenship leads us to work as a church and human community towards the establishment of God’s kingdom on earth… We believe that Christ’s strength is in his weakness and that the present aggressive stance of the world’s military powers runs counter to our call to be peacemakers.

• In the 1 October 1979 issue, Ferd Wiens attacked “what may be called a ‘peace” cult” of Mennonite flagellants who, in his view, had turned the doctrine of nonresistance on its head to make it a doctrine of civil disobedience — calling out promoters of war tax resistance in particular.
  • Walter Regier agreed, writing that “[e]mphasis on world peace through demonstrations and nonpayment of taxes simply brings confusion into our ranks” and distracts from “more important issues that we face in our day… like abortion, homosexuality, and divorce”.
• The U.S. branch of Pax Christi (a Catholic peace movement) invited some of their Mennonite counterparts to their annual convention in October.

  Mennonites Bob Hull and Don Kaufman of Newton, Kansas, led a workshop on tax resistance and the World Peace Tax Fund Act. Interest in this was strong. About 40 persons, including some tax resisters, participated. Hull is peace and social concerns director for the General Conference; Kaufman is author of The Tax Dilemma: Praying for Peace, Paying for War.

  In a private meeting with Sister Mary Evelyn Jegen, executive secretary of Pax Christi USA, and Gordon Zahn, a Catholic conscientious objector in World War Ⅱ, Hull, Kaufman, and William Keeney explained the General Conference resolution on war taxes. Keeney, North Newton, Kansas, is director of the Consortium on Peace Research, Education, and Development.

  Although Pax Christi USA, supports the World Peace Tax Fund it has not responded to its members who engage in war tax withholding and are requesting official support from Pax Christi.

• Albert H. Epp felt that civil disobedience and other sorts of confrontation with government “can ensnare a people in activities that make them obnoxious to the general citizenry. It is ‘good’ deeds that earn respect and give us a right to speak.” For this reason “It seems improper for Christians to start at the point of urging illegal tax-resistance rather than first declaring a church-wide month of prayer for a national crisis.”

  In my congregation we took a poll on ideal ways to influence government. We prefer to exhaust all legal means to achieve peace before we engage in illegal maneuvers. Only 5 percent approved of refusing to pay one’s tax as a protest. But in terms of practical, positive solutions, we found that 65 percent approved the World Peace Tax Fund alternative; 85 percent approved writing the President and Congress; 85 percent approved using the ballot box to elect responsive leaders; and 89 percent approved increased giving to decrease taxes.

  • But David Graber responded that in his opinion “the demand to lay down our tax dollars is a similar call to idolatry” as those that prompted the civil disobedience of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. “Thank God for Christians today who refuse to cooperate with our government’s demands in Jesus’ name. Where is Epp’s recognition of their witness?”
  • And Mark S. Lawson added that the blessings of government that Epp felt we should all be humbly grateful for weren’t all that. For example: “My country forces me to cut my income below the taxable level so I can obey both the laws of God and man. Religious liberty is only for those who support the killing in wars financed by their tax money.” He seconded the idea that only through “widespread tax refusal” could pacifists pressure Congress into creating an alternative for conscientious taxpayers.
  • C.B. Friesen was more appreciative of Epp’s take. He trotted out the usual Render Unto Caesar ⇒ Romans 13 ⇒ 1 Peter 2 biblical justification for submission to civil government and said that those who counsel war tax resistance “mostly benefit their egos” in service of their “own philosophies and pet theories”.
• The Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section (U.S.) met at the end of November. They “formally supported the passage of the World Peace Tax Fund bill” but “decided against sponsoring a vigorous campaign to promote Mennonite participation in a war tax resistance campaign. Section members felt such a resolution would not reflect the will of their constituent bodies.” So they instead adopted the kick-the-can routine, passing “a resolution that the section ‘is prepared to consider at its spring 1980 meeting a decision to promote participation in a war tax resistance campaign.’ ” There seemed to be some acknowledgment of flaws in the Peace Tax Fund bill:

  The section said in resolution “that it is conscience that the WPTF legislation might not in itself force a significant reduction in military spending, but it recognizes that it would provide funds for peacemaking efforts and would be a witness against military spending.”

This is the twenty-seventh in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today we enter the 1980s.

The 8 January edition began with an article about the global military build-up and possible Christian responses to it. Tax resistance was one example:

During the first and second world wars the Mennonite “presence” to the world was the shock of refusal to bear arms. That’s not an issue now; most military service is voluntary. What are we refusing now?

Not many are doing it, but some Mennonites in the U.S. are refusing to pay the portion of their income tax which will be used for military expenditures. For instance, Cornelia Lehn, director of children’s education for the General Conference, has shared this witness: “Finally I decided to give half of my income to relief and other church work and thus force the Internal Revenue Service to return that portion of my tax which they had already slated for military purposes…

“I realize that this is not the perfect answer… It is, however, the best answer I know at this time. Finally I could no longer acquiesce and be part of something so diabolical as war. I had to take a stand against it…

“I wish that my church, which believes in the way of peace, would as a body no longer gather money to help the government make war. I wish all the members of our church would stand up in horror and refuse to allow it to happen. Then the conference officers would be in a position to say to the government: ‘We will not give you our sons and daughters and we will not give you our money to kill others. Allow us to serve our country in the way of peace.’ ”

Is Cornelia Lehn speaking as a prophet? Does she have a word from the Lord to help us respond in a meaningful way to demonic forces?

Peter Ediger writes with prophetic urgency about what people like Cornelia Lehn are doing: “Do we know that there are hundreds and thousands of people out there waiting for a word from the church, waiting for some action from the church? Have we some sense of the explosive evangelistic potential of this kind of action? Do you know that the day of the police state is not only coming but that it is here in its roots, and the issue will not go away?”

Whether we follow Cornelia Lehn’s example or not, we would do well to have her sense of urgency about our own allegiance to the Prince of Peace and ask God for help in making our own faith relevant to our times.

The Commission on Home Ministries met in February. Military conscription was prominent on the agenda (President Carter had recently revived military draft registration), but war tax resistance seems to have been pushed aside except for a brief mention:

Chairperson Don Steelberg asked, “How can we who are older support those facing this decision?”

[Robert] Hull replied, “If we counsel them to say no to registration then we should say no to paying war taxes.”

This was part of a “council of commissions” gathering. Another report on that gathering mentioned the “Smoketown Consultation” rebellion of conservative Mennonites the year before. Three of these dissenters were at the council, and one, Albert Epp, reportedly “said the preparatory materials for the war tax conference in Minneapolis last year were slanted in favor of war tax resistance.”

The West Coast Mennonite Central Committee and the Fellowship of Reconciliation co-sponsored a February “first annual” workshop on war tax resistance.

Local tax resisters told their stories.

Gray-haired Helen, a Friend, donates the amount of her military tax to organizations working on justice. Diane works at a state institution for the mentally retarded and realized that military taxes take money away from human needs.

All hope for a mass movement by citizens but stressed the consistent commitment necessary. They write letters of explanation to the Internal Revenue Service, editors of newspapers, their churches, members of Congress, the President. They educate employers and bank officials of the possibility of their wages being garnisheed or a lien put on an account.

The IRS is sensitive to “principled tax refusal,” said Irwin Hagenauer [sic], retired social worker who now serves as volunteer resource person to those who would refuse war tax. He gives advice on every method, from W-4 exemptions to war-crime deductions.

The 4 March edition carried an article by Weldon Schloneger on Biblical Authority that discussed the difficulty of interpreting even straightforward-sounding biblical passages in context, and urged charity toward other Christians with differing interpretations. Among those verses he describes are Matthew 5:44 (“Love your enemies”) and Matthew 22:21 (“Render unto Caesar”) and he mentions how war tax resisters and their opponents each accept the authority of these verses, but interpret them differently.

On 8 March, a hundred people from the traditional peace churches came together to discuss whether the abolition of war was feasible. War tax resister John Howard Yoder addressed the gathering, which came up with a set of questions to bring back to their churches, including this one: “have we recognized that while we lament the arms race we continue to pay for it through our taxes?”

The 18 March edition included another poem trying to drive home the point about taxpaying and complicity: “I fueled the fire / Pumped gas in the the furnaces at Buchenwald / Its flames have lingered within us, smoldering / Today I paid my taxes, that’s all” and so forth.

Conscription was again the topic when 400 Mennonite conscientious objectors met in late March to condemn the revival of the draft. Again, in passing, the question came up: “How can the too-old-to-draft people expect draft-age people to not serve in the military if they pay war taxes?”

The 29 April 1980 edition included the article “Tax form for pacifists” by Colman McCarthy. It started by pointing out taxpayer complicity with military spending, and “the hollowness of denouncing increases in the defense budget and ‘the wicked Pentagon’ [when c]itizens pay for both.” The article took a detour into wishful thinking about the World Peace Tax Fund bill before finally returning home:

Without this kind of legislative relief conscientious objectors are left with three options: violate their moral values by financing the military, violate the tax laws by not paying, or earn so little income that it is not taxable.

Traditionally courts have had little patience with tax resisters. Often judges mistakenly see those citizens as evaders, when actually they are pacifists who want to put their money where their convictions are.

According to William Samuel of the [National Council for a World Peace Tax Fund], cases of conscientious tax resistance have not only been increasing in recent years, but they have also been going on to higher courts of appeal. In May 1979 at Richmond the 4^th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments from three citizens claiming First and Ninth amendment rights not to pay taxes for military spending.

While Congress and the courts mull over the issue a few individuals are acting on their own. Only blocks from the White House, Collective Impressions Printshop has been refusing for the past two years to send its federal withholding tax to the IRS. Instead this corporation submits the money to the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency.

The defiance of these pacifists unloosens only the smallest of screws in the U.S.’s vast military machine. The arms-control agency politely returns the checks and eventually the IRS seizes the group’s bank account. But it doesn’t seize its moral integrity or squash the option for dissent that is so crucial.

That issue also included an interview with Harold R. Regier and Hubert Schwartzentruber, until recently the peace and social concerns secretaries for the Mennonite General Conference and the Mennonite Church respectively. The former, when asked what the highlights of his term had been, mentioned the 1971 General Conference resolution that had announced church support for war tax resisters, and also God and Caesar:

This little newsletter of information and dialogue about war taxes brought together a community of people struggling with the question of supporting with our money what we could not participate in personally. We discovered increasing numbers of people responsive to the dilemma of being Christian peacemakers and their support of war with tax monies. Working on the war tax issue as a new frontier for Anabaptist discipleship was perhaps the single most exciting highlight of my eight years as PSC secretary.

A special Commission on Home Ministries supplement, dated 20 May 1980, listed “some ideas we are testing” which included this one:

Just as our forefathers clarified important church-state issues in objecting to war participation, we may be able to make a significant contribution for freedom of religion and against state religion in the area of paying taxes to support war. An outside-our-conference-budget fund could finance test cases in the U.S. and Canada to clarify the church-state issues involved in paying taxes used for war. A creative proposal could be tested with legislators, such as one just surfacing: persons contributing “sabbatical service,” a VS term every seventh year to work for the good of others, should be allowed to designate their taxes for constructive purposes.

This idea apparently came out of a discussion between Robert Hull of the CHM Peace and Social Concerns group and a young conscientious objector facing a trial on tax charges.

The task force that had been assigned to try to find some legal avenue for the General Conference to stop withholding taxes from its conscientious objecting employees seems to have come up with its first concrete action plan:

Tax exemption resolution to be presented

A resolution seeking approval to initiate a judicial action to exempt the General Conference from withholding taxes from the income of its employees will be presented to delegates attending the denomination’s triennial meeting in Estes Park, Colorado, July 12–19.

At a special meeting of church delegates in Minneapolis in February 1979 the highest governing board of the church was instructed to vigorously search for “all legal, legislative, and administrative avenues for achieving a conscientious objector exemption” from withholding taxes. Implicit in the initiative is the view that if it is wrong for pacifists to countenance the drafting of their bodies, it is also wrong to agree to the drafting of that portion of income taxes which go to the military.

The judicial action would be based on the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which protects the church from laws causing it to violate its principles. The estimated cost of a judicial action is $75,000 to $130,000. It would likely require several years to reach a final decision by the U.S. Supreme Court. Delegates will be asked to authorize an annual church offering to fund this action and also a stepped-up drive to gain congressional support for the World Peace Tax Fund act.

That resolution would pass “easily” Monday evening at the conference, 1,156 to 353 with seven abstentions.

In the 19 August issue, John Stoner of the Mennonite Peace Section (U.S.) encouraged those readers who were war tax resisters to redirect their taxes to a draft resisters’ mutual aid fund.

The New Call to Peace­making in­i­ti­a­tive had another na­tion­al con­fer­ence in Octo­ber. The article an­nounc­ing the up­com­ing meeting in­clud­ed this news:

The Church of the Brethren has af­firmed “open, non­e­va­sive with­hold­ing of war taxes as a le­git­i­mate wit­ness to our con­sci­en­tious in­ten­tion to fol­low the call of dis­ci­ple­ship to Jesus Christ.”

A later article about the meeting noted:

With respect to the pay­ment of taxes used for war pur­pos­es, the New Call re­stat­ed its 1978 com­mit­ment to urge Christ­ian peace­makers to “con­sid­er with­hold­ing from the In­ter­nal Rev­e­nue Ser­vice all tax monies which con­tri­bute to any war effort.”

The statement of find­ings rec­om­mend­ed the fol­low­ing as al­ter­na­tives to the pay­ment of war taxes: (1) ac­tive work for the adop­tion of the World Peace Tax Fund bill which, if passed by the U.S. Congress, would serve as a legal alternative to payment of war taxes just as conscientious objector status is a legal alternative to military service, and (2) individuals are urged to consider prayerfully all moral ways of reducing their tax liabilities, including sizable contributions to tax-exempt organizations, reduction of personal income, and simplification of lifestyles.

In the 7 October edition, Peter Farrar shared a letter he wrote to his senator saying that he was going beyond draft resistance “to sever all personal connection with the federal government of the United States”:

I will no longer vote in federal elections, pay federal taxes, nor use federal services, and I will do everything in my power, privately and in the press, to influence others to join me.

The magazine also covered the November annual conference of the Center on Law and Pacifism. Among the things discussed:

Ed Pearson gave an update on an “escrow fund” originated in November 1979, to which people can send the part of their taxes they refuse to pay… The government is notified that the money will be released when the World Peace Tax Fund Bill, pending in congress, is passed. Similar efforts are under way in Canada, Great Britain, Japan, Holland, Switzerland, Australia, and New Zealand.

William Sloane Coffin, Jr. addressed the World Conference on Religion for Peace (Canada) in November. In The Mennonite’s description of his remarks is this note:

Perhaps the time has come for civil disobedience, suggested Coffin, citing tax resistance as a strategy which the church should lead out in.

Finally, “The Historic Peace Church Task Force on Taxes” met again in November.

The Historic Peace Church Task Force on Taxes will undertake a major effort to inform and educate members of its congregations and meetings on the implications of the payment of taxes used for military purposes.

The committee has commissioned the preparation of a packet of study materials on the biblical basis of war taxes, the World Peace Tax Fund (WPTF) bill currently pending in the U.S. Congress, and suggestions for personal and political action.

Meeting at the General Conference Mennonite Church (GCMC) headquarters here on November 14 and 15, the task force also heard a report that William Ball, noted constitutional law attorney from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, has indicated interest in representing the GCMC in its proposed judicial action on the withholding of taxes from its employees.

Among other attorneys being considered to carry the case are Alan Hunt of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; William Rich of Topeka, Kansas; and Harrop Freeman of Ithaca, New York. The selection of a legal representative will be finalized early in 1981.

Preparation of the tax study materials will be coordinated by Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) Peace Section in Akron, Pennsylvania, in consultation with the National Council for a World Peace Tax Fund in Washington, D.C., and representatives of the historic peace churches. These groups include the General Conference Mennonite Church, Mennonite Church, Mennonite Brethren Church, Brethren in Christ, Church of the Brethren, Friends General Conference, Friends United Meeting, and Evangelical Friends Alliance.

Several members of the task force voiced concerns over the lack of understanding on the part of lay people within these congregations and meetings of the magnitude of the nuclear and military threat, of which the U.S. is a major participant.

The decision to prepare study materials came in response to the need for greater awareness of the sizable contribution which each taxpayer makes to the “morally bankrupt” process of gigantic military expenditures.

“Our congregations need to be educated to understand the issues and the policies of our [U.S.] administration,” said Alan Eccleston of the National Council for a World Peace Tax Fund.

Eccleston noted that the WPTF bill has entered a critical phase; during the 1980 elections, 5 of its 35 sponsors were lost. Efforts to see the legislation through Congress must be redoubled, or the bill will soon have to be abandoned and energies channeled in other directions, he said.

Regarding the legal action to seek an injunction against the Internal Revenue Service concerning the collection of taxes from General Conference employees, Vern Preheim, general secretary of the GCMC, indicated that other historic peace churches have been invited to join in in the suit in some way. Responses from other church groups however, are still in process.

The General Board of the GCMC was empowered to undertake the court challenge at the triennial meeting of conference delegates at Estes Park, Colorado last July.

At the November 14–15 meetings, task force members seemed to differ significantly in terms of their interests in war tax issues. Committee members such as Eccleston and Robert Hull, secretary for peace and justice for GCMC, were concerned about the future of the peace witness in comprehensive terms, and specifically as it related to the war tax issue. Others, such as Duane Heffelbower, an attorney from Reedley, California, were interested in the tax question in more professionally restricted terms. Heffelbower stated that he could face disbarment if he became an active tax resister; therefore, the passage of the WPTF is an attractive option because it involves no risk to his profession.

Other task force participants included Heinz Janzen, Hillsboro, Kansas (chairperson); Delton Franz, North Newton, Kansas; Paul Gingrich, Elkhart, Indiana; Janet Reedy, Elkhart, Indiana; John Stoner and Ron Flickinger of Akron, Pennsylvania; and James Thomas, Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

The entire task force will meet again on 13–14 March 1981 in Chicago.

This is the twenty-eighth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today we hit 1981.

In our last episode, a proposal was briefly floated in which people would be allowed to become legal conscientious objectors to military taxation in exchange for donating their labor, one year out of every seven, in a “sabbatical service” program. Robert Hull, who developed this idea along with a young conscientious objector he was counseling, expanded on this idea in two articles for The Mennonite in early 1981:

1. Sabbatical service: a new form of congregational ministry introduced the proposed program and showed how it fit into Mennonite ideas of service, ministry, and mutual aid
2. Sabbatical service: a new legislative proposal described how this supplemented war tax resistance. Excerpts:

   Can it be that this misplaced respecting of institutions and laws rather than persons has come about because we have put the burden of Christian witness on 18-to-20-year-olds, who are perhaps least prepared through experience to detect the difference?

   Can it be that because of the risks to ourselves and our security, we who are older have failed to acknowledge that conscientious objection to military participation and conscientious objection to war taxation are Siamese twins? Just because we may have become too old to be liable to the draft does not mean our contribution to warfare is ended. We continue to serve the military through conscription of our taxes.

   In fact, governmental draft boards could, for reasons of administrative efficiency, take the position that everyone who is nonconformist enough to request a conscientious objector classification should be granted it, so long as he or she continues to work and pay taxes.

   So our rush to prepare our sons and daughters as Christian peacemakers to face the draft board and seek alternative service may be leading them only to “men-pleasing eyeservice” if we do not wrestle with our command to “make known the wisdom of God to the principalities and powers.”

   The difficulty which faces us in 1981 is that those among us who have recognized this danger have so far been given no option but noncooperation with conscription, and jail or emigration. (And let us recognize in due honesty the Christian service and witness that has frequently been given in these situations.)

   What we are called upon to propose in 1981 is a new option, a new model for Christian service in the midst of the demands of militaristic societies. Our proposal must be directed first to the church, and secondarily to the U.S. and Canadian governments. It must strike a new stance in the political arena where the demands of the state and the call of God overlap and frequently conflict.

   The congregational ministry of sabbatical service as outlined in part one would seem to be such an option. It would involve the whole congregation, including people at every stage of life, and would remove the particular burden of responding to militarism now largely borne by 18-to-20-year-old males. By acknowledging that we as Mennonites ought to face together the Siamese twins of military conscription and war taxation, which spring from the parent, militarism, we can unify the generational differences in our congregations.

   How can this be accomplished? Currently the World Peace Tax Fund bill is pending in the U.S. Congress, and efforts are being made to introduce a similar measure into the Canadian Parliament. By diverting from military to peacemaking uses an amount (equivalent to the military proportion of the annual federal budget) from each “eligible” taxpayer’s income and estate taxes, the peacemaker’s burden of conscience with regard to paying for war would be satisfied. (This does not answer the political problem of swollen military budgets themselves, of course, but only whether peacemakers shall contribute to them.)

   So the Peace Tax Fund bills speak effectively to the war taxation twin. They speak to the military conscription twin as well by defining as “eligible” taxpayers those classified as conscientious objectors.

   If it is true, as General Lewis Hershey and numerous U.S. Selective Service documents have claimed, that the CO provisions of 1940–75 were a good accommodation strategy for the U.S. government (by avoiding a direct confrontation with the peace churches as in World War Ⅰ), then one wonders why the U.S. legislators and Canadian MPs have not rushed to establish Peace Tax Funds and thereby avoid confrontations with the war tax objectors.

   Certainly one part of the answer is that our governments know that the peace churches are not unified on this issue, and they can continue to deal with individual objectors quietly and piecemeal in Internal Revenue Service and Revenue Canada offices.

   But perhaps the stronger reason is that taxation is more important for a high-technology military establishment than manpower. Peace Tax Fund bills allow the taxpayers some choice in directing the spending of their taxes. This could, as the minds of many legislators conceive, “open the floodgates” to a deluge of what they look upon as “special interest legislation.” Most of such tax legislation, or “loopholes,” is written to financially benefit individuals, groups, or corporations.

   One answer to this mindset of legislators is to point out the distinct history of conscientious objection and its recognition in both legislative acts and judicial decisions. This argument is usually helpful but not sufficient. Many legislators and MPs still see little distinction between CO alternative service and “draft dodgers,” despite its legal status. It seems to them a special interest provision, the “easy way out.”

   If a young person were to covenant as a sabbatical servant, pledging to perform subsistence-level VS periodically throughout his or her working life, and willing to undergo repeated financial sacrifice for this purpose, would this help change the mindset that “these COs are parasites on the U.S. (and Canadian) economic system”?

   For this reason, a “Sabbatical Service Act” may have considerable appeal in the U.S. Congress or Canadian Parliament where the Peace Tax Fund bills alone have not. How can one consider that a people who are willing to accept seven years of service spread throughout their working lives, and thus accept substantial limits on their income growth, are seeking “special interest legislation”? Are such a peculiar people unpatriotic, who are willing to reduce the benefits they receive from North American economic systems in return for recognition of their conscientious objection to military service and military-purposes taxation?

   How could this be done? A “Sabbatical Service Act” could be introduced into the U.S. Congress and the Canadian Parliament which would provide legal recognition for persons who covenant with their congregations (or agencies established for the purpose of receiving such sabbatical service covenants from conscientious objectors). In other words, a form such as the Christian Peacemaker Registration, which has become familiar among U.S. Mennonites in recent years, would then be the registration. Congregations or conferences would then simply report those who so covenant to the appropriate government, and they would then be omitted from military conscription rather than registered, and their beliefs classified by the governments.

   The “Sabbatical Service Act” would further incorporate the Peace Tax Fund provisions (which may differ in Canada and the U.S.). When a sabbatical servant performed his or her periodic VS, their income would be below taxable levels. During the six intervening years, when their income would be taxable, the Peace Tax Fund mechanism would operate to divert the military-equivalent proportion of their taxes to peacemaking efforts (such as National Peace Academy, funding an Ambassador for Disarmament, conflict resolution research, economic conversion plans for military installations, etc.).

   The concept of sabbatical service thus envisions a response to militarism (represented by military conscription and war taxation) which is voluntary in the sense of being self-chosen by peacemakers, yet structured into enabling legislation by governments. It is a proposal which could be both faithful and legal, with the potential for generating a Jubilee of enthusiasm for service in the name of Christ.

A brief note in the 3 February 1981 issue read:

Mennonite Central Committee U.S. Peace Section’s “Taxes for Peace” fund experienced an increase in contributions during 1980. The fund was established in late 1972. “Persons whose consciences forbid them to yield money on request to the government’s death-by-technology militarism are contributing the military portion of their income tax instead to the life-supporting work of MCC U.S. Peace Section,” says John K. Stoner, executive secretary of the section. “They see it as a way of fulfilling the scriptural command to owe no one anything, except to love one another.”

Paul Leatherman explained why he and his wife Joan had started to dip their toes into tax resistance, in the 10 March 1981 issue. Excerpts:

A willingness to allow the ongoing conscription of our tax dollars for war purposes — without witness against it — is surely a tacit support of the arms race.

This reality is crucial to Mennonite witness today. The fuel that supports military madness is tax dollars, not the conscription of our youth. Previous conscientious objection (CO) patterns — expressed mainly in alternative service by our youth — are inadequate. We must find new ways to show our personal CO witness.

Several options have some validity. (1) Leave the country and find a place not given to the madness of war. Our forefathers have done this more than once. (2) Decrease our earnings so we have no tax obligation. (3) Increase our giving to the church; that which otherwise goes for the arms race. (4) Do not file an income tax return. (5) Withhold payment of that portion of income taxes used for military purposes. (6) Symbolic withholding of income tax. (7) Pay taxes under protest. (8) Do nothing at all.

We personally have tried various ways to withhold a portion of our income taxes we considered to be used for military purposes. This has opened unique opportunities for witness. But in the end the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) took the money.

What next step might a larger group of Mennonites take? Many have done nothing; some have written letters of protest. A lot of them feel quite uneasy.

This year we withheld $7.77. There is no place on U.S. tax form 1040 — nor is there legal provision to take such a deduction; just as there was no legal provision for our youth to register as COs. But Mennonite churches encouraged those who registered to do so as COs. To us, it seems that a symbolic $7.77 war tax deduction helps us to be counted as COs. We used line 46 on page 2 of the form and wrote in the words “war tax credit — see letter.” An attached letter explained the deduction.

Our proposal of a $7.77 deduction may be as little as one can do and still be counted. It is not more radical or illegal than asking our youth to register as COs when there was no legal provision.

Why $7.77? Seven is the perfect number in the Bible. Jesus tells us to forgive 70 times 7. While any amount might do, $7.77 has special meaning to us.

If you withhold $7.77, it is necessary to explain to IRS. Seven dollars and seventy-seven cents becomes a frustration to IRS. It is too small and too costly to collect. Much discussion can follow.

We are proposing — to our elected officials — passage of the World Peace Tax Fund (WPTF) so we can designate taxes for peaceful purposes. We sent our $7.77 to the national council of the WPTF in support of its efforts.

If nobody joins us in this symbolic withholding, IRS will be glad for one less war-tax resister to deal with. In the past they came to take from us what we withheld. This year they may ignore us. But if 1,000 or 10,000 or perchance 100,000 would join us in this symbolic action, it could not be ignored. Provision would be made to accommodate these COs.

We know symbolic withholding of $7.77 is timid. But by this act we can be counted as COs. It is our attempt to follow Christ’s teaching to be peacemakers.

The midtriennial in Minneapolis where the war tax resistance idea came to a head in the General Conference seems to have planted some seeds in the local faith-based peace community. From the 21 April edition:

Twin cities peace group issues war tax protest

An interdenominational clergy and lay group in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area has sent a statement of protest against the world arms race and the taxes levied to support it to U.S. senators, representatives, and President Reagan.

The group, called the “People of Faith Peacemakers,” sponsored a public meeting on the arms race and war tax resistance recently at University Lutheran Church of Hope in Minneapolis. The statement, entitled “Covenant of Witness and Mutual Support,” grew out of the meeting and was attached to a list of 50 supporters, with signatures and addresses.

The statement reads as follows: “We, people of faith in God as our sustainer and source of peace, hereby register our protest against the world arms race and against taxes levied to support that race. As stewards of life we are compelled by conscience to oppose the use of our money for the infliction of suffering and destruction of humanity.

“We therefore support each other as we select various means, such as the following, to protest this payment for war, recognizing our responsibility as American citizens and members of the larger global community: (1) Deliberately choosing to earn less than a taxable income; (2) Payment of taxes accompanied by a letter of protest against their use to sustain the arms race; (3) Withholding a token amount of taxes as a symbol of opposition to the use of any funds dedicated to military purposes; (4) Refusal to pay the entire portion of taxes used for military purposes; and (5) Refusal to pay the telephone tax which is levied for military purposes.”

The last three measures were coupled with a clause whereby the withheld amount could be donated to an escrow account for the World Peace Tax Fund, the Minnesota Alternative Fund, or some other peaceful purpose.

The interdenominational group took shape shortly after the General Conference Mennonite Church held a special midtriennium session in the Twin Cities on the theme of Christian civil responsibility in 1979.

Myron Schrag, pastor of Faith Mennonite Church in Minneapolis, is one of the coordinators of the interfaith body.

A conservative backlash to changes in the Mennonite General Conference, including but not limited to the emergence of war tax resistance, resulted in the “Smoketown Consultation.” A “Consultation on Continuing Concerns” grew out of that, and held another meeting in March 1981. An article on the meeting included this section on taxes:

[Myron] Ausburger said we are unfair when we expect the state to operate at a Christian level. It is a people’s franchise. The church is Jesus[’] franchise. We need to relate to the state as we do to the world — in loving responsibility first to God but also to our fellow persons.

Augsburger also presented his tax-proposal: (1) Get giving high as possible, so taxes are low as possible; (2) pay taxes; (3) calculate amount used for defense and give an equivalent amount to a peacemaking fund.

Dean Denner wrote to the IRS to explain his tax resistance, and portions of the letter were reproduced in the 2 June 1981 edition:

Of the United States income tax collected, approximately 50 percent is used for the military. Such use is in violation of my constitutional rights and responsibility. The First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law… prohibiting the free exercise (of religion)…”; i.e. my religious beliefs preclude my paying for the genocide or mass suicide… The Ninth Amendment: “The enumeration in the constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people”; i.e. I maintain the right not to participate in (by paying for) governmental mass murder… International law as ratified in Congress and signed by the President is U.S. law; e.g. the Nuremburg Principles state each individual is responsible for not being complicit in crimes against peace, war crimes, or crimes against humanity. Therefore, it is my responsibility as a United States citizen not to be complicit in such crimes by paying for U.S. first-strike nuclear war preparations. Therefore, I have used Schedules A and B for a war tax deduction which results in the necessary 50 percent adjustment in my income tax… For further clarification please contact me at…

The 16 June 1981 edition brought the news that the war tax resistance bug had reached the Netherlands:

[N]either the Mennonite church nor the IKV [Interchurch Peace Council] feels comfortable with individual radical action.

Dirk Visser, a Dutch Mennonite journalist working for the equivalent of the Associated Press wire services in the Netherlands, called my attention to Willem-Jan Maas, a Mennonite minister serving in Opeland. This minister tried to funnel what he considered the war tax portion of his income tax to the Dutch Mennonite Peace Group via the local income tax office.

This effort was halted by the tax officers, but even had it been successful, the minister would not have been applauded by the IKV, according to Visser. The IKV has taken the political action route, and with that the churches can cooperate.

An interview with popular Christian speaker Tony Campolo in the 14 July 1981 edition asked him “What do you think of war tax resistance?” He answered:

I think war tax resistance is a viable means for Christians to express their opposition to a system that is requiring unchristian behavior. The Anabaptist tradition calls us to noncooperation if the state asks us to support something that we believe is contrary to the will of God.

The 28 July 1981 edition brought the news that the General Conference Mennonite Church was going to federal court to ask a judge to order the IRS to stop requiring the Conference to withhold taxes from the income of conscientiously objecting employees. Mennonites have traditionally eschewed lawsuits for biblical reasons, for example:

Matthew 5:39–40

“…I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.”

1 Corinthians 6:1–8

Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints? … But brother goes to law against brother, and that before unbelievers! Now therefore, it is already an utter failure for you that you go to law against one another. Why do you not rather accept wrong? Why do you not rather let yourselves be cheated? No, you yourselves do wrong and cheat, and you do these things to your brethren!

So the General Conference had to explain why this lawsuit was different. First off, it wasn’t a case of brother going to law against brother, but an institution asking a judge for a ruling on a constitutional interpretation. Secondly, if the Conference did not initiate such a suit, the only way to get such an interpretation would be for it to break the law, be brought into court by the government, and then defend itself, but “the majority does not want to break the law in order to test whether the law violates the constitution [so] the only alternative is for us to take the initiative”.

That didn’t completely settle the debate. In particular, the Deacon board of the Eicher Emmanuel Mennonite Church wrote in to say they wanted nothing to do with the suit. Their objections “in the order of their importance” (my summaries):

1. Christians are under Biblical obligation to pay taxes.
2. Lawsuits fly in the face of Mennonite nonresistance.
3. The ostensible separation of church and state Constitutional issue in the lawsuit disingenuously masks the real purpose of the suit, which is to defend conscientious objection to military spending.
4. The lawsuit is doomed to failure and will only have the effect of enriching lawyers to the detriment of other church functions.
5. Even if it were won, the underlying issue would remain unresolved.
6. Member congregations should not be compelled to support a position like this that they don’t agree with.

The MCC Peace Section (U.S.) met in November, and a majority resolution on the nuclear arms race from the 225 members there included this statement:

We were repeatedly reminded in this assembly that the conscription of our income supports the nuclear arms race. Moreover, we saw that the government is increasing expenditures for nuclear and other weapons by decreasing expenditures for human services for the poor and oppressed. We encourage people to consider ways to witness against this evil use of the power of taxation, such as refusing to pay the military portion of the federal income tax.

An accompanying article said that the original draft of this statement “was criticized for not being specific enough, [so] the group moved to add a paragraph on the war tax issue.”

This is the thirtieth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today we continue to work through the early 1980s.

War tax resisters’ hour comes round at last in Bethlehem

In March 1983 the General Board of the General Conference Mennonite Church met.

On the ongoing issue of tax withholding, GB agreed to submit a resolution to delegates at Bethlehem ’83 to “authorize the officers [of the conference] to test the constitutionality of [the tax withholding] requirement… by refusing to serve as tax collectors in cases where individual employees have asked that their federal income taxes not be withheld from their wages, in order that they may conscientiously refuse to pay for war.”

Peter J. Ediger contributed another of his prophecy-poems to the 1 February 1983 issue, saying in part:

The church which seeks to save her security by following only “legal, legislative and judicial avenues” to salve its war tax conscience will lose her life; the church willing to lose her security in supporting non-registrants for the sake of Christ will find life.

A special edition prepared for the triennial conference summarized the progress of the Conference task force on the war tax issue:

At the 1980 triennial sessions, the conference authorized the General Board to initiate a judicial action seeking exemption for the General Conference Mennonite Church from withholding taxes from the income of its employees. James Gingerich, Duane Heffelbower, Larry Voth, Robert Hull, and Vern Preheim were appointed as a judicial action committee to implement the resolution. William Ball was engaged as legal counsel. In March 1982, Ball advised the conference that the general climate in the United States, the attitude of the present government administration, and the attitude of the Supreme Court as evidenced by some recent decisions dealing with religious conviction or conscience and taxes were such that the likelihood of the General Conference accomplishing its objectives through a judicial action was virtually nil. The committee recommended and the General Board concurred to put the judicial action on hold and to bring the matter once again to the conference for further discernment and decision. A more detailed report and a recommendation from the General Board to the conference that we honor the requests of employees to not withhold taxes on their wages will be sent to the congregations in advance of the triennial sessions.

Throughout the past three years, while pursuing judicial action, we also continued to encourage the enactment of World Peace Tax Fund legislation.

An editorial in the 21 June 1983 edition described the upcoming decision thusly:

At a special midtriennium conference in Minneapolis in 1979, GC delegates voted 1,218 to 134 in favor of urging their General Board to “use all legal, legislative and administrative avenues for achieving a conscientious objector exemption from the legal requirement that the conference withhold income taxes from the wages of its employees.” If no solution could be found within three years, the GB was to bring the matter back for further action. At Estes Park in 1980, a judicial test case on the issue was okayed by a vote of 1,156 to 353.

Bethlehem ’83 will bring GC delegates face to face with the fact that all three avenues, at present, look like dead ends. As a result, the GB is proposing that the conference stop withholding taxes from salaries of employees who request such action in order to “assert the higher claim of Christ’s law of love.”

If approved, the resolution would take the conference one small but significant step into the sphere of divine obedience/civil disobedience. It could become the most formidable — and challenging — business item for GCs, despite the fact that several other organizations have already taken the same action.

In advance of the Bethlehem gathering, the text of the proposed resolution was released in the pages of The Mennonite:

Bethlehem ’83 resolutions (1): tax withholding

Among the resolutions for consideration by delegates at the General Conference Mennonite Church Triennial Sessions… is a formal action authorizing conference officers to stop withholding taxes from the salaries of its employees as required by U.S. law. It also encourages Canadian Mennonites to obtain relief from the same requirement by Revenue Canada.

The conference’s General Board… will bring the "Resolution on Faithful Action Toward Tax Withholding" to Bethlehem ’83 delegates as their recommendation for resolving the moral dilemma which church officials feel they are facing. If approved, the resolution could take the conference into divine obedience/civil disobedience.

The following is the text of the resolution:

As Mennonite Christians we seek to be biblically obedient, submitting to such injunctions as Romans 13:7, “Pay taxes to whom taxes are due,” but also Romans 13:8, 10, “Owe no one anything except to love one another… love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.” We accept our subordination to government and our obligation to pay taxes. However, we must witness to governments our conviction that war and preparation for war do wrong to our neighbors and are contrary to the will of God as revealed in the teachings of Jesus Christ and his death, resurrection and ascension to lordship.

Thus we urge our governments to sharply reduce military spending and use our resources for life-affirming purposes. Furthermore, just as conscientious objectors have received exemption from military service, we also seek legislation exempting conscientious objectors from paying taxes for military purposes. Thus we continue to work in the United States for passage for the World Peace Tax Fund Act and in Canada for the Peace Tax Fund, which would allow individuals to designate all of their federal taxes for peaceful purposes.

Both the U.S. Internal Revenue Service and Revenue Canada require the General Conference Mennonite Church to violate the consciences of its employees who are conscientious objectors to paying taxes for military purposes.

In the United States, we have thoroughly explored all legislative, administrative and judicial avenues for obtaining a conscientious objector exemption to these withholding requirements, as we resolved at the 1979 Minneapolis midtriennium conference. Our explorations have convinced us there is no likelihood of relief in the near future for conscientious objectors to military taxes. The time has come when, like Peter and the apostles, “We must obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29).

In Canada, equally thorough explorations of similar avenues for seeking a conscientious objection from withholding requirements have not yet been accomplished. We commend the “Resolution on Security and Disarmament” of the Canadian Mennonite Conference in 1982 and the work of the Canadian Tax Task Force under the sponsorship of MCC Canada Peace and Social Concerns. We encourage Canadian congregations to continue study of materials made available on the issue of military taxes.

As delegates to the 1983 triennial sessions of the General Conference Mennonite Church, we therefore:

1. Authorize the conference officers to test the constitutionality of the withholding requirements in the United States and to assert the higher claim of Christ’s law of love by refusing to serve as tax collectors in cases where individual employees have asked that their federal income taxes not be withheld from their wages in order that they may conscientiously refuse to pay for war preparations. These employees will be treated similarly to the way General Conference treats ordained ministers, i.e. as self-employed persons, in that their earnings will be reported to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, but no federal income tax withheld.
2. We request that the Conference of Mennonites in Canada consider means to obtain relief from Revenue Canada withholding requirements as these apply to General Conference Mennonite Church employees.
3. We shall inform the U.S. government of this act of conscientious objection to their withholding requirements. We shall again urge them to provide exemption from these requirements and exemption for people of peacemaking conscience from military use of their tax money.

At this moment of decision we commit ourselves to surround with our prayers the General Conference staff and government officials who will be involved in this action and all those individuals who refuse in conscience to pay taxes for war preparations, however costly their witness may be.

To cut to the chase: “The resolution was discussed in a vigorous and orderly fashion. The arguments for and against were scarcely new ones. After an hour’s debate, the resolution was brought to a ballot vote and passed by approximately a 70-percent majority.”

A more extensive report on the triennial put it this way:

Jim Gingerich of Moundridge, Kan., chairperson of the conference’s judicial action committee, reported that the suit against the IRS approved at Estes Park was, in the opinion of constitutional lawyer William Ball, almost certain to fail. Little progress was being made on the legislative or administrative fronts either. In light of this, the General Board was recommending that the conference honor the consciences of its employees who request that their full salaries be paid to them, allowing the employees themselves to remit to the IRS what their consciences would allow.

After Robert Hull, secretary for peace and justice, had reviewed the experiences of other groups which had attempted similar actions, Duane Heffelbower of Reedley, Calif., outlined the points of the resolution in detail and spoke of their possible ramifications. “We could scarcely devise a softer velvet glove to cast at the feet of the IRS,” he said. “But the action does show our corporate willingness to stand beside our employees. What will the government do? We don’t know.”

What followed was probably the most vigorous interchange of viewpoints by GC delegates of the entire week. Nearly two dozen speakers took their turns at the mikes before the vote was called for. Viewpoints on the resolution ran the gamut from disassociation with it to praising God for it.

“We believe that the Bible says we ought to pay our taxes. We want to be separated from and not have any part of this action,” said Paul Goossen, Wayland, Iowa.

“This resolution is creating an impossible situation for our government,” added John Voth of Meno, Okla. “We have emphasized that we love our enemy. I wonder whether the government has become our enemy. Have we adopted the same big-stick approach that we so often have criticized?”

Others, however, urged the conference to push ahead with the proposed action. “Mennonites took a stand against slavery even though it was unpopular,” said Mark Winslow, Allentown, Pa. “Today, the nuclear arms race is the primary social sin of our day. We should take a stand regardless of the fact that it may be unpopular.”

Lois Barrett, Wichita, Kan., observed that “in the U.S., disobeying the law is the time-honored way of changing the law,” noting that the cause of civil rights in the 1960s was advanced primarily through civil disobedience.

H.A. Fast of North Newton, Kan., prompted the only round of applause during the lengthy discussion. “We refuse our selves in service, but we say nothing about our taxes,” Fast said. “I have said to the government, ‘You can’t take my body to fight a war.’ I have said, ‘You can’t take my son.’ And now I am saying, ‘You can’t take my money, either.’ ”

When it was over and the ballots counted, the resolution passed by a 70 percent majority. [1,128 to 457]

One of the characteristic features of the discussion on tax withholding, as well as other debates during the week, was the sensitivity and willingness to listen with which delegates approached the microphones. Several told of how they had come to the convention ready to vote one way, but were now moved to vote another. Phrases such as “I want to respect your point of view…” or “I’m willing to learn more…” preceded many of the speeches. And the tough debates of Bethlehem, during which emotions ran high and convictions deep, never seemed to overshadow the determination by participants to celebrate their common identity, their peoplehood, their unity. After the convention, many attributed that prevailing unity to the moving of the Spirit.

Delegates at the conference were treated to a performance of The Plow and the Sword, a musical about American Mennonites during the Revolutionary War who disputed whether or not it was proper to pay taxes to the rebellious Continental Congress. “The play’s content was powerfully pertinent to the delegates meeting at Bethlehem who discussed present-day responses to war taxes.”

The Conference’s test cases began in September:

Non-withholding tax action begins, seven make request

Acting on the basis of a resolution adopted by General Conference delegates at Bethlehem ’83, conference treasurer Ted W. Stuckey on Sept. 22 issued the first paychecks on which federal income taxes were not withheld.

Seven employees of the denomination’s central offices made the request that the taxes not be withheld, so that they can remit to the IRS personally the amount of federal taxes their consciences will allow, given the U.S. government’s high rate of military spending.

Those making the request were Robert Hull, secretary for peace and justice; Lynn Keenan, Mennonite Voluntary Service associate director; Paula Diller Lehman, secretary for youth education; Fred Loganbill, assistant for peace and justice; John Sommer, overseas personnel secretary; Meribeth Sprunger, secretary for mission communications; and Elizabeth Yoder, general editor. Several others have indicated that they may be willing to take part in the action at a later date.

Stuckey said that, beginning with the September paychecks, the seven will have state and social security taxes deducted but be treated like self-employed persons as far as federal income taxes are concerned. Under such a classification, they would be required to submit quarterly estimated tax payments to the IRS.

The seven plan to make a portion of those quarterly payments but put the balance — the amount they feel they cannot voluntarily pay because of high U.S. military spending — into a special account at General Conference central offices.

Stuckey and general secretary Vern Preheim informed Commissioner Roscoe L. Egger, Jr., at IRS headquarters in Washington by letter of the conference’s action, the motivation of employees for requesting the procedure, the reasons for the church’s granting the requests, the identities of the seven employees and the location of the account to which the IRS may initiate collection procedures. “We’re trying to be completely open and above board with them about this matter,” he said. Copies of the letter were also sent to IRS offices in Wichita, Kan., and Austin, Texas, as well as to state and federal legislators.

The September pay period is the first opportunity for the conference to implement the “Resolution on Faithful Action Toward Tax Withholding” adopted by delegates to a churchwide convention in Bethlehem, Pa., on Aug. 2. There, conferees voted 1,128 to 457 to “authorize the conference officers to test the constitutionality of the withholding requirements in the United States and to assert the higher claim of Christ’s law of love, by refusing to serve as tax collectors in cases where individual employees have asked that their federal income taxes not be withheld from their wages, in order that they may conscientiously refuse to pay for war preparations.[”]

Miscellany

A note in the 4 January 1983 edition mentioned that the Historic Peace Church Task Force on Taxes had decided to go all-in on the World Peace Tax Fund bill, promoting “dunamis groups which approach congresspersons in a spirit of compassion rather than confrontation… to obtain a dozen more co-sponsors for the WPTF bill in the coming year.”

The 15 February edition noted that “MCC U.S. Peace Section has put together a War Tax Packet, designed to equip individuals and groups with a variety of resources for study on the question of paying taxes for war. Cost is $2.”

The 1 March edition included a profile of Cornelia “Nellie” Lehn, whose war tax resistance became the focus for much of the debate that overtook the General Conference Mennonite Church. It summarized this as follows:

Nellie was… dealing personally with the perplexing issue of war taxes. She liked to read Bible verses that say to pay your taxes, but began to wonder why she did not concentrate equally on those saying to love your enemies and put your sword away.

Finally she felt she could not pay that part of her taxes going to war purposes and asked the General Conference office not to withhold any of her salary for taxes. “The time comes when you have to cut through all the complexity and be obedient,” she says, reminiscent of her stand earlier in life.

At the 1977 triennium she stated her views. The conference continues to work on this issue even today.

I’m surprised I haven’t come across this amusing example of war tax resistance outreach before:

Mennonites in Harrisonburg, Va., gathered on Good Friday (April 1) to attach over $300 to about 75 helium-filled balloons. Each balloon, in addition to a five- or ten-dollar bill, carried a note from a participant explaining why he or she had withheld the money from current income taxes. “Because we are Christians who are trying to follow the peaceful way of Jesus, we cannot support this country’s military build-up,” said many of the notes. “Instead, we have chosen to ‘waste’ our money in a more constructive way.” Participants read Scripture, sang, danced, prayed, confessed their sins, and clowns passed out jelly beans as the balloons rose.

The shift of focus to “Peace Tax Fund” legislation would aggravate a decline in interest in real war tax resistance in the General Conference Mennonite Church that continues to the present day. Clearly, some Mennonites perceived this danger, as Robert Hull wrote an article to defend the push for such a law:

Is “peace tax” just a diversion of energies?

An argument by some war tax resisters is that any peace tax fund is a means for conscientious objectors to salve their conscience with regard to diverting their own taxes, and that this provision then will encourage such COs to be quiet and passively accept the warmaking of governments which will continue more efficiently without their dissent.

When I have explored this argument, I almost invariably discover that the war tax resister speaking is drawing upon an analogy made with the 20^th-century U.S./Canadian history of conscientious objection to military service.

The Civilian Public Service camps of World War Ⅱ by and large had this “quietistic” effect. However, it should be noted that the provision for COs in World War Ⅱ came about because the government remembered the difficulties it had encountered with historic peace church resisters in World War Ⅰ. Similar spokespersons on the eve of World War Ⅱ stated their convictions to “draw the line” again if acceptable provisions were not made.

But even during World War Ⅱ, the legal criteria for CO classification in the United States were broadened by the Supreme Court to include all religious objectors, then during the Vietnam War to include people holding a belief equivalent to that in a Supreme Being (Seeger, 1965), and later to all people morally, ethically or religiously opposed to all war (Welsh, 1970). In the draft registration debate in 1980–81, projections by the Selective Service of future CO claimants extended to 40 percent of all registrants. It seems reasonable to conclude that at least one cause for this large increase in the potential CO population is a result of the public visibility of thousands of young men performing alternative service during the Vietnam War.

The recent response of the U.S. Selective Service to its own projections has been to develop plans for CO alternative service which seek to once more “contain” the CO visibility by centralizing the program under direct Selective Service administration in order to meet military mobilization priorities. This policy is in turn quite likely to produce non-cooperators who will have registered but then find that such an alternative service program is unacceptable to their conscience. A significant number of such non-cooperators would increase the already more than 500,000 draft-eligible young men who have not registered.

Twentieth-century CO history has lodged anomalous laws within the government structures. That is, if these laws are interpreted by relatively tolerant regulations, the CO population may grow uncontrollably large; if the laws are interpreted by repressive regulations, the number of non-cooperators may grow uncontrollably.

Now let’s pursue this analogy with regard to peace tax legislation and war tax resistance. I am convinced that Parliament or Congress will never enact peace tax legislation until the war tax resistance movement grows so large that such laws come to be viewed as an expedient accommodation, as Civilian Public Service was viewed on the eve of World War Ⅱ.

But several differences between the two are significant. Bear in mind that peace tax legislation provides for the taxpayer to claim he or she is a CO and that the burden of the challenge and rebuttal lies upon the government. Additionally, peace tax legislation’s provision for income tax forms and information materials to describe the military proportion of the federal budget in some detail will ensure that a far greater percentage of the taxpayers become aware of the peace tax alternative than the percentage of draft-age men who were made aware by the government of the CO alternative from World War Ⅱ through Vietnam. Finally, the peace tax legislation provides for the diversion of CO taxpayers’ “military taxes” into a trust fund. This is intended to result in a direct drain out of the general treasury available for war preparations.

Thus the peace tax legislation further raises people’s consciousness. If peace trust funds in the United States and Canada are administered as the legislation intends, many millions of people will choose to support peacemaking alternatives to conflict rather than supporting warmaking preparations, and a “democracy of defense” may develop: those who rely on military weapons can pay for them without coercing the contributions of those who place their reliance upon other alternatives.

If the CO eligibility criteria are interpreted too restrictively, or inaccurate portrayals of the military proportion of the federal budget are published, or CO taxpayers’ funds are demonstrably rechanneled into the warmaking treasury, then increased numbers of informed citizens may respond with direct tax resistance.

The government will thus have on its hands another significant anomalous law, one by which millions of citizens can measure the government’s tendency to override their democratic rights in its clearing of the path toward war.

This then is the educational strategy behind the peace tax effort as I see it. The legislation will reach millions of people with the message that there are alternatives to paying for the war system. It will provide a step which millions of citizens can take, and whose aggregate pressure for peacemaking will be enormous, without overwhelming risk to the individual taxpayer. After all, it is at least in part the risk involved in war tax refusal which keeps it an infinitesimally small protest movement in the total population.

I hope that thousands of active peacemakers will heed the call to war tax refusal and that the pressure for peace upon the warmaking tendencies of government will grow. As it does, I believe it will prove disastrous if the peacemaking community has no legislative proposal to put forward which will secure as much of the “democracy of defense” goal as possible, and to which the government can turn as an accommodation.

The 2 August 1983 edition reported on the annual conference of the Church of the Brethren (Anabaptist cousins of the Mennonites). Among the notes:

The Church of the Brethren has long supported members who conscientiously object to the payment of war taxes. Some members wish to refuse to pay taxes but are unable to because the taxes are withheld by their employers. The delegates approved a paper that gives guidance to church institutions whose employees request, for reason of conscience, that their taxes not be withheld. The annual conference recommended that all legal possibilities be explored first but affirmed civil disobedience for both individuals and institutions when it is a matter of conscience.

This news comes from the 27 September 1983 edition:

A United Methodist congregation in New Haven, Conn., backing their pastor’s right to refuse paying federal taxes for military use, has declined to turn over his salary to the Internal Revenue Service. Carl Lundbord [sic], pastor of First and Summerfield United Methodist Church, has withheld federal income taxes in both 1981 and 1982, telling the IRS his “obligations as a Christian and as a citizen are no longer reconcilable. The 50 percent of my taxes that support the military I cannot pay.” IRS ordered the church to withhold the pastor’s salary until the amount was paid. But church members voted on July 10 to reject IRS’s demand.

An article in the 16 August 1983 edition:

“War tax” dilemma continues for many U.S. taxpayers

Our ancestors migrated to the United States so that they would not be forced to participate in European wars. Eventually this government respected their deeply held beliefs about peacemaking and granted them the right to register as conscientious objectors.

Today we find ourselves in a technological age in which our money is more useful to the military than our bodies. So we are being forced by law to participate financially in the preparation for war, which violates the biblical command to love our neighbors as ourselves. When Caesar’s demands conflict with God’s, we cannot blindly obey our government.

These words from John S. and Sara L. Wengerd’s April 14 letter to the Internal Revenue Service echo the convictions of nearly 60 individuals and families who chose to contribute to Mennonite Central Committee U.S. Peace Section in lieu of paying a portion of their income taxes that would have been used for military purposes.

For some, the contribution was a symbolic amount, such as $7.77. For others, it equaled the 36 to 54 percent of their tax dollars that would have financed military activity. That portion is commonly referred to as a “military tax” or a “war tax.” In another case, a couple’s taxes had already been withheld by the Internal Revenue Service, so they donated an amount equal to their military taxes, which they had already paid.

In all cases, these individuals felt that silent compliance with the tax collection process would be a violation of their consciences and religious convictions against killing and participating in war in any way. Many noted that their dilemma of conscience could be ameliorated by passage of the World Peace Tax Fund (WPTF) Act…

Meanwhile, the federal government is attempting to crack down on various types of tax protests. People who object to paying taxes for military purposes may face stiff penalties designed to deter those trying to evade tax collection or destroy the tax system.

The Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982 instituted an automatic $500 penalty for individuals filing “frivolous” tax returns. The penalty can apply to people who take unallowable deductions, credits or exemptions or give incomplete information on their tax returns.

Those taking “war tax” deductions or credits or claiming an excessive number of exemptions to reduce their tax liability could be subject to the new fine. Several conscientious military tax resisters have received notices from the Internal Revenue Service that the penalty has been imposed, according to the May–June issue of Center Peace, the news journal of the Center on Law and Pacifism.

Robert Hull, peace and justice secretary for the General Conference Mennonite Church, suggests that conscientious objectors to military taxation take steps to distinguish their non-payment of military taxes from secular tax protests and evasion schemes. If taxpayers correctly compute and report the amount owed and indicate in an attached letter that they cannot with a clear conscience pay the military-related portion, their tax returns will go directly to the Internal Revenue Service Collection Division instead of to the overloaded Audit Division.

Hull suggests that this action be accompanied with letters to legislators to communicate the religious and moral grounds for such action, and to demonstrate the need for remedial legislation such as the World Peace Tax Fund.

Bill Samuel, member of the WPTF steering committee, suggests that taxpayers write a contract on the back of their check to IRS stating that deposit of the check constitutes a legally binding agreement (contract) that the money will not be used for military purposes. Courts have held that contractual checks involving private parties are legally binding, but it is uncertain whether or not IRS would abide by the contract.

A 27 September 1983 article profiled Canadian war tax resister John R. Dyck. Excerpts:

Tax with­hold­ing is also a Can­a­di­an issue

All his life, John R. Dyck of Rosthern, Sask., has been a law-abiding citizen. He’s never been to court. But he expects that to change when Revenue Canada catches up with him for non-payment of taxes.

Dyck is one of a small but growing band of Canadians who are refusing to pay the portion of their income taxes they feel is designated for the military. Instead, they are calling for an alternative “peace tax fund” which would use their tax money for peaceful purposes.

Since that alternative does not exist and Dyck withheld 10.5 percent of his taxes for 1981 and for 1982, he expects a court order to arrive eventually.

John R. Dyck is not a young radical defying authority. Officially he is retired (though not willingly or inactively) and has given the better part of the past two decades to service with the Mennonite Central Committee, Mennonite Foundation and the MCC Food Bank. A sudden stroke forced him to slow down over a year ago, but he has recovered and calls it “a real miracle.” Now he can go on serving, and he places military tax resistance in that category.

The decision did not come easily or hastily. “I don’t know where it (a conviction) began,” he commented during an interview at this year’s annual meeting of MCC Canada in Saskatoon. He had come to listen to the discussion and spend time with his brother and fellow peace-seeker, Peter J. He remembers that “Cornelia Lehn made us sit up and think” in the late 1970s.

John began with his 1979 tax return, filed while the Dycks were in Jordan under MCC and able to observe firsthand the effects of military exploitation. He sent two checks to Revenue Canada, asking that the smaller one be used only for peaceful development work. He heard nothing further and assumed that both checks flowed into government coffers.

Along with his 1980 tax return he sent only a letter of concern. But with his 1981 return he again enclosed two checks, one for Revenue Canada and a second made out to the Peace Tax Fund. Revenue Canada replied that such a fund did not exist (legally) and demanded payment in full. Dyck then sent the check to the Victoria, B.C.-based Peace Tax Fund and began correspondence with government officials to explain why. “I want to do things correctly and openly,” he says.

Now Dyck is expecting a day in court. It is bound to come, since Revenue Canada wants his money and must obtain a court order before garnisheeing his account at the Rosthern Credit Union. The sooner the better, he adds, since it may help establish a right of conscience that would allow other people to divert their hard-earned tax money from bombs to working for peace. He also hopes to find a sympathetic lawyer to handle the case.

“I think a lot of people would rather not talk to me about it,” he says, summing up the reaction to his protest. So far, any criticism has been muted, though one friend told him, “I admire you for it, but you’re wrong.” Paula, his wife, is supportive, but most fellow members at Rosthern Mennonite Church are either uninformed or indifferent.

John R. Dyck firmly believes, “We don’t need the military.” The threat of nuclear war hanging over the world means Christians must resist militarism with renewed vigor. “I see this (nuclear holocaust) coming and we’re accountable. The handwriting is on the wall.”

Dyck adds that there is a growing network of people asking about the peace tax fund, though the actual number withholding taxes is still small. (Ernie Hildebrand, a teacher at the Swift Current (Sask.) Bible Institute, is another Mennonite who is doing so.) “But people must think this through carefully,” Dyck concludes. “You can’t legislate a thing like this… I’m glad the Lord led us to this position.”

As the General Conference pushed ahead with its support of war tax resisting employees, with the blessing of the majority of conferees, the U.S. “Peace Section” seemed more reluctant to take a stand, at its November meeting. From the 6 December 1983 edition:

While agreeing that the church has an important role to play in saying no to preparations for [nuclear war], the members struggled with the place of military tax resistance as a method of saying no.

Several members observed that the constituency is “not of one mind on this matter,” while Darrel Brubaker of Philadelphia, Brethren in Christ representative, urged that “here is one place we need to be leaders more than representatives.”

After the matter was tabled overnight for further reflection, the group affirmed a recommendation commending the General Conference for the serious attention it has given the issue and urging churches to work more diligently at the process of prayerful discernment of their response to this issue.

The resolution also strongly encouraged constituents to initiate further action in support of the World Peace Tax Fund bill, which would provide a legal alternative to the payment of taxes for military purposes.

War tax resister Don Schrader wrote in on 12 December to insist that Mennonites can best criticize revolutionary and other violence if they are careful not to support violence with their taxes:

Until our nonviolence becomes revolutionary, revolutions will be violent.

[A]s long as well-fed U.S. pacifists pay war taxes to support the imminent nuclear terror and mass murder of our planet and the dictatorial repression of Central America, what integrity do we have in questioning or condemning those peasants’ use of violence for survival.

To be peacemakers in this perilous age, we must refuse to pay war taxes, we must renounce all materialism which breeds militarism, and we must denounce foreign policy regardless of the risks for our community standing and employment.

Over four years ago I confronted the question “How can I speak for peace and pay for war,” and I became a war tax resister.

This is the thirty-second in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today we reach the middle-1980s.

A conference held in March 1985 and sponsored by the Mennonite Church General Board (I think this is distinct from the General Conference Mennonite Church’s General Board, but it gets confusing) concerned “The Church’s Relationship to the Political Order.” War tax resistance was among the topics discussed:

John and Sandy Drescher Lehman of Richmond, Va., told how they followed their conscience and decided a few years ago to withhold the part of their income taxes that they figure goes for military spending.

Now they have become employees of Mennonite Board of Missions in their role as co-directors of the Richmond Discipleship Voluntary Service program. “What should an institution do when its employees, following their consciences, ask that we stop withholding taxes from their paychecks?” asked MBM president Paul Gingrich.

A panel of four attempted to answer the question, including Robert Hull, soldier-turned-tax-resister who is peace and justice secretary of the General Conference Mennonite Church. He explained how his denomination, with the instruction of its members, is now breaking the law by not withholding taxes from the paychecks of seven of its employees who have requested that.

In an editorial in the 11 June 1985 edition, E. Stanley Bohn wrote that war tax resistance is an example of Christians taking their doctrine seriously and taking risks for it, and that this is useful in missionary work. Excerpts:

While my wife, Anita, and I were in a language school in Mexico, we stayed with a family that claimed to have a faith but had no relation to any congregation. They had a good supply of humorous imitations of TV preachers and stories of inconsistencies of church people. They also had the feeling that churches were exploitive of people and supported the exploitive governments to the north and their manipulation of governments in Latin America.

When I explained one night at the evening meal that in my denomination people often took a different position than the government, they listened politely. But when I explained there were Christians who took the New Testament so sincerely that they accepted fines and jail terms, they wanted to know more. Accepting penalties for conscientious objection to war, non-registration, refusing to pay a war tax and offering sanctuary to Central American refugees caused at least the son in that family to reconsider a faith he had earlier ridiculed.

The second incident happened in Japan with a Japanese friend who had lived in our home as an MCC trainee. Christianity is not sweeping the country in Japan. Although the door is not closed to Christian missionaries, it may be that a large percentage of the people are closed to a Christ who has been identified with what the West did to Asians in Vietnam, their parents in World War Ⅱ and with the current pressure on Japan to violate its constitution and establish armed forces capable of international war.

Our friend had arranged for a meeting of a group of his student friends, some of them non-Christian. He asked me to speak while he translated on the topic of peacemaking efforts of Mennonites in the United States. Topics like draft registration, prayer vigils at missile sites or war taxes — that are controversial for us — were in his eyes exactly what was needed to make credible what the church was teaching and to open the minds of his friends to the Christian faith.

In Canada and the United States we often see the more controversial peace witness and overseas missions as opposite kinds of religious expression, having little to do with each other. Yet in some overseas situations the unbelievers we met were more open to the gospel if it included a peace witness that was clearly international and repudiated protecting ourselves at the expense of others (not that their governments would be any more receptive to that than ours is).

From their viewpoint it is clear that such witness efforts as those of Christian war tax refusers actually aid the work of overseas missions.

This may put our triennial conference action in a different light. At the Bethlehem ’83 conference our delegates voted that we would not accept the position in which the U.S. laws put us: that the church act as a tax collector, taking taxes for war from those who are conscientiously against war. That stand may some day require us to pay for legal assistance. Since our conference was not unanimous in taking this stand, it was agreed that costs should be covered by donations from those who believe this was the right path to take.

Those who contribute to such legal expenses, if and when they come, may feel they are paying a penalty for having a conscience. However, whether the ruling is favorable or unfavorable, their dollars may help our overseas mission dollars accomplish more. They may be helping to open some minds closed to national and tribal gods and hungry for the God of all nations who makes a difference in people’s lives.

This news comes from the 11 February 1986 edition:

About a year ago, Mennonite Central Committee established a task force to study how MCC should respond to employees’ requests that MCC not withhold federal taxes from their paychecks. This was to enable them to keep that portion of their taxes used for military purposes. After meeting with leaders from eight conferences, the task force reported in December 1985 that none of the conference groups was in favor of honoring the employees’ requests. Even though the General Conference honors such requests by its employees, the executive committee of its General Board did not favor MCC taking similar action.

The 14 January 1986 edition reported:

The former moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland (Presbyterian) has called for the creation of a peace army committed to withholding the 13 percent of income taxes that the British government spends on defense. Lord MacLeod of Fuinary hopes such an army will be able to persuade the government to allow people to give an equivalent amount of their taxes to relieve world hunger instead. Even if the government refuses to go along with the idea, he said, taxpayers should still withhold the money and give it to famine relief.

In the 28 January 1986 edition, Richard McSorley wrote about having taken “a vow of non-violence.” The Catholic peace group Pax Christi was encouraging people to take such a formal vow annually, and was encouraging the Catholic Church to support such vows by providing a ritual context for them.

In my formulation of the vow I said, “I, before the cross of Jesus Christ, vow perpetual non-violence in fulfillment of the command of your Son, ‘Love your enemies.’ ” It seems to me beyond doubt that I cannot love a person in the same act in which I kill that person. The vow means I will not take part in killing anybody. That means I will not pay taxes for weapons of death and be a part of the preparations to kill done by the military or the hangman or the abortionist. Neither will I hold, as morally acceptable, the program of killing some to save others.

The Mennonite Central Committee met in late January to consider the question of war tax withholding for its employees:

Discussion about payment of U.S. federal income taxes used for military purposes — or “war taxes” — was prompted by a request from four MCC Akron employees who asked MCC to stop forwarding the portion of their income taxes which go for military spending. In letters last year to the executive committee, the four cited deployment of missiles in Europe, U.S. funds for war in Central America, MCC’s support of conscientious objection during the Vietnam War and the deaths of friends killed by American-made weapons as basis for the request.

A tax withholding task force reported to the board that, after discussions with eight Mennonite and Brethren in Christ conferences, “no group counseled MCC to honor the requests.” MCC Canada indicated that payment of military taxes is not an issue among Canadians “at this time.” The task force recommended that MCC “continue to withhold and forward taxes to the (U.S.) government.”

Possible penalties for not forwarding an employee’s tax include the amount plus interest, a $10,000 fine and/or five years imprisonment.

Board member Phil Rich, who served on the task force, emphasized that conference leaders “agonized” over the decision and observed that “none of the groups said that civil disobedience is absolutely wrong.” Some of the leaders, he indicated, “are in favor but do not think their people will go along.”

He also noted that most conferences are open to dealing with the issue in the future.

During a lengthy discussion, board members wrestled with the issue. Ray Brubacher, a Canadian, indicated that his church allows him to withhold the military portion of his income tax. “I cannot,” he said, “vote against their request if I can [have taxes not withheld] myself. I don’t want to vote against the constituency, but I cannot vote against my conscience.”

Larry Kehler of the General Conference noted that his denomination had decided in 1983 not to forward the tax of individuals who had made such a request. As a member of that conference, he indicated that he “could not vote for the recommendation.” Both said that their vote would be made with “much pain.”

Other board members shared their pain but agreed with MCC Canada representative Ross Nigh that “we are bound by the process. We went to the conferences in good faith, and not one recommended that we withhold taxes. In the interest of the wider brotherhood, we must vote for it.” The recommendation passed with four against and two abstentions.

The board also passed recommendations that affirm the four and others who make a similar request and that encourage MCC to find ways for them to resist payment legally. Staff were also encouraged to increase efforts to educate the churches about the relationship between militarism, hunger, development and refugees.

The task force also suggested that MCC and the conferences hold a study conference on church/state issues.

In a prepared response, Earl Martin read a statement on behalf of the four that expressed appreciation for the process and deliberation but appealed to the conferences to discuss the issue at their next annual conventions. The four also asked MCC to help facilitate the discussion and invited the conferences to report their findings at the 1988 MCC annual meeting.

Martin also pointed out that while U.S. members of MCC’s seven constituent conferences donated $9.4 million to MCC in 1984, they paid an estimated $159 million in military taxes. Approximagely $880,000 was paid during the course of the two-day meeting.

When the General Board met in late February, however, they backpedaled from their own participation in this decision:

[The board] passed a motion brought by CHM U.S. that GB reverse its recommendation to the Mennonite Central Committee that it continue to withhold taxes from its employees even when they request otherwise.

Staff member Robert Hull… disagreed with MCC’s decision not to stop withholding taxes of employees. He said the General Board is partly responsible because it was contacted, along with seven other denominations when the decision was being made.

The MCC executive committee met in April and continued to hash the question out:

The committee continued to struggle with the issues posed by MCC employees whose request not to have income taxes withheld was rejected after long debate at the MCC annual meeting in January. It was decided at that time that, despite this decision, MCC should continue to affirm the integrity of those objecting to war taxes and establish a committee that would study and create broader awareness of the impact of militarism on refugees, hunger and development.

But the mandate of that group, which is to begin meeting in June, was not clearly defined. Executive committee chairman Elmer Neufeld said that there seems to be a “strong expectation” from some that the special committee will continue to work specifically on the tax withholding issue. Others said the committee’s task was to struggle with congregations to find legal ways to express a Christian witness on the issue of militarism.

It was also reported that the General Conference Mennonite Church has had further discussion regarding how to counsel MCC to respond to the request from its staff on income tax withholding. At MCC’s annual meeting it was reported that MCC representatives had met with constituent conferences and that none had counseled MCC to honor the request of staff. In March the General Conference’s General Board decided to counsel MCC “that they honor requests of their employees to not have their taxes withheld, in line with General Conference policy.”

An update in the 27 May 1986 edition noted:

As authorized by the 1983 triennial sessions, the conference is honoring the requests of four employees not to withhold income tax due to the U.S. Government. Thus far, Internal Revenue Service has not taken action against the conference.

Originally, seven such employees had requested not to have taxes withheld. This was later reduced to five. Now it’s four. I can’t tell whether this is from a general shrinkage of staff or from a flagging of enthusiasm for war tax resistance.

This is the thirty-third in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today we continue through the middle-1980s.

War tax resistance grew to be a front-and-center concern of the General Conference Mennonite Church in the 1970s, but by the mid-1980s interest in the topic began to suddenly decline. I noticed a similar thing when I looked at how war tax resistance rose and fell in the Society of Friends.

Perhaps the topic had been talked-out and people felt there was little more to add to the arguments that had already been made: everybody had the chance to learn about the issue and take their stand, and there wasn’t much left to talk about.

Or perhaps the topic had left the pages of The Mennonite for other publications — like God and Caesar (a specialty publication for war tax resisters put out by a Mennonite group), or the newsletter of the recently-founded National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

The energy Mennonites were putting into the fools’ errand of World Peace Tax Fund legislation was certainly a distraction. Certainly there were Mennonites who would have contemplated conscientious war tax resistance or argued for it, but who were instead content to lobby Congress to give them a box to check.

John R. Dyck wrote in with concern about this lapse of interest:

Thank you for picking up this important issue [military taxes] again (see March 10 issue) at a time when many of our people hoped it was a thing of the past. Must we look to other denominations or people than our own to take a bolder leadership position when it comes to dealing with governments? We have almost fallen asleep in the quietness and relative peace in our country, and the fairly consistent drop of dollars into our coffers has been an effective tranquilizer.

One of the articles in that March 10 issue was Edith Adamson (of Conscience Canada) and Marian Franz (of the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund) promoting the Peace Tax Fund law idea. Such a law, they said “would remove the agonizing dilemma that forces conscientious objectors to either disregard their deepest beliefs or disobey the laws of their country.” They claimed the proposed law would “rechannel[] some tax dollars away from the military and into human needs programs,” and would raise awareness of “nations’ misplaced priorities.”

The 10 March 1987 issue also brought this news:

The Tax Court of Canada, in a recent 28-page ruling, held that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms does not permit taxpayers to withhold the “military portion” of their taxes. Jerilyn Prior, a Vancouver physician of Quaker faith who brought the case, had withheld 10.5 percent of her 1982 taxes and sent them instead to a peace fund. The court concluded, “Even if the assessment were objectively and in reality an infringement upon the appellant’s freedom of conscience and religion… the Canadian tax system… would be a reasonable limit which must be imposed in a free and democratic society…”

1987 taxes for peace fund

Titus and Linda Peachey are directing a Pennsylvania project supported by Mennonite Central Committee U.S. Peace Section. Taxes for Peace is for those wishing to designate a portion of their 1987 tax dollars for a peaceful purpose. The section is also offering a packet of information about military tax opposition.

This year’s Taxes for Peace fund supports the Lancaster County Peacework Alternatives Project, addressing peace and militarism issues in Lancaster County, where 50 companies held prime military contracts worth $150 million with U.S. military agencies in fiscal year 1985.

The Peacheys hope to raise public awareness of the nature and extent of militarism in the Lancaster area and to work with local churches and groups about the theological and ethical questions of militarism. They also want to help defense employees deal with the ethical dilemmas posed by defense-related jobs and begin a dialogue with managers of local military-related industries.

Peace Section hopes that this one-year pilot project will serve as a model and inspiration for other peace groups interested in initiating similar projects in their communities.

In 1986 more than 40 people contributed $4,645.85 to the Taxes for Peace fund. This money was forwarded to a project in Guatemala that aided victims of violence.

European Mennonites: “as important as conscription”

Tubingen, West Germany (MCC)— Green party parliamentarian Petra Kelly called on governments to heed the example of Christian communities and churches during the opening address at the First International Conference of Military Tax Resisters and Peace Tax Campaigns held here Sept. 18–22, 1986. In particular she lauded the decision of the General Conference Mennonite Church not to force its employees to pay war taxes against their conscience.

Over 80 people representing most Western European countries, Australia, Japan, Canada and the United States attended.

Most of those at the conference were tax resisters. Some redirect the military part of their income tax to peace-making purposes, others live below a taxable income level, and others symbolically withhold some of their taxes.

In West Germany and the Netherlands, for example, many take a first step by redirecting 5.72 German marks or Dutch guilders as a sign of their opposition to the deployment of the 572 U.S. Pershing and cruise missiles in Western Europe. They believe that the conscription of their money is as important as the conscription of young men in preparing for and fighting war.

Several participants shared their experiences with tax resistance. Arthur Windsor, a white-haired and mild-mannered Quaker from Gloucester, England, told how he could not reconcile his faith in Christ with paying tax monies that built nuclear and traditional weapons for oppressive Third World regimes. He smiled when he remembered the remark of the constable who came to take him to jail, “The law is not the same as justice.”

Work groups met on Saturday to discuss “Law and Conscience,” “Symbolic Actions and Publicity” and “International Cooperation.” Susumu Ishitiani, a Quaker from Japan, preached the final sermon in the Stepahanus Church, which hosted the conference.

Sponsors of the event included the German Mennonite Peace Committee, the German Quaker Peace Committee and the German Branch of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation. Mennonite participants included Marian Franz, executive director of the U.S.-based National Campaign for a World Peace Tax fund, Wolfgang Krauss of the German Mennonite Peace Committee and Andre Gingerich of Mennonite Central Committee in West Germany.

In 1986 there had been something of a purge of gay Mennonites from leadership positions, after a resolution at the Saskatoon conference unambiguously condemned homosexuality. Robert Hull wondered why Mennonite institutions were being so selective about which sins they were going to condemn in this manner:

I… pointed out that the GC triennial sessions at Fresno, Calif. in 1971 declared that “all war and all that contributes to war is a sin.” Yet some GC congregations accept as members people who have served in the military and not publicly repented, who work in defense industries, who pay federal taxes.

The 9 June 1987 edition announced:

A new video program on war tax resistance is available for free loan from the Mennonite Central Committee Resource Library… War Tax Resistance Seminar includes a lecture and panel discussion presented in March 1986 in Lancaster County, Pa.

The General Assembly of the Mennonite Church (confusingly not the General Conference Mennonite Church) took place in July 1987. According to The Mennonite: “Nearly all 260 delegates representing 22 conferences in the United States and Canada encouraged the church’s governing body to find a way for church institutions to respond to the consciences of employees who object to paying that portion of their taxes destined for military use, even if such action involves civil disobedience.”

Marian Franz wrote in the 28 July 1987 edition that in her experience war tax resistance and work on peace tax fund lobbying was a good form of outreach for the anti-war message. Excerpts:

In the national capitals. When you in the local areas and we in Washington and Ottawa continue to press the issue of conscience, our single acts have widespread reverberations. Often members of government and their legislative assistants feel compelled to examine their consciences. In my experience, as we explain why people cannot pay the military portion of their taxes, the member of government or the aide feels compelled to explain why their conscience does not agree with ours (something we did not come there to ask) or to admit that our witness has caused them to listen to their conscience in a new way.

Among religious bodies. The fact that a sincere expression of conscientious conviction is infectious is demonstrated by the burgeoning examples of conscientious statements among religious bodies. In North America a new “peace church” is emerging that spans virtually every denomination, confession and constituency. Most of the major church bodies and bishops’ conferences have made statements, many surprisingly forceful, against nuclear weapons and the spiraling arms race. At the congregational and parish level, Bible study, prayer and discussion around the nuclear question is occurring across Canada and the United States. Old distinctions between pacifists and just-war proponents are breaking down. The threat of nuclear war has raised, for an increasing number of Christians, a crisis of conscience.

At the corporate level. Until now in our history, conscientious objection was considered only an individual matter. Conscientious objection to paying taxes for military force was a matter between the individual and God, the individual and conscience, the individual and the courts, the individual and revenue collection agencies. Now another dimension has been added to the picture. It is called corporate military tax resistance.

Even in the face of large maximum penalties ($25,000 fine for each person and/or 10 years in prison), religious bodies are beginning to ask if they as corporate entities can any longer in good conscience withhold taxes from the salaries of those employees who ask for reasons of conscience that they not be withheld. To date such corporate action has been taken only by small groups in historic peace churches (e.g. the General Conference Mennonite Church; Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, a six-state region of Quakers; and the Friends World Committee on Consultation). But that action is now under consideration by some of the largest denominations.

When we mention such corporate actions and considerations in Congressional offices, new interest is sparked. Conscientious objection as a matter of individual conscience is one thing, but when it occurs on a corporate level it draws a different quality of attention.

At an international level. The Canadian and U.S. Peace Tax Fund efforts are a small campaign as lobbies go. Yet small seeds continue to sprout and blossom. The exact wording of the U.S. Peace Tax Fund Bill now appears in legislation introduced in the parliaments of several nations. How could David Bassett, a Quaker physician from Ann Arbor, Mich., who drafted the U.S. peace tax legislation with law faculty, have dreamed that one day he would attend an international conference of peace tax campaigns?

After five years as executive director of the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund in the United States, I was thrilled to attend the first international conference of peace tax campaigns and war tax resisters in Tubingen last fall. One hundred participants from 15 countries gathered for the conference. They came together at the invitation of five German groups, including the Deutsches Mennonitisches Friedens Komitee (German Mennonite Peace Committee).

In workshops, panel discussions, and plenary sessions many participants expressed openly and in moving ways the Christian basis for their beliefs and actions. While the religious and political backgrounds of the participants varied, there was little diversity in their conviction of conscience. All found it a clear violation of conscience to pay the military portion of their taxes. All saw the connection between the 4 million people who starve each year and swollen military budgets. All noted that what the world spends in just 10 days for military expenditures could not only feed all the hungry on earth for a year but also provide them with clean water, housing and education. Even the setting for the conference was a reminder of why we had gathered. From the Tubingen church where we met, we could see a hospital for brain-damaged people from World War Ⅱ, now under conversion into a training center for the triage method of treating the victims of the next war.

I was struck by how many of the participants had known the trauma of war firsthand. The majority were Europeans and had lived under bombs and/or had grown up with family members missing because of World War Ⅱ.

Antje Spannenberg was one of the generation of children who had plagued their parents with the question, “How could you have allowed Hitler to come into and remain in power? Why didn’t you stop him?” Now Antje’s children are asking her, “How can you allow a world full of weapons so dreadful and dangerous?”

Ursula Windsor, a refugee from Nazi Germany now living in England and married to Britisher Arthur Windsor, admits, “I know if enough of us had resisted we could have stopped Hitler. For some it would not have been difficult; for others, a great sacrifice. Whether simple or difficult, there came a time when it was too late.”

Ursula knew that truth from experience. “I have watched my favorite possessions being taken out of my home as the British Inland Revenue Service claimed them in lieu of taxes we have not paid because we believe that Jesus forbids us to pay for war.”

Her husband, Arthur, went to prison for three weeks. On the day of Arthur’s release he was met at the prison gate by a member of the British Parliament who escorted him to the British House of Commons. With Arthur in the gallery, the member of Parliament introduced the British Peace Tax Fund into Parliament. On that day, for the first time, it received 10 minutes of official debate.

She also briefly profiled conference attendees Wolfgang Krauss of West Germany and Susumu Ishitani of Japan.

Military tax resistance. Are there conscientious objectors to taxes for military purposes in other countries, and do some refuse to pay the military portion of their taxes to their governments? Yes. Some withhold all, some the military portion and some a symbolic portion from their taxes. For some these actions are a political strategy; for many they are based on religious commitment.

Reports from the various countries echoed a refrain. In the Netherlands 5.72 guilders is a symbolic amount withheld by many. In Germany 5.72 Deutsche Marks is a symbolic amount. The number represents the 572 Pershing Ⅱ and cruise missiles on European soil and expresses abhorrence for the fact that they shorten the nuclear fuse to six minutes.

Legislative efforts. Has any country succeeded in passing peace tax legislation that would make it legal to have the military portion of their citizens’ taxes go into a separate fund? Not yet.

Countries working for legislation are the Federal Republic of Germany, Great Britain, Belgium, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Finland, Australia and the United States. Switzerland and Spain have no organized effort for legal recognition of conscientious objection to military taxes. France has a fund in which tax-resisted dollars are collected, as does Italy.

The Peace Tax campaigns of Canada and Japan, rather than promoting peace tax legislation, are challenging their governments in the courts based on constitutional guarantees of freedom of conscience (Canada) and constitutional stipulations that not more than 1 percent of the gross national product be used for military force (Japan).

Other judicial efforts. Attempts to establish through the courts the legal right to redirect taxes from military purposes have been pursued in many countries. Except in Italy, these efforts have been without success. The standard response of governments to non-payment of the military portion of taxes (if they respond at all) includes trials, confiscation of property, fines and interest fees, and — in rare instances — prison.

The standard response of the courts to tax resisters who are brought to trial is that the issues raised present a “political question” that the courts cannot address or that constitutional guarantees of freedom of conscience and/or religion do not outweigh the duty of a citizen to pay taxes.

The greatest success and surprise story was that de facto recognition of conscientious objection to military taxes exists in Italy. Fifty war tax resisters have been prosecuted in six legal cases and have been acquitted in every case. They based their case on the fact that freedom of conscience is guaranteed in the Italian constitution. Participants from Italy reported at Tubingen that four years ago they knew of only 20 who did not pay the military portion of their taxes for reasons of conscience. That number is now 3,500 and growing. War tax resisters are no longer prosecuted in Italy.

I listened with anticipation to the featured speaker, Petra Kelly, founder of the Green party, and member of the West German Bundestag (Parliament). Referring to the Hitler years, she said, “Because we can recall the painful experiences of fascism in this country, especially when it comes to military violence, we cannot retreat into obedience by our citizens in relation to the state. In the domain of conscience there is a higher duty. The special status of human conscience and the fundamental right not to kill is set apart from other issues. Therefore governments should make allowance for tax redirection that they would make in no other cases.”

Then came the surprise. Kelly said that in searching for signs of some way out of the dark morass of military expenditures, she finds an example in the Mennonites.

She said, “An example for me is the [General Conference] Mennonite Church. A group of members decided the following: ‘The employees of the church administration are given the power to be true to the high demands of Christ’s Law of Love, in that they can resist withholding taxes from employees that have requested it and therefore open up the possibility to resist for reasons of conscience to pay for the preparation of war.’ ”

She continued, “This example should give us all courage, but it is also a clear signal of that which happens in many Christian churches and can give us hope.”

I thought back to the long struggle of conscience that culminated in the 1983 conference decision cited by Kelly. At the time we were not thinking of what the rest of the world would think of us, but only whether our action was consistent with obedience to Christ. I certainly did not expect to hear it quoted three years later by a member of a foreign parliament, at a conference of 15 countries.

Conscience is contagious.

This is the thirty-fourth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today we enter the late 1980s.

The 25 February 1988 edition again announced the “Taxes for Peace” fund that had been established by the MCC Peace Section (U.S.) to coordinate war tax redirection.

In 1988 the fund would be redirecting taxes to “the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund… [which] seeks to enact the U.S. Peace Tax Fund Bill… to give those conscientiously opposed to war a way to pay 100 percent of their taxes, with the military percentage going to a separate fund for peace-enhancing programs.”

In 1987 about $4,000 was contributed to the U.S. Peace Section Taxes for Peace fund. Those monies helped support the Lancaster County Peacework Alternatives project. In other years peace-related projects in places such as Laos and Guatemala have received funds.

MCC U.S. Peace Section is also offering an information packet on military tax opposition that contains varying theological positions on the war tax issue, and materials about tax laws and legal concerns for the tax resister.

The 8 March 1988 issue brought this news:

The General Board of Friends United Meeting has adopted a policy of not withholding the federal withholding tax of employees who are conscientious objectors to paying taxes used for military purposes. The General Conference Mennonite Church adopted a similar policy in 1983. On the current staff, said general secretary Steven Main, are three conscientious objectors to paying war taxes. The policy requires employees who want to participate in the witness of military tax refusal to first go through a “clearness process” with their Meeting or church community.

That issue also reprinted excerpts from the letter Ethel S. and Henry A. Fast sent to the IRS:

I was a conscientious objector to war in World War Ⅰ. So I reported this to the military camp office, informing them I could not participate in regular military training. I asked them to assign me to service in a base hospital designed for overseas patients. They respected my claim of conscience and gave me an opportunity to serve face and stomach victims of war. Later… they handed me an “honorable discharge” card. I still have this card.

Can you now extend to me, as a person of 92 years, and to my spouse, the same sensitive respect for our claims of conscience? We love our country and we respect our government. And we do not hesitate to pay taxes for orderly affairs and services of government.

But we have become deeply troubled over the vastly disproportionate part of our federal income tax being allocated to the building up of a military force and arsenal. This is entirely out of proportion to the huge debt and the staggering needs among the poor, the sick, the aged and the unemployed.

Our conscience can no longer endure this. So we have decided to withhold 37 percent of this year’s (1986) federal income tax liability (namely, the 37 percent used in the present military build-up program). We want to send this as a donation to the Commission on Home Ministries… [which reaches out] to the poor, the unemployed, the underprivileged and the many people hurt and adrift by wars…

In World War Ⅰ the government recognized my concern of conscience. Can you grant us this kind of courtesy for our older years?

The 12 April 1988 edition noted:

Six Mennonite pastors who have refused to pay some or all of their military taxes were interviewed in the November 1987 issue of ACTS (Another Church Tries Something), published by the Commission on Home Ministries. Donald Kaufman of Bethel College Church, North Newton, Kan., John Gaeddert of First Church, Halstead, Kan., S. Roy Kaufman of Science Ridge Church, Sterling, Ill., Ronald Krehbiel of Salem Church, Freeman, S.D., Mark Weidner of First Church, Bluffton, Ohio, and Dorothy Nickel Friesen of Manhattan (Kan.) Fellowship told of how they decided to resist war taxes, how they involved church members in the decision and how their action has affected others.

The New Call to Peacemaking initiative and the Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns sponsored a gathering of leaders from the traditional peace churches in February 1988 to discuss what to do about the dilemma of such churches withholding taxes for the government from the salaries of their employees who wanted to resist paying war taxes. Paul Schrag wrote up an article on the meeting that was reprinted in the 24 May 1988 edition of The Mennonite. Excerpts:

The question of how church organizations can help their employees follow their consciences — and how to deal with the risks involved for both employees and employers — were the issues that the 36 Mennonites, Brethren and Quakers struggled with.

The church leaders, organizational representatives and lawyers affirmed their support for individual military tax resisters and for efforts to seek a legislative solution by working toward passage of the U.S. Peace Tax Fund bill in Congress.

They agreed to organize a peace church leadership group to go to Washington sometime in the future to support the peace tax bill and to express concerns about tax withholding. They also agreed to help each other by filing friend-of-the-court briefs if tax resisters are prosecuted and by sharing the cost of tax resistance penalties.

“You may think the world will little note nor long remember what has happened here,” said Marian Franz, director of the U.S. Peace Tax Fund. “But I regard it as a historic meeting.

“The decision to end the human race does not belong to Caesar. Therefore, tax dollars that wrestle that decision out of the hands of God do not either.”

Participants in the meeting included both military tax resisters and people who would not engage in tax resistance themselves but support those who do.

People from churches that have policies of breaking the law by not withholding the federal taxes of employees who oppose paying military taxes shared their experiences with people from churches considering adopting such a policy. The General Conference Mennonite Church and two Quaker groups are in the first category. The Mennonite Church is in the second.

MC leaders, including moderator James Lapp and moderator-elect George Brunk Ⅲ, came to the meeting to explore church policy options on military tax withholding. MC general assembly delegates asked the church last July to develop a policy recommendation on the issue for consideration at Normal ’89.

“This roots us in a larger movement,” Lapp said of the meeting. “It gives us ideas and handles about how other people have addressed it. We don’t have to start from ground zero.”

The MC General Board plans to formulate questions about tax withholding for congregations to discuss. It will prepare a recommendation next year based on congregations’ responses.

Robert Hull, GC secretary for peace and justice, said it was frustrating that many members of historic peace churches are not willing to witness against financial participation in preparing for war, although they are opposed to physical participation in war.

Some said it was disappointing that so many people are unwilling to follow their consciences until the government, through the Peace Tax Fund, might allow them to do so legally.

One quoted Gandhi: “We have stooped so low that we fancy it our duty to do whatever the law requires.”

“Do we want our righteousness without a price?” asked Ray Gingerich, a professor at Eastern Mennonite College, Harrisonburg, Va.

When a church or organization decides to honor employees’ requests not to withhold their federal income tax, it assumes serious risks. Any “responsible person” who willfully fails to withhold an employee’s taxes theoretically could be punished with a prison sentence and a $250,000 fine. An organization could be fined $500,000.

But such penalties have never been imposed on legitimate religious organizations, nor are they likely to be, said two lawyers at the meeting. The usual Internal Revenue Service response to war tax resistance is to take the amount of tax owed, plus a 5 percent penalty and interest, from the employee’s bank account.

The IRS has not taken even this action against the four GC employees who are not having their taxes withheld. All GC personnel who could be subject to penalties have agreed to accept the risk.

The Friends World Committee for Consultation, which has had a non-withholding policy since 1982, has had tax money seized, plus interest and penalties, from its resisters’ bank accounts. The Friends United Meeting adopted a non-withholding policy last October. The Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of Friends will decide in March whether it should have such a policy.

Charles Boyer of the Church of the Brethren said he would use the input from the meeting to work toward helping develop a denominational policy on tax resistance.

An even more basic issue than war tax resistance arose concerning tax-withholding laws. Some compared the church’s tax-collecting role to that of the biblical publicans.

“I have a growing dis-ease that the church is a tax collector for the government, regardless of what the money is used for,” said Vern Preheim, GC general secretary.

Participants made suggestions for improvements on a draft of “A Manual on Military Tax Withholding for Religious Employers,” written by Hull, Linda Coffin of the Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns and lawyers Peter Goldberger and J.E. McNeil, who both gave legal advice at the meeting. The manual is expected to be available later this year.

That book’s availability would be announced in the 22 November edition.

Another concern I have with promotion of the Peace Tax Fund law is that in order to tempt legislators to support it, there is a tendency to defang war tax objection and make it less threatening to the government. Take for example this description of Marian Franz’s testimony before a House committee reviewing the tax code: “Franz said that the U.S. Peace Tax Fund Bill would alleviate a persistent burden on the IRS and permit these citizens [conscientious objectors] to pay their full share of tax without violation of religious conscience.” All we want to do is pay our taxes and not cause any trouble for the IRS — is that really the best way to speak truth to power and challenge militarism?

The 27 September 1988 edition brought this news:

The Internal Revenue Service filed two suits against a Quaker group in Pennsylvania because the organization refused to attach the wages of two employees who have withheld part of their income taxes as a conscientious protest against military spending, Religious News Service reported. The lawsuits against the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends seek $16,836 in connection with federal taxes not paid by William V. Grassie and David A. Falls. The Quakers sent a letter to the IRS saying neither Grassie nor Falls is “a tax evader but a conscientious taxpayer who is conscientiously refusing payment of the military portion of his taxes.”

This is the thirty-ninth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today we hit 1994.

War tax resistance mentions have slowed to a trickle. It’s hard to be certain whether this reflects a waning of interest in Mennonite circles generally, or just a change in editorial focus, but in any case the contrast is stark between the passion and the quantity of discussion about war tax resistance just fifteen years before and as we hit 1994.

Almost all of the war tax resistance material was crammed into a single tax day issue that year.

The 12 April 1994 edition included a lengthy meditation on civil disobedience by Arthur P. Boers. It gave a couple of passing nods to war tax resistance.

The same issue profiled a handful of war tax resisters:

Refusing to Pay for War

Four Mennonites follow their consciences by telling the Canadian and U.S. governments they cannot pay for war with their taxes.

Larry Penner

When the Persian Gulf War broke out in 1991, Ed Olfert protested. “I needed to have a little bit of voice to say that this is stupid and has to end,” he says. “This is my tax money at work, killing women and children.”

Ed had considered tax resistance before. He decided to withhold about 9 percent of his tax payment, a percentage that Conscience Canada, a tax resisters’ group, suggests to represent the amount of taxes that goes to the military.

Along with withholding, Ed sent letters to government and Revenue Canada officials voicing his protest. But in the end the effort brought mostly frustration.

As a self-employed farmer, the amount he withheld was minimal, under $100. When Revenue Canada officials contacted him, they didn’t know about his protest. “I wondered if the letters I sent even arrived,” Ed says.

At his church, Su­perb Men­non­ite Church in Ker­ro­bert, Sask., Ed found lit­tle sym­pa­thy. “There was a fear of what I was do­ing,” he says. “There was a draw­ing away, as if peo­ple won­dered, ‘Is this what the Men­non­ite church is mov­ing toward, that we all have to do this?’ ”

Ac­tu­ally, Men­non­ite tax re­sist­ers are few and scat­tered. More sup­port leg­is­la­tive change that would al­low peo­ple of con­science to des­ig­nate their tax dol­lars for non­mil­i­tary ends. Such leg­is­la­tion has been pro­posed in both Canada and the United States.

Those who do resist paying taxes find the need to resist more imperative as technology moves warfare farther from conscription and closer to the pocketbook. While the draft in the United States has remained inactive since 1972, 28 percent of the 1993 federal budget went to current military efforts and another 18.7 percent to payments on past military efforts, according to the Friends Committee on National Legislation. And although Canada has not conscripted its citizens since World War Ⅱ, Conscience Canada reports that $12 billion, or 7.5 percent of the federal budget, went to military spending in fiscal year 1993. The Persian Gulf War proved that with modern technology, full-scale war can be fought without conscription, but not without dollars.

Hypocritical: For re­sist­er Menno Klas­sen of Win­ni­peg, re­sist­ing war­fare through his taxes has be­come more im­per­a­tive as he has grown older. Ex­cused from war as a con­sci­en­tious ob­ject­or to World War Ⅱ, Menno says it would be hyp­o­crit­i­cal now to pay to send some­one in his place. “Our con­sti­tu­tion guar­an­tees free­dom of con­science, but if we’re not al­lowed to ex­er­cise our con­science, it doesn’t mean much,” he says.

Like Ed, Menno has re­ceived mixed re­ac­tions from his con­gre­ga­tion, Fort Garry Mennonite Fellowship in Winnipeg. “I must admit I don’t receive much support from the church, even though my church is one of the more tolerant in Winnipeg,” he says. “People [in the church] are busy with family and inward looking. It’s a family affair.”

In Ontario, Jane Pritchard has found some support. Like Ed, her conscience condemned the Gulf War, “the first war fought by my country since I became politically aware.”

A physician, Jane faced a higher tax pay­ment. She with­held just over $1,000. For her the act was a lib­er­a­tion. “Once I’d done it I didn’t see how I could con­vince my­self to pay be­fore.” Jane has found sup­port for her de­ci­sion in her Bible study group at Toronto United Men­non­ite Church.

When Revenue Cana­da called Jane in, she ex­pect­ed the worst. She was not dis­ap­point­ed. She was shown into a stark room with no­thing but two chairs, a desk, a light and a com­pu­ter ter­mi­nal. “It was like some­thing out of [the book] 1984,” she says. The Revenue Canada representative kept saying she owed this portion of her taxes. He didn’t ask why she didn’t pay but said Revenue Canada had to do something. He did not say what.

Sympathy: At some point partway through the interview, Jane realized her interviewer was more nervous than she was. When he did not respond to her questions of what Revenue Canada would do, she suggested possibilities. “Garnishee my wages?” He nodded yes. “From where?” He did not know. “Raid my bank account?” Again he nodded. She left feeling sympathy for her inquisitor, a sympathetic young man caught in a system.

Don Kaufman of Newton, Kan., knows that many Internal Revenue Service officers are sympathetic people caught in a system. He has resisted military tax for 36 years. He recalls one IRS representative who said he hoped the government would make it possible for tax resisters to resist without breaking the law.

Partly because IRS of­fi­cials are bound by reg­u­la­tions, Don’s pro­test has shift­ed its em­pha­sis over the years. “In­it­ial­ly I wrote more to the IRS, now I write more to Con­gress. The IRS is just car­ry­ing out Con­gress’ or­ders,” Don says. “If there were a pro­vi­sion for con­science in giv­ing money for war as there is in giv­ing body to war, tax re­sist­ers wouldn’t have to feel guilty for fol­low­ing their con­science.”

In his many years of re­sist­ance, Don has seen in­ter­est in tax re­sist­ance wax and wane. But, he says, it has never died out. The history of war tax resistance in North America dates to the first settlers from Europe, many of whom left their home country in part to avoid paying taxes for war. But when the personal income tax was introduced in both the United States and Canada, funds raised went to pay for war.

Don believes a change will come. “It may be like women’s suffrage, it may take 60 to 80 years before there is a change, but if people keep working and don’t give up too easily, there will be a change,” he says.

Until the law changes, Don will continue to resist. “It’s enough of a threat to who I am as a person that I don’t want to give it up. If I quit, I become schizophrenic at that point — I’m not being honest with who I am. I want my life to be integrated.”

A sidebar concerned two other Mennonite tax resisters:

Waiting for the tax collector

Pat and Earl Hostetter Martin have been resisting taxes since they returned from Mennonite Central Committee work in Vietnam in 1969. As students in Palo Alto, Calif., they began by withholding 10 percent of their telephone tax, a sum that totaled about $10 after three years.

For this, Internal Revenue Service representatives drove down from San Francisco twice and questioned their landlord while Pat and Earl were at work. Then they received a notice threatening a lien on their property and ordering an appearance at the IRS office. But before the appearance, the IRS found the Martins’ bank account and took the money.

In 1984 the Martins went to Akron, Pa., to serve as co-sec­re­tar­ies for East Asia for MCC. They with­held about 30 per­cent of their taxes, a fig­ure rep­re­sent­ing the amount of tax money go­ing for cur­rent mil­i­tary ex­pen­di­tures. “Af­ter be­ing in Vi­et­nam and hav­ing seen a lot of friends who had suf­fered be­cause of U.S. weap­ons, we de­ci­ded we couldn’t pay,” Pat says.

The couple has re­sist­ed pay­ing taxes ever since.

At first the IRS froze their per­son­al check­ing ac­count for a couple of weeks to col­lect. Pat called it an odd bles­sing. “You get caught with checks out and you have to go back to stores and explain. But that also gave us an opportunity to explain why we are tax resisters.”

Four years ago the couple began moving its bank account frequently to keep the IRS from finding the money. They now owe between $2,000 and $3,000.

When the IRS tried to garnishee the couple’s wages at MCC, MCC’s response was to ask the IRS to reconsider, to try to find the money some other way.

MCC, like most Mennonite organizations, does withhold income tax from employees’ paychecks for the government. The General Conference Mennonite Church is the only major Mennonite organization that will grant employees’ requests to not have federal taxes withheld from their paychecks so that employees may resist taxes.

Last year the Martins were in Vietnam from January through July. While they were gone the IRS attached a lien to all their property: house, car, real estate. Anything they own could now be sold to pay the debt.

The couple is part of a Lancaster group of resisters called “Taxes for Life.” The group meets monthly to support each other. “Anyone who chooses tax resistance should have a support group because it can be scary,” says Pat. “We agree to stand behind each other and keep ourselves honest to our conscience.”

That issue’s editorial, by Robert Hull, read in part:

In recent years I have joined with Don Kaufman and 20 others in the Newton, Kan., area to form a support group concerned with the military use of our taxes. Our refused tax dollars and contributions build up a “Heartland Peace Tax Fund,” which in March granted $750 to local human needs agencies and $150 to the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund in Washington.

In St. Louis, Bill Ramsey (staffer for the regional American Friends Service Committee office) spent 30 days in jail in 1993 for his prophetic witness. As a condition of probation, he was ordered by the federal judge to pay his 1993 military taxes, due this April. Bill has done as ordered, sending personal checks to seven life-affirming agencies and asking them to certify to the court that he has done so. It is unlikely that the federal judge will agree that Bill Ramsey has paid his taxes in this way. Bill is preparing himself spiritually for more prison time. But his point is made: We Americans and Canadians are robbing from the human needs so evident in our societies to build and sell weapons.

The witness of some among us to this truth goes on. Whether they continue to stand alone depends upon whether more of us come to incarnate the peacemaking of Jesus Christ in our own witness.

The 10 May 1994 edition had a brief follow-up that noted the Heartland Peace Tax Fund’s grants for 1994.

This is the twentieth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of Gospel Herald, journal of the (Old) Mennonite Church.

In 1979, the Mennonite Church had the luxury of being by-standers as the General Conference Mennonite Church wrestled with the war tax issue, and in particular about whether to continue to withhold income taxes from the salaries of their employees who were conscientious objectors to military taxation (the Mennonite Church would get its own chance to wrestle with these issues a bit later on), at a special mid-triennium conference on the issue. Meanwhile, disgruntled conservative Mennonites met at the Smoketown Consultation, Peace Tax Fund advocates ramped up their campaign, and the New Call to Peacemaking pushed the Peace Churches to step up their game.

As a result, there was a plethora of war tax resistance-related content in Gospel Herald that year.

The 2 January 1979 issue of Gospel Herald quoted Don Kaufman on the war tax problem:

“The federal income tax is the chief link connecting each individual’s daily labor with the tremendous buildup for war,” Donald D. Kaufman observes in his new book, The Tax Dilemma: Praying for Peace, Paying for War (Herald Press: 1978). “Preoccupied as some citizens are with paying too much tax, I suggest that the crucial issue has to do with the purpose for which tax monies are used,” Kaufman maintains. “While a young person can be exempted from personally serving in the Armed Forces, no one is easily exempted from making contributions to the military leviathan.” In his book, Kaufman considers issue of the two kingdoms. After a brief examination of the biblical background, he traces the history of conscientious objection to war taxes. He discusses a dozen viable options which concerned Christians can use “to register our faithfulness to Jesus Christ as Lord and our opposition to corporate war making by the state within which we live.”

“The Bulletin of the Mennonite Biblical Seminaries” which was included as a January 1979 supplement, announced that Henry Poettcker would be the new president of Mennonite Biblical Seminary:

[W]hat words can we say to our brother in his new responsibilities? Lawrence Burkholder last June in the consultation on taxes and war initiated an intriguing discussion on the manager (or the administrator) and the prophet and corporate responsibility. He observed that with only a few incidental references, "the Bible is almost solidly against those who assumed responsibility for institutional life" (a distressing word for a biblical scholar on his inauguration).

At the February 1979 meeting of the Mennonite Board of Missions, it became clear that Mennonite Church agencies would also have to deal with the tax withholding question that was roiling the General Conference Mennonite Church:

Ray Horst reported that two staff members have said they would want to consider a personal response on war taxes should Mennonite Board of Missions seek alternatives to such withholdings. The directors acted to continue discussions with other Mennonite groups and Mennonite Church agencies on the war tax question.

In the 13 March 1979 issue, Carl Kreider offered simple living and charitable giving as war tax resistance techniques:

How to save taxes.

There has been much discussion about the appropriateness of paying for war as we pray for peace. Some have sought ways in which they can refuse to pay federal income taxes and thus give a concrete witness against the militarism which plagues the U.S. and many other countries of the world — even, alas, poor countries.

The focus on income taxes may obscure the fact that there are many other federal taxes which are also used to support the national defense establishment. In fact, in fiscal 1979 the personal income tax provided only about one half of the non-trust fund U.S. federal revenue. The other half came from a variety of sources such as the corporation income tax, excise taxes (on many items such as telephone service, air travel, automobile tires, gasoline, and especially alcohol and tobacco), estate and gift taxes, and customs duties.

Can we avoid paying these taxes? Not completely, but we can reduce the amount we pay by the simple device of not buying at all the things which are harmful and by reducing our expenditures for all other items by holding down our standard of living. The United States tax law is very generous in allowing deductions for making contributions to churches and charitable institutions. (The Canadian law is less generous.) Up to 50 percent of income may be deducted.

These charitable gifts will first of all reduce sharply the amount of federal income tax we pay — in some cases even avoiding the tax completely. But in the second place, since the gift to charity will reduce our remaining disposable income we will have reduced our standard of living and thus will have to pay less of the hidden taxes which also support the defense establishment. The corporation income tax, for example, is one third the size of the personal income tax.

Although the check to pay the corporation income tax is sent to the government by the corporation, rest assured the corporation will, if they possibly can, pass on the tax to the consumer in the form of higher prices for the things the corporation sells. If we don’t buy the product, we aren’t paying this tax.

Reducing our standard of living as a means of avoiding federal taxes has an important additional benefit. It is a powerful witness that we are disturbed by the disparities in wealth and income throughout the world. Our lives should demonstrate that we can get along without buying the multitude of things an affluent America deems important.

A report on an April 15 protest at Titan Ⅱ missile base noted that “Also scheduled for the same day will be a nonviolent protest at the Wichita offices of the Internal Revenue Service, designed to draw attention to tax money being used for military expenditures…” And a separate report on a protest at Rocky Flats said that “On Apr. 16, tax resisters made statements about their refusal to pay for war in a press conference outside the IRS office.”

The 17 April 1979 issue brought news of the Quaker war tax resisters Bruce & Ruth Graves’ court battle:

Quaker couple billed for tax not owed

A Quaker couple from Ypsilanti, Michigan, attempted to claim a “war tax” credit on federal income tax returns, but has lost an unusual case before the U.S. Supreme Court, the Associated Press reports. The court left intact lower court rulings that Bruce and Ruth Graves, as conscientious objectors, may not claim such a credit. The couple had sought a refund of the portion of their taxes used for war materials.

Since 1973, the Graves have converted the “foreign tax credit” on their federal tax forms to a “war tax credit” and entered only 50 percent to the income tax otherwise due. Each year they have asked a refund but not received it. So after failing to get the couple to sign corrected tax statements, the government initiated action to collect the “deficiency” even though it had already collected the correct amount. The appeal argued that the government’ s action violated the Graves’ constitutional right to freedom of religion.

Catholic priest John M. Garvey also fought the law and the law won, a bit. The 15 May 1979 Gospel Herald had the scoop:

Priest who refused to pay taxes has to get around without a car

Father John M. Garvey gave up his car for Lent. Actually, the Internal Revenue Service hauled it away on Ash Wednesday. It now sits amid big, drab army trucks behind a fence topped with barbed wire 20 miles away in Mobridge, S.D. It is there because the Roman Catholic priest has not paid income taxes as a protest against military spending and the federal government’s treatment of Indian people.

Without a car on the South Dakota prairie, the priest has been walking more, hitchhiking, and riding buses. “It’s been inconvenient,” he said, and when he does he gets some puzzled looks. “But it’s no big dramatic thing. I’m not standing out there shivering to death.”

John K. Stoner, in the 29 May 1979 issue, imagined the conversation between a taxpayer and his or her Maker in the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust:

There was a blinding flash of light, an explosion like the bursting of a million bombs, and in an instant everything was burning in a huge ball of fire.

The first time it was the Flood.

But next time the fire… It was the End.

Afterward a prominent evangelical leader was being quizzed by his Maker.

“You say you were taken by surprise. But didn’t you know it might happen?”

“Well, yes, Sir. I guess I did, Sir. But You see, Sir, they…”

“Wasn’t anybody talking about the fantastic risks involved? But not risks really. It was a certainty. As predictable as death and taxes.”

“Well, Sir, I can see it now. But hindsight is always better…”

“What do you mean, hindsight? Couldn’t you discern the signs of the times?”

“Well, Sir, we were kind of busy…”

“Doing what?”

“Well, Sir, some of us were searching for remnants of Noah’s Ark. We thought if we found it maybe they would believe in You…”

“But surely you weren’t all hunting Noah’s Ark?”

“Well, Sir, not exactly. But a lot of people who weren’t hunting it were watching movies about the search. And then we were busy defending the Bible.”

“Why didn’t you know it was going to happen? Surely there were people warning you. In fact, I had assigned a few Myself to sound the alarm.”

“Well, Sir, You see, Sir, those people… I don’t know quite how to say this… er… they didn’t believe the way we… er… I mean I…”

“Did you think you could go on building three more bombs a day forever and not blow things up?

“Well, Sir, You see, I thought You would look after those things. I didn’t think it would happen unless You wanted.

“Women nursing infant babies? Children swinging on the side porch, playing in the lawn sprinkler? An old man reading his Bible? Millions of people, burned up?”

“Well, sir, in retrospect it does look rather overwhelming. I’m not sure it was really fair. But then, things were getting rather bad, what with communism, homosexuality, welfare, big government, pollution…”

“And capitalism, national security, the good life, nuclear deterrence.”

“Well, Sir, I hadn’t thought of those things as…”

“Why not?”

“Well, Sir, You see, the people who talked about those things were not… er… Bible believing. As an example, they talked about resisting war taxes, even though the Bible says, ‘Render unto Caesar…’. Things like that…”

“You paid your taxes?”

“Well, Sir, yes, Sir, I did.”

“Every penny?”

“I think so, Sir.”

“Are you saying that I am responsible for this fire and your tax dollars were not?”

“Well, Sir, I… er…”

“Next!”

Allan W. Smith responded in a letter to the editor, saying that Christians should beware of inadvertently putting themselves under an Antichrist who promises worldly peace at the expense of abandoning Biblical truth:

In Stoner’s depiction of the scene of judgment day, it is to be observed that Jesus dictum, “Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s,” is contradicted. It is not to be supposed that Jesus and Paul, who both told people to pay their taxes, were ignorant of the way that Rome got and held its power. Taxes are, after all, not freewill gifts to the state, and we may well be grieved with the way the state uses them. However, we must all live by our Word-enlightened consciences.

In July 1979, the General Board of the Mennonite Church met. Gospel Herald reported:

A proposed Mennonite Church statement on militarism and conscription, originally drafted by MBCM staff members Hubert Schwartzentruber and Gordon Zook in consultation with several other persons, was presented. The Board gave the statement extensive discussion and some refinement, and unanimously approved the document for submission as a recommendation from MBCM to the General Board for presentation to the 1979 Mennonite Church General Assembly. The statement contains sections on peace and obedience, use of material resources, Christian service and conscription, and militarism and taxation.

That article also noted that the Mennonite Board of Congregational Ministries met and approved a “task force to represent the Mennonite Church in cooperation with the General Conference Mennonite Church committee on conscientious objection and tax exemption.”

Hubert Schwartzentruber gave the keynote address at the 2–4 August 1979 Allegheny Conference annual meeting:

Sensing the radical nature of his comments on the theme, “The Way of Peace,” Schwartzentruber said that he could be taken to jail if he put into action his beliefs on such issues as war taxes and conscription. If he had to go to jail, he said, it would be easier to go with brothers and sisters in the faith. Peacemaking is the way of Jesus, but it has to be the work of the church and not of individuals alone, he said.

Representatives of the Mennonite Church gathered in Waterloo, 11–16 August 1979, and war tax resistance was on the agenda but was overshadowed by other concerns about draft registration:

Debate over the proposed statement on militarism and conscription was centered in two subpoints. One counseled Mennonites not to comply with any military registration law that might be passed by the U.S. Congress if the Department of Defense and not civilians would be responsible for the registration program. The other point counseled administrators of church schools not to comply with any legislation which might be passed that would require them to provide information about their students for purposes of registration.

Noting that passage of any such registration bill is very much in doubt, Linden Wenger, Harrisonburg, Va., told fellow delegates, “It seems to me we’re being a bit premature in making an issue of these two items.” Wenger also said that he “will not hinge my decision” on whether to support compliance with a registration law on whether it is administered by civilian or military personnel.

Other delegates, including John E. Lapp of Souderton, Pa., responded that it was important that the items in question not be deleted.

In the amended statement which was finally approved, the two items were combined and weakened slightly, but were retained. A subpoint urging “careful biblical study” on the issue of war tax payment was added. In addition, the statement was upgraded from “guidelines” to a full statement of position.

The eventual statement on militarism and conscription that came out of the Waterloo conference on 16 August 1979 was reprinted in Gospel Herald. It included the following section:

On militarism and taxation

We recognize that today’s militarism expresses itself more and more through expensive and highly technical weaponry and that such equipment is dependent upon financial resources conscripted from citizens through taxation. Therefore,

1. We encourage our members to pursue a lifestyle which minimizes such tax liability through reduction of taxable income and/or increase of tax deductible contributions for the advancement of the gospel and the relief of human suffering.
2. We endorse efforts in support of legislation which would provide alternative uses for taxes, paid by conscientious objectors to war, which would otherwise be devoted to military purposes.
3. We encourage our congregations to engage in careful biblical study regarding Christian responsibility to civil authorities including issues of conscience in relation to payment of taxes.
4. We recognize as a valid witness the conscientious refusal to pay a portion of taxes required for war and military efforts. Such refusal, however, may not be pursued in a spirit of lawlessness nor for personal advantage but may be an occasion for constructive response to human need.
5. We encourage our congregations and institutions to seek relief from the current legal requirement of collecting taxes through the withholding of income taxes of employees, especially those taxes which may be used for war purposes. In this effort we endorse cooperation with the General Conference Mennonite Church in the current search for judicial, legislative, and administrative alternatives to the collection of military-related taxes. In the meantime if congregational or institutional employers are led to noncompliance with the requirement to withhold such taxes, we pledge our support for those representatives of the church who may be called to account for such a witness.

On 20 September 1979, Robert C. Johansen (“president of the Institute for World Order”) spoke at Goshen College and boosted war tax resistance:

Johansen encouraged his listeners to become part of a “new breed of abolitionists,” to take a more active stance, even if this included refusing to pay war taxes and refusing to be drafted. He reminded his audience that those in opposition to slavery had also defied the law in order to bring about change.

Gordon Zook, in the 2 October 1979 issue, wrote that the whole economy was distorted towards militarism, and took a sort of sideways look at tax resistance in that context:

One current issue of obedience is the militaristic mentality which keeps producing new weapons systems at the expense of basic human needs. So much of North American “abundance” results from the distorted values and priorities of our militaristic economy. Many are wondering, how to repent of such involvements including questions of responsibility for the use of tax revenues.

In the same issue, John K. Stoner was back to urge conscientious objection to nuclear deterrence which necessarily meant action before the nuclear war, not just options to be held in reserve for after the war started:

Mennonites who believe that the Bible teaches conscientious objection to military service should also be conscientious objectors to the concept and practice of nuclear deterrence. We have expressed conscientious objection to military service by refusing military service, whether by refusing to put on the military uniform, going to prison, doing alternate service, or emigrating. We should express our Conscientious objection to the concept and practice of nuclear deterrence by publicly rejecting the myth of nuclear deterrence, denouncing the idolatry of nuclear weapons, refusing to pay war taxes, and identifying with resistance to the nuclear madness.

Mennonites should do this because the concept and practice of nuclear deterrence is a form of military service in which the entire population has been conscripted. The concept of nuclear deterrence epitomizes the spirit of war. The practice of nuclear deterrence is to war what lust is to adultery, and whoever engages freely in lust should not consider himself innocent of adultery. As E.I. Watkin has said, it cannot “be morally right to threaten immoral conduct.” To plan and prepare for the annihilation of millions of people is a culpable act in the extreme, and whoever does not deliberately and explicitly repudiate the concept and practice of nuclear deterrence participates in the act.

The Catholic peace group Pax Christi wanted in on the war tax resistance action according to this report of their October 1979 convention:

The U.S. branch of the international Roman Catholic peace movement, Pax Christi USA, initiated informal contacts with General Conference Mennonite peace spokespersons Oct. 12–14. Rural Benedictine College at Atchison, Kan., provided the setting for the sixth annual convention of Pax Christi USA, at which Mennonites Bob Hull and Don Kaufman of Newton, Kan., led a workshop on tax resistance and the World Peace Tax Fund Act. Interest in this was strong. About 40 persons, including some tax resisters, participated. In a private meeting with Sister Man Evelyn Jegen, executive secretary of Pax Christi USA, and Gordon Zahn, a Catholic conscientious objector in World War Ⅱ, Hull, Kaufman, and William Keeney of Bethel College, North Newton, Kan., explained the General Conference Mennonite Church resolution on war taxes. Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section’s Christian Peacemaker Registration form received active interest at the convention, particularly during a workshop on “Militarism in Education.” The possible resumption of registration and perhaps the draft in the U.S. is stimulating regional Pax Christi groups to promote conscientious objection to war by Catholic youth.

The 23 October 1979 issue noted that “MCC Peace Section (U.S.) is sponsoring a speakers bureau… to promote support of the World Peace Tax Fund among U.S. Mennonites and to be supportive of persons and groups who refuse to pay taxes used for military purposes.” The article included a list of speakers with their addresses and phone numbers, in case you’d like to track down some of the people involved back then.

When the MCC Peace Section (U.S.) met around the end of November, war tax resistance was on the agenda:

Resolutions concerning the Iranian-U.S. crisis, SALT Ⅱ, and the proposed World Peace Tax Fund were passed at the fall meeting of Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section (U.S.), Nov. 30–Dec. 1 at Akron, Pa.

Section members also agreed to postpone a decision on a resolution to support war tax resistance campaign until they could have further dialogue with constituent members…

The World Peace Tax Fund (WPTF) bill now before Congress also received an endorsement from the Peace section group. The bill would provide a legal means for conscientious objectors to channel the portion of their tax dollar which now goes for the military budget to be used in a special fund for projects to promote world peace.

The section said in resolution “that it is conscious that the WPTF legislation might not in itself force a significant reduction in military spending, but it recognizes that it would provide funds for peacemaking efforts and would be a witness against military spending. The section continues to support other forms of witness against military spending, including persons who refuse to pay war taxes.”

Although Peace Section has given staff time to the promotion of a better understanding of WPTF in its constituency, it had not before been a formal sponsor of the bill.

Peace Section has also established a bureau of Christian speakers available to address congregations and other groups concerning WPTF.

On 3 December 1979, a Mennonite war tax resister was convicted of tax evasion. I found it interesting that the prosecutor attacked Chrisman’s acts on scriptural grounds:

Federal court convicts Mennonite in Illinois war tax resistance case

Bruce Chrisman, 30-year-old General Conference Mennonite, was convicted on Dec. 3 by U.S. District Court in Springfield, Ill., of federal income tax evasion.

Chrisman, who lives in Ava in southern Illinois, was charged with failing to file a tax return in 1975. Actually Chrisman did file a return in 1975 and other years for which the government said he failed to file. But the returns did not contain the financial data the Internal Revenue Service contends constitutes a legal tax return.

Chrisman attached letters to his returns saying he objected on religious and moral grounds to paying taxes that support the U.S. military. His defense lawyers said the government had to prove that he “willfully” failed to file a return — that he knew what the statute required and purposefully decided not to comply.

At a three-day criminal trial Chrisman said, “The returns I filed with the IRS were in accordance with the dictates of my conscience and religious beliefs and the IRS code.”

He testified that his father never hit him and that “guns, even cap guns, were never allowed in our home.”

The prosecuting attorney read Romans 13, Luke 20:20–26, and Matthew 17:24–27 and asked Chrisman, “Don’t you believe in the Bible? Doesn’t it state here you should pay taxes?”

Chrisman said, “The government is not the supreme authority in my life, but Jesus Christ is.”

In the closing arguments to the jury the prosecution said Chrisman’s “joy” and “peaceful composure” exposed his lack of deeply held religious beliefs.

James Dunn, Mennonite pastor in Urbana, Ill., observed the trial. He said evidence of Chrisman’s character and of his pacifism were not allowed as testimony by the judge, J. Waldo Ackerman.

During the pretrial hearings, Ackerman allowed Robert Hull, secretary for peace and social concerns of the General Conference Mennonite Church, and Peter Ediger, director of Mennonite Voluntary Service, to testify about Mennonite witness against war and conscription of persons and money for war purposes. But the testimony was disallowed at the trial.

One of Chrisman’s attorneys, Jeffrey Weiss, in addressing the 12-member jury, argued that Chrisman’s religious beliefs and his conscientious objector status during the Vietnam War should exempt him from paying that portion of his federal income tax that supports the military. “He did not try to hide behind the shield of religion to rip off the government but honestly believes he is exercising his constitutional rights to religion.” he said.

Chrisman, married, with a two-year-old daughter, faces up to one year in prison and a $10,000 fine The verdict will be appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals in Chicago.

A pair of articles advertised seminar on war tax resistance that would be held at Laurelville Mennonite Church Center in December:

Does Caesar ask for only what belongs to him? Should there be a Mennonite consensus on paying or not paying war taxes? These and related questions will be the agenda for a seminar at Laurelville Church Center, Dec. 14–16. The seminar is entitled “War Taxes: to Pay or Not to Pay?” It is jointly sponsored by the Church Center and Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section. Persons on both sides of the issue are encouraged to participate. More information is available from Laurelville Mennonite Church Center…

“War Taxes: To Pay or Not to Pay?” is the title of a Dec. 14–16 seminar cosponsored by MCC Peace Section and Laurelville Mennonite Church Center. Persons on all sides of the issue are encouraged to participate as such questions will be raised as: What belongs to Caesar and what to God? What are these taxes buying? What are the alternatives? More information is available from Laurelville Mennonite Church Center…

The GCMC Mid-Triennium

This was the first Gospel Herald report from the General Conference Mennonite Church special mid-triennium conference on war taxes:

Meeting shows diversity of views on militarism

Debate was vigorous and heated as more than 500 delegates from the General Conference Mennonite Church and some 200 visitors met Feb. 9 and 10 to discuss how Christians should respond to the nuclear threat and to massive expenditures for defense. War tax resistance, or the refusal to pay for the military portion of the federal budget, was among possible responses discussed at the meeting, held in Minneapolis.

A few delegates present at the first day of the conference said the church should not act as tax collector for the state through withholding taxes from employees’ paychecks. But most of the delegates present the first day said that while they were troubled by worldwide military expenditures of over one billion dollars daily, the church as a corporate body should not engage in illegal activity in its witness against war preparations. Instead, speakers urged alternatives such as pressuring congressional representatives to reduce defense expenditures, eliminate the arms trade, and to increase aid and trade to Third World countries. A few observed that Mennonites contribute to the disparity in living standards around the world through their affluent lifestyle.

A sentiment often expressed, however, was that the church, while avoiding illegal actions, should actively support its members who engage in civil disobedience on the basis of conscience.

Roy Vogt, economics professor from Winnipeg, Manitoba, berated the assembly for loading the responsibility for witness upon isolated individuals. “It is morally reprehensible,” he said, “to give only moral support. We must provide financial and legal support for those prophets who have arisen from our middle-class ranks.”

In contrast to the social activists at the conference are Mennonites like Dan Dalke, pastor from Bluffton, Ohio, who castigated the social activists for making pacifism a religion. “We will never create a Utopia,” he said. “Jesus didn’t come to clean up social issues. Our job is to evangelize the world. A peace witness is secondary.”

Some of the statements were personal. A businessman confessed that while he could easily withhold paying military taxes on the basis of conscience, he was frightened. “I am scared of being different, of being embarrassed, of being alienated from my community. Unless I get support from the Mennonite church, I will keep paying taxes.”

Alvin Beachy of Newton, Kan., said the church seemed to be shifting from a quest to being faithful to the gospel to being legal before the government. Echoing this view, J.R. Burkholder of Goshen, Ind., said, “The question is not who is most faithful, but what does it mean to be faithful?”

A follow-up article in the 6 March 1979 issue filled in some blanks:

Church should not act as tax collector

General Conference Mennonites voted today to launch a vigorous campaign to exempt the church from acting as a tax collector for the state.

Five-hundred delegates, representing 60,000 Mennonites in Canada and the U.S. passed the resolution by a nine to one margin. Charged with responsibility to implement the decision is the highest policy-making body of the General Conference Mennonite Church, the General Board.

Heinz Janzen, executive secretary for the denomination, said the decision will increase political activism among Mennonites, a group which has traditionally kept distant from legislative activities.

Delegates met Feb. 9–10 in a special conference to discern the will of God for Christians in their response to militarism and the worldwide arms race.

Some Mennonites are practicing war tax resistance — the refusal to pay the military portion of federal income tax. This was a central focus of debate during the two days because one of the employees of the General Conference has asked the church to stop withholding war taxes from her wages. In 1977, Cornelia Lehn, who is director of children’s education, made the request on grounds of conscience. Her request was refused by the General Board because it would be illegal for an employer to not act as a tax collector for the Internal Revenue Service.

Although delegates to this convention affirmed that decision, they instructed the General Board to vigorously search for legal avenues to exempt the church from collecting taxes. In that way individuals employed by the church would be free to follow their own conscience.

The campaign to obtain legal conscientious objection to war taxes will last three years. If fruitless the question is to be brought back to another meeting of the church.

Activists in the church were not completely satisfied with the decision. They would prefer that Cornelia Lehn’s request be granted. These delegates spoke for an early First Amendment test of the constitutionality of the church being compelled to act as a tax collector.

Nevertheless, Donovan Smucker, vice-president of the General Conference and from Kitchener, Ont., said of the decision, “Something wonderful is happening. We are beginning to bring our witness to the political order.”

Vernon Lohrenz, a delegate from South Dakota, observed, “We must proceed in faith, and not in fear. If this is the right thing to do, God will take care of us.”

From the discussions on taxation, it seemed the issue will not easily be resolved.

The 21 August 1979 issue gave an update on how the General Conference Mennonite Church was progressing on the goals it had set for itself:

Slow progress reported by task force on taxes

Implementing the decision of the General Conference Mennonite Church “war tax” conference in Minneapolis last February has not been easy.

The Minneapolis resolution mandated a task force on taxes to seek “all legal, legislative, and administrative avenues for achieving a conscientious objector exemption” for the General Conference Mennonite Church from the withholding of federal income taxes from its employees. (About 46 percent of U.S. federal taxes are used for the military.)

Two meetings of the task force have been held. The task force has been expanded to include representation from the Church of the Brethren, the Friends, and the Mennonite Church. This group of 11 is expected by the participating churches to establish the legal, legislative, and administrative agenda of a corporate discipleship response to military taxes.

At their second meeting (June 28–29) the task force members rejected administrative avenues. Within the scope of U.S. Internal Revenue Service or Revenue Canada regulations, this would involve extending ordination, commissioning, or licensing status to all employees of church institutions. It was a consensus of the task force that this would be an administrative loophole. It would not develop a conscientious objector position in response to military taxes.

However, both the judicial and legislative options will be pursued simultaneously. Plans for the legislative option are the more developed.

For the legislative route to work, says Delton Franz, director of the Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section office in Washington, D.C., the problem of conscience and taxes will have to be defined carefully. Currently a paper focusing on the reasons the General Conference has a major problem of conscience with collecting taxes from its employees is being drafted. After it has been reviewed, it will be sent along with cover letters by leaders of the historic peace churches to members of Congress who represent major constituency concentrations or sit on key subcommittees. Later on, church members will also be asked to write letters. It is important, says Franz, to define the problem of conscience in such a way that it will motivate Senators and Representatives to work vigorously for the bill.

Another follow-up to these initiatives will be a visit to Washington of the most influential peace church leaders to solicit support from selected members of Congress and to obtain a sponsor for an exemption bill.

There is a possibility that a parallel task force will emerge in Canada. Ernie Regehr, director of Project Ploughshares, Waterloo, Ont., notes the necessity of defining the question of militarism in Canadian terms for Canadians; for example, arms export revenues. Regehr in attempting to gather a Canadian task force. Heinz Janzen, general secretary of the General Conference Mennonite Church, is convener of the war tax expanded task force. Mennonite Church members are Winifred Beechy, secretary for peace and social concerns under the Board of Congregational Ministries; Janet Reedy, member of the Mennonite Church committee on tax concerns; and Gordon Zook, executive secretary of the Board of Congregational Ministries.

A New Call to Peacemaking

The “New Call to Peacemaking” campaign continued. Another conference was announced for March 1979:

Saturday workshops will deal with conflict resolution, tax resistance and the World Peace Tax Fund, economic conversion and the arms race, and resources for peace education.

Organizers of the Peace Tax Fund legislation campaign took heart:

Campaign organizers assert that interest in the “issue of conscience and war taxes” has been growing recently. It was given a “high priority” by the New Call to Peacemaking national conference last October in Wisconsin.

Results of the conference (which had apparently been pushed back a few weeks) were reported by Winifred N. Beechy:

More war-tax opposition

A group of 30 to 40 church people met on Saturday, Mar. 24, at City Church of the Brethren, Goshen, Ind., to consider the moral dilemma faced by Christians who are opposed to war as a method of settling disputes but who involuntarily contribute to war by payment of taxes.

Participants in the one-day seminar came from 12 area congregations and represented four denominations. The focus of the meeting was on that portion of the federal income tax which goes to support the military and weapons production. This group felt that the increasing militarization of our society, the escalation of the arms race, and production of highly technological weapons of destruction posed the problem of priorities and stewardship, and the contradiction of “paying for war while praying for peace.”

Willard Swartley, professor of New Testament at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminaries in Elkhart, spoke on “Biblical imperatives,” emphasizing the Christian’s mandate for responsible use of the earth’s resources. Cliff Kindy of Goshen then outlined what we pay for war, giving a breakdown of the federal budget with percentages of expenditures going to current and past military and war-related items. He computed current military spending as roughly 25 to 30 percent, while a more comprehensive figure, taking into account veterans’ expenses and interest on the war-related portion of the national debt, reaches as high as 50 percent of the national budget. Kindy also estimated that members of Mennonite and Church of the Brethren churches in Elkhart County pay more for war taxes than they contribute to their churches.

A survey of the history of war tax resistance among the historic peace churches since the Reformation was presented by Leonard Gross, archivist of the Mennonite Church. Current responses to the problem of war taxes were given by a number of people. Janet Reedy of Elkhart and Jim Sweigart of Goshen discussed possible options such as refusal to pay that portion of the income tax which goes to support war, payment made with an accompanying letter or protest, or voluntarily limiting income below the level of tax liability.

Following the presentations the group broke up into three workshops for further discussion. From these emerged a consensus on the need for a continuing support group such as this. Participants expect to draft a statement which can be presented to their respective congregations for consideration.

The seminar was planned by a New Call to Peacemaking Committee made up of members from six Church of the Brethren and Mennonite Churches in Goshen, with Virgil Brenneman from The Assembly (Mennonite) serving as chairman.

And the “4^th Mid-America New Call to Peacemaking” was held in November 1979. The theme was “Conscription of Youth and Wealth”:

The workshop on national service and voluntary service discussed a proposal by members of Rainbow Boulevard Mennonite Church, Kansas City, Kan., regarding a legal tax alternative which would involve cooperating with a national service plan.

In the workshop on conscription of wealth Bob Hull, secretary for peace and social concerns of the General Conference Mennonite Church, suggested alternatives to paying war taxes. Others offered their own suggestions.

Several persons expressed the desire to pay taxes only for nonmilitary programs, and said they wished there was legal provision for this, such as the World Peace Tax Fund. McSorley, who has had contacts on Capitol Hill, responded by saying that until there is a large grass-roots movement of tax resistance the WPTF doesn’t stand a chance.

The latter half of the workshop included sharing by Bruce Chrisman, Carbondale, Ill., who is involved in a federal criminal case, one of two in the U.S. involving tax resistance. His case is significant because it will provide a precedent either for or against tax refusal on the basis of conscience and religious convictions.

In 1971 Chrisman received draft counseling from James Dunn, pastor of the Champaign-Urbana (Ill.) Mennonite Church. He made a covenant with God to only pay taxes for humanitarian purposes. Since that time he has paid no federal income taxes.

It wasn’t until this year, however, that the government prosecuted him, charging that he willfully failed to disclose his gross income in 1975. “Willful” is the key term, because Chrisman claims he conscientiously chose not to disclose his income. He feels the government has purposely waited to build its case.

In the conclusion to his talk Chrisman said that when he first appeared in court on Oct. 1 this year he was “scared to death.” “Today,” he said, “I have no fear in me. God has given me an inner peace. I know I’m doing what He wants me to do.”

The Smoketown Consultation

The Gospel Herald covered “the Smoketown Consultation” of 10–11 July 1979, in which conservative Mennonites organized against innovations like war tax resistance. It noted that “All 25 persons invited were white males,” but also reproduced the statement that came out of the conference.

Several letters to the editor reacted to this news:

Harvey Yoder

“I… wondered about the inclusion of the specific war tax issue. Were individuals who sincerely hold to an alternate point of view asked to take part in the discussion? Again, I am not questioning the conclusions of the group so much as to ask whether any ‘by-invitation-only’ meeting can speak for the church with any more integrity than can existing boards and commissions of the church.”

John E. Lapp

Also wondered why the Smoketown crew picked out the war tax issue in particular.

Jim Drescher

“It is very easy to pick a Scripture verse to use to prove or disprove almost anything. The group at one point (Statement #2) speaks about total commitment to Jesus Christ but then uses quotations from the Apostle Paul (Statement #5) to validify payment of all taxes. If Jesus Christ is central, let’s use His example and specific words to guide us! I can imagine the Pentagon people jumping for joy upon hearing such a statement about taxes. I’m sure they are glad for this voluntary assurance (from ‘peace church’ members) that money will continue to roll in so that the military can increase its nuclear arsenal. Because of the apparent unquestioning payment of taxes by German Christians, Hitler was able to annihilate millions of persons. We (U.S.) will be able to do it with nuclear weapons Neat, eh?”

Greg & Ellen Bownan

“At Smoketown Ⅱ, when we assume the sisters of the church will take the opportunity to share their thoughts, we suggest that a fuller range of statements be reported. Issues, the unavoidable places where doctrine meets practical decisions, should be identified and addressed to give definition to the positive reaffirmation of the authority of Scripture and a renewed zeal for personal and church evangelism. And, for the grass roots, a minority report on the nonpayment of war taxes could be included.”

John Verburg

Verburg didn’t think much of all this talk about war taxes, saying that the peace witness was about more than opposition to military, so the war tax emphasis was sign of an imbalance. “We are not the flower children of the sixties. We are Jesus people and there is a big difference.”

When the General Board of the Mennonite Church met in November, the Smoketown consultation came up.:

[Gordon] Zook [executive secretary of the Board of Congregational Ministries] noted the difference between the Smoketown statement “that we should pay all taxes” and the statement on peacemaking passed by the General Assembly at Waterloo. The Waterloo statement recognizes the withholding of war taxes as a valid option. Which statement represents the church? he asked.

Peace Tax Fund Legislation

The 10 April 1979 edition included an article by Dan Slabaugh laying out the case for the World Peace Tax Fund bill. An editor’s note in that issue mentioned that “The U.S. copies of the March 6 issue of the Gospel Herald carried a center insert with cards that may be used by readers to encourage U.S. lawmakers to support the World Peace Tax Fund. The following article provides the author’s rationale for support of the Fund legislation. Readers who care to are encouraged to make use of these cards or to write their own leaders on its behalf.”

Why I support the World Peace Tax Fund

by Dan Slabaugh

Any collection of taxes for military purposes has created problems of conscience for those committed to the peaceful resolution of conflict. Many members of the “historic peace churches” have viewed war taxes as a denial of religious freedom since such payments forced them to engage in personal sin. The question has been put this way: “How can I, as a follower of the Prince of Peace, willingly provide the government with money that’s needed to pay for war?”

The most recent war tax in the United States, aside from the income tax, has been the federal telephone tax. This levy was initiated originally to support the Vietnam War, but is still continuing for a few more years. Many people have refused to pay this tax to the federal government. Instead, they have been sending the equivalent amount to the [“]Special Fund for Tax Resisters” of Mennonite Central Committee’s Peace Section, or to similar designated organizations.

To a smaller percentage of individuals the payment of the federal income tax (approximately 50 percent of which they know goes to support wars and military activity) also has been considered a matter of personal sin. They therefore have informed the government that in good conscience they cannot voluntarily pay that portion of their tax. In some cases persons have deposited the amount in a local bank where the Internal Revenue Service comes and “steals” it from them. By so doing these persons are freeing themselves of personal responsibility for the money’s eventual use and also providing a visible protest against the evil.

To most of these law-abiding, peace-loving people continual confrontation with their own government has been an unhappy prospect. So nearly a decade ago a small group of Christians at Ann Arbor, Michigan — with considerable faith in the American legislative process — came to believe that it might be possible to draft a bill and eventually convince the federal government to legalize “peace” for those citizens so inclined.

A faculty member and a few graduate students at the University of Michigan’s Law School drafted such a proposal. It provides, for the individual requesting it, a setting aside of that percentage of the federal income tax which the U.S. Attorney General would determine to be earmarked for military purposes. This amount would then be placed in a trust fund to be administered by a board of trustees to fund peaceful activities, as approved by the U.S. Congress.

This legislation, which has become known as the World Peace Tax Fund bill, was introduced into the U.S. House of Representatives by Ronald Dellums of California in 1972. In 1976 the National Council for a WPTF was invited to present its case in the House Ways and Means Committee. The bill was introduced into the Senate in 1977 by Senator Mark O. Hatfield of Oregon. In the last Congress it had 25 sponsors in the House of Representatives and the three in the Senate (The legislation was not enacted and so must be reintroduced to be considered by the present Congress.)

The World Peace Tax Fund bill is often misunderstood. It does not call for any tax relief or special favors benefiting anyone financially. The bill, if passed, probably will not affect the U.S. government’s military activities. In all likelihood it will not cut the military budget, or of itself, stop wars. And it will not diminish the need to continue peace teaching or peace activities.

But it will allow a citizen to legally refrain from contributing to the cost of war and violence. It will provide a fund to finance peace programs and support efforts to eliminate the causes of violent conflict.

The biggest obstacle to getting this bill passed in the U.S. Congress is the large number of people who say they are committed to peace, but who seemingly feel no responsibility regarding the government’s use of their tax money. As a result, legislators tell us that they can’t see the payment of war taxes as much of a problem because they get very few letters expressing concern about the matter.

To a large degree, Congress is “problem-oriented.” An alert young Congressman told us personally that “this bill probably will not be passed until enough of you refuse to pay war taxes — even if it means going to jail. In other words,” he was saying, “create a problem that Congress must deal with.”

I am convinced that the conscientious objector provision of the Selective Service act of 1940 never would have been included had it not been for the “problem” created by C.O.’s who refused induction during World War Ⅰ. As the U.S. was mobilizing for World War Ⅱ the government did not want another “problem” on its hands, so it agreed to make provisions for the C.O.’s — not necessarily out of concern for religious liberty, but in order to keep the boat from rocking too much.

We should remember that God’s prophets and even His own Son were seen as “problems” in terms of natural human tendencies toward power, selfishness and greed. Few of us like to “cause problems” for others. We like to work at solving them — and be successful in our efforts. But in matters of conscience, we haven’t been called to be successful, we have been called to be faithful.

---

“Conscience and War Taxes” is the title of a slide set produced by the National Council for a World Peace Tax Fund. A resources packet accompanies the 78 color slides, 20-minute cassette. “Conscience and War Taxes” can be obtained from MBCM Audiovisuals…

Lobbying didn’t always go so smoothly, as this report from a Mennonite study group at East Union Mennonite Church (28 Aug 1979) shows:

The first issue the class tackled was the payment of war taxes. In early 1976 U.S. Rep. Edward Mezvinsky was invited to church for Sunday lunch and a discussion of the war tax issue.

“He sidestepped every issue,” said Jim Yoder. Mezvinsky promised to vote for the World Peace Tax Fund Act if it ever made it to the floor of the House, but declined to help the bill out of committee.

“He spent most of his time expounding upon his efforts to kill the B-1 bomber,” recalled Nyle.

When the Fourth of July rolled around that Bicentennial year, the class sponsored an alternate celebration for the church. Guy Hershberger was asked to chair the meeting. He interviewed some of the local “veterans” — conscientious objectors Henry Miller, Henry Brenneman, and Sol Ropp — who had been badly mistreated by the U.S. Army during World War Ⅱ. He also discussed the war tax issue.

Later in the year the class presented a proposal to the congregation, asking the church to lend moral support to people who did not pay the portion of their taxes going for war. After initial misunderstandings and further discussion, the congregation approved the proposal.

Nyle [Kauffman] and Jim were the only class members making enough to have to worry about paying any taxes at all in 1976. Both withheld 33 percent of their estimated tax and sent a check for the amount to Mennonite Central Committee.

This is the twenty-first in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of Gospel Herald, journal of the (Old) Mennonite Church.

In 1980 there was a lot of discussion of war tax resistance, and a lot of individual Mennonite war tax refusal and redirection, but Mennonite Church institutions seemed more reluctant than their General Conference to take corporate stands supporting their war tax refusing employees.

The 2 January 1980 issue brought an update in the case of a Mennonite war tax resister who was fighting his case in court:

Tax resister gets sentence of one year in MVS program

Bruce Chrisman of Ava, Ill., a General Conference Mennonite who was convicted on Dec. 3 of failure to file an income tax return in 1975, was sentenced on Jan. 2 to one year in Mennonite Voluntary Service.

Chrisman is a war-tax resister. He believes conscientious objectors should be exempt on First Amendment grounds from paying that portion of federal income tax that supports the military.

Judge J. Waldo Ackerman of the U.S. District Court in Springfield, Ill. ordered the unusual sentence, giving Mennonite Voluntary Service (MVS) staff 30 days to work out a program with Chrisman.

“I’m amazed,” said Chrisman. “I feel very good about the sentence. The alternative service is probably the first sentence of its kind for a tax case. I think it reflects the testimony in the trial and its influence on the judge.” Chrisman could have been sentenced to one year in prison and a $10,000 fine.

Chrisman and his wife, Mary Anne, and two-year-old daughter, Venessa, live on a small farm near Ava. Plans are for them to join MVS as a family. They will remain in their home community and engage in prison ministries and peace education work along with their farming. Charles Neufeld, regional MVS administrator, is working with the Chrismans and local support committee headed by Ted Braun, pastor of United Church of Christ in Carbondale, Ill., to give guidance to this ministry.

At the November trial Bob Hull, Jim Dunn, and Peter Ediger joined with Chrisman in testifying to Christian conviction against warfare, including payment of taxes for support of war. When the prosecution cross-examined Chrisman from the Bible they also called Ediger as a trial witness. Ediger, who is director of Mennonite Voluntary Service, articulated Mennonite pacifist beliefs and how the tax code infringes on the First Amendment rights to religious pacifists.

Dunn, who is pastor of the First Mennonite Church in Champaign-Urbana (Ill.), was a character witness. Hull, secretary for peace and social concerns of the General Conference Mennonite Church, and Ediger testified about Mennonite beliefs during the earlier pretrial hearing.

An appeal of the case has been filed by Chrisman’s attorney, Jeffrey Weiss, not to contest the sentence, but to test the court’s rulings denying relevance of First Amendment rights in this case. Persons interested in helping with court costs may contact the General Conference Mennonite Church, Commission on Home Ministries…

The Chrismans are ready to share their faith and concerns for peacemaking in their community and beyond. Persons or churches interested may write them at Route 2, Ava, IL 62907.

I found the following filler-paragraph in the 22 January 1980 issue:

A prayer for believers who voluntarily pay war taxes: “Father, forgive them, even though they know very well what they are doing.” ―from Daniel Slabaugh, a conscientious objector to voluntary payment of war taxes, pastor of the Ann Arbor (Mich.) Mennonite Church.

Mennonite attorneys held a meeting in late January. A report on their meeting included this note:

Elam Lantz, currently residing in Washington, spoke on “First Amendment Religious Freedom.” He spoke at some length on the “free exercise” phrase as some have tried to apply it to war-tax resistance.

The Mennonite Board of Congregational Ministries met in February and was unwilling to endorse war tax resistance:

[T]he board responded to an inquiry from James Longacre, Mennonite Church representative on MCC Peace Section (U.S.). Longacre sought counsel on whether Peace Section should approve a proposal for advocacy of “war tax” resistance. The Board acknowledged that there is a lack of consensus on the subject in the church and counseled caution, urging sensitivity toward those who hold to different practices.

The bishop board of Lancaster Conference also refused to boost war tax resistance at the Conference’s 20 March 1980 assembly:

In a controversial decision, the bishop board reported that “after careful consideration… we do not support promoting participation in a war tax resistance campaign.”

Meanwhile, activists at the 27–29 March 1980 Assembly on the Draft and National Service urged Mennonites to buckle down:

Calling on congregations to stand with draft-age young people in a costly peace witness, meeting participants urged “a stronger stand” in resistance to the payment of taxes for military purposes and called for “increased participation in existing and expanded service programs by young and old alike.”

An 8 April 1980 commentary by Michael Shank and Richard Kremer pushed Mennonites to take a stand with their taxes, if only a small, symbolic one:

A call for tax resistance

During the past year, the Mennonite congregation of Boston has felt a growing concern about the enormous military expenditures of our government and about our silence as a church. Events of the past months — Americans increasing demands for military intervention to “solve” the stalemate in Iran, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and President Carter’s requests for sharply increased military spending, for opening new military bases near the Middle East, for restoring draft registration — have made us realize, yet again, how close a nation ostensibly “at peace” can be to war.

Last January, we spent several meetings discussing militarism and war taxes so that our congregational representative could speak for us at the General Conference Mennonite Church consultation on war taxes held in February 1979. Since that time we have been grappling with our responses to the war tax issue, both as individuals and as a congregation.

Why do we think this issue is so important? First we assume that as Mennonites our commitment to reconciliation and our refusal to participate in war-related activities remain fundamental to our understanding of the gospel. In this respect, we remain in continuity with the conscientious objection to war voiced by our predecessors, particularly during World War Ⅰ and the wars which followed.

Although this commitment has not changed in any fundamental way, the world situation in which we find ourselves is significantly different from that of our parents and grandparents. Until very recently, manpower appeared to be the crucial ingredient for war. Since we could not in good conscience participate in war, we objected to the government’s demands for our military service. This stance led to the imprisonment of Mennonites and other conscientious objectors during World War Ⅰ, and later to alternative service legislation during World War Ⅱ.

During the past 35 years, however, the character of warfare has changed in drastic ways. The threats to human life and peace presented by large armies, unfortunately, have been completely dwarfed by nuclear weapons, which our country did not hesitate to use on an earlier occasion. These weapons of large-scale and indiscriminate death presently exist in quantities sufficient to destroy all human life many times over, and the stockpiles continue to grow.

Under such circumstances, the military branches of our government no longer need our bodies as badly as they need our money and our silence. Every year they need new funds:

• to research, develop, and test more accurate and efficient means of carrying bombs to their targets;
• to produce, deploy, and maintain these weapons;
• to train technicians to use them; and
• to attract, recruit, and pay people who presently “volunteer” for the armed forces.

All of these activities take place without our direct participation (unless, of course, the draft is cranked up again); none of them could take place without money. These expenditures are authorized by our representatives and paid for by the taxes we contribute.

In contrast to the Roman Christians to whom Paul wrote, we have alternatives beyond silent submission or open revolt. Our government expects its citizens to voice their concerns. Our constitution and laws have provided channels for doing so. These include, among others, communications to representatives, and provisions for challenging bad laws by testing their validity (e.g., by refusing to comply so that a higher court will need to examine the law). Under such circumstances, our government and representatives can be expected to interpret our silence, both as individuals and as a church, in only two ways: either we approve of their policies, or we do not care.

Many in our congregation are convinced that the biblical teachings and arguments which led Mennonites to the conscientious objector position in World War Ⅰ (when this position was not legal) and in World War Ⅱ (when it was) lead us also to object to the use of our tax dollars for weapons of mass destruction. The quiet payment of war taxes today is as inconsistent with the spirit of Jesus life and teachings as the act of joining the army was earlier (and indeed still is). The same concern for obedience today demands a response suited to the new circumstances into which military developments have placed us.

There is yet another reason why we must voice our concerns. Many of us would undoubtedly make use of the World Peace Tax Fund, if such an option were presently open to us. But how will we honestly be able to call ourselves conscientious objectors to war taxes in the future (if and when such a possibility becomes legal) if we raise no objections whatsoever now? What grounds will the government have for believing our sincerity if it has no record of our past objections either as a church or as individuals?

Last April, a number of our members took the symbolic step of withholding $10 from their income tax payments and forwarding this amount to the Mennonite Central Committee. Others included letters with their tax returns protesting use of their tax monies for military purposes. We plan to reconsider our tax-paying responsibilities as April 15 approaches once again. We encourage other Mennonite congregations to join with us in seeking to build peaceful relations among all peoples and nations and to denounce the tendency to solve world problems solely through military might.

D.R. Yoder wrote a letter to the editor in response, rejecting war tax resistance for lack of scriptural support.

Eastern Mennonite College hosted a “New Call to Peacemaking” seminar in April:

Seminar participants elected workshops, Saturday afternoon on organizing public peace witness, war tax alternatives, the draft and conscientious objectors, and the arms race and the economy.

A commentary in the 15 April 1980 issue promoted income reduction, simple living, and charitable deductions as a war tax resistance method:

We try to avoid supporting the war machine

by J. Michael Loss

The Mennonite brotherhood stands firmly on the position that Christians should not serve in the military. The basic reason for this position is that the military is a force and a power of destruction, and it cannot be brought together with the role of a servant as we understand the call to commitment in the New Testament. To avoid military service in various countries and centuries Mennonites have used different methods. Substitutes have been hired, men have refused to serve and have been imprisoned and killed. Since the 1940s, Mennonites have been excused from serving and have been allowed to do alternative service.

The methods of fighting wars and being a power have changed greatly since the 1600s. World War Ⅰ and most of World War Ⅱ were fought with the same methods as for thousands of years, that method being vast numbers of men and hand weapons.

World Wars Ⅰ and Ⅱ also brought new ideas and methods to the “act of war”: the fighter plane and the bomber, that now destroys women, children, and the old who are not in the military through the bombing of cities; tanks and rockets and (the thing that ended the war with Japan) the atomic bomb, not by destroying or defeating the army, but by destroying two cities and killing old people, women, and children. War and power are not measured today so much by the number of men carrying a rifle but by the number of atomic bombs, tanks, bombers, jet fighters, aircraft carriers, submarines, other ocean vessels, and even computers.

War is fought today not so much with men but with machines. I believe that this change in war methods also calls for a change in the way we as Christians respond. We need to refuse to serve, as we have done in the past, but we also need to refuse to support the war machine with our material resources.

President Carter has recently asked for a large increase in military spending. Since the peak of the Vietnam War in 1969, the amount spent on military in the U.S. has gone from $77.3 billion to the $142.0 billion projected for 1981. What is or should be our response as followers of the Prince of Peace? Do we continue to pay our taxes without speaking out against or doing something about the insanity of war and the terrible waste of money and natural resources, to say nothing of the potential for destruction? What should be a Christian response to the enormous spending for the military? I will not argue with the right of the state to determine its own course, but I believe that we as Christians have a responsibility to decide whether we participate with the state in destructive goals.

My wife and I have attempted since the early 1970s to avoid supporting the war machine by not paying income taxes. We have not withheld payment from the government but have used another method that has been taught in our fellowship. I must say, we have not been 100 percent successful with our method. In the last six years we have paid small amounts of income tax of under $100 for two or three years, one year we paid a larger sum and the other years we paid nothing.

This method is adaptable to just about everyone and is very legal. We have attempted to reduce our income below taxable levels by giving it to the work of the church and deducting it from our income taxes as an itemized gift. This method has two very positive goals; the first, it gives needed money to the mission and service programs of the Mennonite Church and, second, it speaks out against our consumeristic society because we have to learn to get by on less than normal in the line of material possessions, but usually still more than we actually need.

The second goal is difficult to fulfill. We find out continually how our society has an influence on our lives. Simple living is not easy to accomplish, but by reducing our incomes we can speak out forcefully against the excess consumption and the senseless military spending. I believe that our money is an extension of ourselves, that is, when we give money to MCC or a mission in the Mennonite Church we are in reality there working, where that money is being used. In the same way when we give money to the government for taxes and the government buys and builds weapons of destruction, we are there too, every bit as much as on the mission field. Can you imagine the force for good and the amount of work that could be done in the world today if the people in our brotherhood would reduce their income in an attempt to defer support of war through giving to our church missions and relief organizations?

The decision is yours and mine whether we want to further the kingdom of God or give our money to the building of a war machine. Let us seek the Lord and seek broader counsel in our brotherhood for the answer on how to be faithful today.

A letter to the editor, from Jon Byler (6 May 1980) also promoted the simple living technique:

Why, when the Lord Jesus spoke so clearly about the dangers of wealth, and when we have so many people seeking ways to avoid supporting the military machine, has this been overlooked? If we are willing to reduce our standard of living to help our brothers, we can speak positively against the consumer waste, materialism, and disposable society; we can similarly be in complete obedience to all the laws, and still refuse to support a military machine that we all believe is wrong. I realize this is easier for myself, being young (25) and single, but I am happy to say that I have never paid a single cent that was used to bomb innocent children or to burn their homes, or to support political torture by our “allies.”

Gospel Herald interviewed war tax resisters Loretta & Paul Leatherman in the 29 April 1980 issue:

The payment of taxes for military purposes is a growing source of concern for more and more people. In response to the increasing awareness of the function of taxation in the world arms race. Peace Section (U.S.) is sponsoring an educational effort to aid in the search for a biblical response. As part of that effort, Paul and Loretta Leatherman were interviewed by Ron Flickinger for Peace Section. Excerpts from that interview are presented in the hope that the Leathermans’ convictions and experiences will provide useful information to those who are considering their own action in the future. Paul and Loretta began resisting war taxes when they returned from an MCC term in Vietnam in 1968. Paul is presently employed by MCC as director of the Self-Help program and Loretta is teaching in the Ephrata public school system. Their home is in Akron, Pa.

Question:

What led you to begin resisting war taxes? Did your experience in Vietnam influence your decision to do so?

Loretta:

We saw the war effort change from manpower to money power. Men aren’t used as much anymore and, instead, our money was being used to do intensive bombing. We would not go to war ourselves and so we thought we should resist having our money being sent to war also.

Paul:

I think serving in Vietnam radicalized us in that sense. About every night we were there, we went to sleep with the sound of bombing and we saw bombs exploding from our house. We lived in the middle of the war and saw what it did to children and families. You recognize that it’s done through your taxes and you begin to take a pretty serious look at it.

Question:

Do you also see consequences in the future if people do not start resisting the use of their money in this way?

Paul:

Well, this is supposedly peacetime but I see the military budget increasing in real dollars. It goes up in addition to inflation while many other government programs are being trimmed. It doesn’t make much sense to keep building up and building up the military machinery which is capable of destroying the world. I think history shows that whatever military equipment is made is always used, so I think sometime there is going to be a big nuclear war.

Loretta:

There isn’t much sense in being able to destroy oneself so many times. It’s a terrible waste.

Question:

Many people who are resisting war taxes have voiced specific concerns for their families, their children, their grandchildren. I’m sure this has a part in your thinking, too.

Paul:

Well, I think it does. I don’t know that we’ve specifically said we’re going to resist taxes because of our own children, but more simply for the world community. Our children are certainly a part of that.

Question:

Do you feel as Christians that you have something to say to government? Many people don’t think they are responsible for what the government does with their money once their taxes are paid.

Paul:

I’m pretty convinced that we have to say something. If Christians don’t, who will? Where does the conscience come from? How is man going to see the sin and evil of his ways unless someone speaks up to it? As we would understand the way of Christ and what He has taught us, we need to be prophetic in terms of what that means in the world. We can’t be Christians and be quiet about it. If we are going to be citizens of another kingdom, then we have to speak out about what it means and live it out as well.

Question:

What kind of reactions do you get from friends and acquaintances?

Paul:

I think we get a strong resistance from people in the church who are thoroughly convinced that we must pay all of our taxes and that any tax resistance is going directly against biblical teaching. Mark 12:17 says, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s…” and those who don’t pay all of the taxes Caesar asks for are specifically disobeying the teachings of the Bible. I don’t know all of their motives behind that sort of conviction, but I think there is a stronger resistance there than any place. Now, there are also outside the church the superpatriotic people who believe that anything that tends to speak against the structure of the U.S. military is bad. But there are also a lot of people who are sort of questioning the direction of things in the world today. They are open to thinking about ideas and, while they may not agree with all of it, at least they see some of the reasoning behind it all.

Question:

How do you respond to people who don’t agree with you?

Paul:

That depends very much on who it is. I don’t think there is much point in arguing, but if people want to discuss it in a real way, then I think we can. It’s not a point one can win by arguing and I think we could probably do more harm than good by doing so. We’re not out waving the flag of tax resistance every place we go, not at all. Simply when the opportunity presents itself, we will discuss it. I think we have felt the importance in doing this as much within our own church as any other place. It’s within our own church fellowship that we need to help our brothers and sisters understand what our tax dollars are doing around the world, such as we saw happen in Vietnam. We want to try to help sharpen consciences on this issue.

Loretta:

You have to think of the saying, “Those who do not stand up for the powerless are acting against them.”

Paul:

The thing that we’ve been doing on taxes has given us the chance on numerous occasions to at least talk about it, share it in a way that has helped us as people in the church understand what it means to live in a complicated world.

Question:

What has been the IRS reaction? Tell us about some of your contacts with IRS agents.

Paul:

One of the first years we resisted paying war taxes, we actually owed a little bit of money at the end of the year. We claimed a war tax credit and asked for a refund. The IRS turned it down and called us in to audit the credit and also our contributions, which were somewhat above the norm. The inspector took 25 minutes to audit our contributions and concluded that they were exactly right to the penny. He said that was okay but that he simply could not allow the war tax credit and there was no use in talking about it.

“Now look,” I said, “you asked us to come in here for an audit and we had to leave our jobs to come. You’ve taken 25 minutes of my time auditing something which I knew all along was correct and I’m equally convinced that I’m entitled to the war tax credit. I’d like at least 25 minutes of your time to discuss it.” He said okay, let’s talk. We discussed the pros and cons of why we were opposed to paying war taxes, why we thought it was wrong. He listened and sort of entered into the discussion and then at the end of 25 minutes, I said, “Well, you’ve given me 25 minutes now, but there are still many more things we could talk about. Would you be interested in reading a little more about this? He said he would, so I gave him Kaufman’s What Belongs to Caesar? and a few other things. Then I said, “After you have had a chance to read these, why don’t you come over for dinner next Wednesday and we can talk about it some more.”

He accepted the invitation. We weren’t sure if he would come but he showed up and we had a very good discussion with him for about three hours. He was very much against the Vietnam war but he thought that our tax resistance was completely useless and that there was no way to succeed.

One year, we took our case all the way to court. Loretta didn’t take off from teaching but I took our case all the way through the appeals process. We were turned down at each place and were finally scheduled to go to the tax court in Washington, D.C. At that point, I decided to take it out of that court and asked to have it tried in the small tax court in Harrisburg, Pa. The decision in the small tax court was not precedent setting nor could it be appealed. If I had kept the case in the tax court in Washington, D.C., I would have been able to appeal that decision all the way to the Supreme Court. I decided not to do that because the preparation for the case would have had to be much more careful in order to be heard and not simply dismissed on a technicality. I wrote my own briefs and presented the case myself. It was about three to four months before we got the judge’s opinion turning it down.

Question:

Have you ever felt that you have risked a prison sentence by refusing to pay?

Paul:

Well, that’s another story I can tell. After the court trial, an IRS agent came to see me at the office. The receptionist called me and told me there was someone out there to see me but I didn’t recognize his name. Only when I got out there and he showed me his credentials did I realize who he was. That was when we had the open office at MCC so rather than taking him into a conference room, I brought him in beside my desk. I wanted to be on my own turf when he questioned me.

He asked me about the bill and I said, “Yes, IRS thinks I owe that amount and the judge thinks I owe it. I acknowledge that from the IRS perspective it is a legitimate bill but I don’t have any intention of paying it.”

He replied that he was here to collect the bill and he didn’t expect to leave until I paid it.

“Well,” I said, “I already told you that I don’t expect to pay it and since I’m not expecting to pay it, I think you ought to put me in jail. My wife has been expecting that you might come around sometime and she said that if I go to jail, she’d like to know where I’m going so she could write to me. I would also like to know how soon it would be so that I can make arrangements for somebody to take my place at this desk.” He looked at me and said he had never heard anybody talk like that before. He went up to the bank the next day and issued an order to draw the money out of my bank account.

I must admit that even when I was talking to him I didn’t think I was risking a jail sentence. I didn’t think the IRS would put anyone in jail because they have other ways to collect the money. It is too hazardous for them to take someone out of the MCC office and put them in jail. I don’t think they can risk that.

Question:

What has been your experience with the IRS attaching your bank account?

Paul:

Usually they have just issued an order for the money and the bank notified us that the money was being withdrawn. One time, though, we didn’t have enough money in the account to cover the bill, so the IRS attached the account and nothing could be paid out of it until they got their money. It took about a month before we got our account cleared again.

Loretta:

Every time we wanted to cash a check they would have to call Lancaster to find out if the account was clear. It was embarrassing. I wanted to run in quick to withdraw some cash and it would take all of 45 minutes before I found out I couldn’t get any.

Paul:

Our banking was really skewed. The checks we issued that had not been cashed all bounced because the IRS had withdrawn all the money. The bank stamped on the cheeks that the account had been attached by the IRS. One of the checks we had written was a contribution to the World Peace Tax Fund. When it bounced we got a note from the WPTF office saying, "Good work, brother. Keep it up. We don’t mind losing this kind.” That was sort of interesting but it was a very marked inconvenience for us. That was one of the worst experiences we have had in tax resistance.

Loretta:

That was when the people in the bank knew what was going on.

Paul:

Yes, one of the brothers in the bank is from the Mennonite Church. The first time my account was attached, he took the money out and I just got the notice in the mail. I scolded him for that and told him that he should at least let me know before he took the money out. The next time it happened, he called me saying he had a notice to attach my account and asked me to write a check to the IRS so he wouldn’t have to attach the account. I said, “No way, brother. Thanks for calling me, but now it s on your conscience. If you think you can be a tax collector, then go ahead and do it.” I was kind of mean to him. I won’t think less of him if he pays the IRS, but as least he has to think through what he is doing.

Question:

What keeps you working at this in spite of the inconveniences and the people that disagree with you?

Paul:

I thing we’re getting a little tired. That’s our mood actually now, that we re getting a little tired.

Loretta:

It’s kind of a lonely struggle.

Paul:

It’s a question of how much you really ought to share what you are doing, whether it’s a real sharing of where you are or whether you are bragging about what you are doing. In the final analysis, when the time comes to fill out your IRS form, you’re not doing it in a support group and the consequences are going to be yours.

Question:

What suggestions do you have for someone who is thinking about resisting war taxes?

Paul:

Do it. The first time we did this it was a very difficult, emotional experience.

Loretta:

And even when the telephone rang. I was just terribly worried about what it might be.

Paul:

Well, I have a strong feeling that we ought to pay what is due. I think it’s correct that we ought to render unto Caesar or anybody else what is their due. We also give unto God what is due and I think that is the important thing. When these two come in conflict, then my moral, ethical training is not to pay Caesar. But not to pay becomes a very difficult struggle whether it’s 34¢ or $34 or $340. The one was about as difficult as the other when we started, and starting this is not easy. But in starting, you make a kind of commitment that does something to you.

The other thing is the time and energy to do it. You know it’s easier to do the status quo thing. Resistance takes a lot more energy and time.

A letter to the editor in response (27 May 1980) from Allen King noted “There are a number of people in our community who believe the same way but do not know how to go about it.”

In June an International Mennonite Peace Committee meeting was held, which allowed for an update from the war tax resisters of Japan, though this is all that Gospel Herald readers learned about it:

Michio Ohno of Asia, remembering Hiroshima and Nagasaki, demonstrates his concern about the destruction of nuclear war by his resistance to payment of taxes used for military purposes. He is president of the Tokyo (Japan) Mennonite Conference.

A pair of Mennonites went to court to try to gain legal conscientious objector to military taxation status:

Circuit court judge agrees to hear CO case

On June 16, a federal circuit court judge agreed that Janet and Stan Reedy of Elkhart, Ind., had a case worth hearing after they had claimed a conscientious objector deduction on their income tax report.

Supported by members of their church, the South Side Fellowship of Elkhart, the Reedys presented testimony in opposition to the motion of the Internal Revenue Service that the petition for a conscientious objector deduction is “insufficient, immaterial, and frivolous.”

“As the motion to strike points out,” said Janet Reedy, “there is presently no provision in the IRS code which authorized the deduction we are claiming. That is precisely the problem. The First Amendment to the (Constitution states, ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…’ I want to argue that the present IRS law violates our rights and the rights of all persons who are conscientiously opposed to war by requiring us to pay for war even though it is contrary to our religious beliefs. Thus we are denied a right guaranteed to us by the First Amendment.”

In support of this argument, Janet told of her conviction that killing is wrong and that paying the tax for killing is no different than killing. She asserted that “the law should recognize the right to refuse to pay the taxes that make it possible for others to kill.” She concluded that “the First Amendment guarantees us rights to the free exercise of our religious beliefs which are not being honored by the present IRS code.”

Stan followed with corroborative testimony, stating that “the United States government, through its instruments of the IRS and the courts can of course force what appears to be obedience… But some day the hard, inflexible, and brittle mass of the IRS code will shatter upon or be dissolved by the soft voice of conscience.”

As reported by Kathy Rohrer, one of the Fellowship members in attendance, when Stan was seated the judge asked one question: “Do you come to this court with a new argument?” Janet answered that they had never before claimed the First Amendment in their arguments. The judge was so impressed by their evidence that he denied the IRS claim that their petition for a hearing was “irrelevant, immaterial, impertinent, and frivolous” and granted them a hearing in federal court where the constitutionality of the case will be judged. No date has been set for this hearing.

Ken Reed touched on resistance and war taxes (though not explicitly war tax resistance per se), in “Setting our faces toward Lockheed” (17 June 1980):

Ken Reed: The Mennonite Church has been a beautiful experience for me, but it’s only been the past several years that I’ve seriously asked myself: What is the vision of the Anabaptists? and I’ve concluded it says something about us being both a community of love and a community of resistance. We’ve emphasized the love side perhaps — MCC, Voluntary Service, and giving ourselves in service (the towel and the basin). Perhaps we haven’t emphasized resistance to evil. Then I look at Luke 4, where Jesus says: “This is what my mission is all about in coming to the world” — He talks about a mission of love and a mission of resistance, a mission of identifying with people and also a mission of saying “no” to the evil that was around Him. I take His life as a model for my own. Last year on Hiroshima Day, Aug. 6, I was thinking about taxes and where my tax dollars go. I was looking through a book on Hiroshima which was produced by a committee of Japanese journalists and it just struck me that my money is paying for future Hiroshimas. At that moment, I made a commitment to myself, “I don’t want to be part of that.”

The 1 July 1980 issue noted that the Southern New England Conference of United Methodists “supports those who oppose preparations for or participation in war, and those who refuse to pay taxes for military purposes.”

A report on the 12–19 July 1980 General Conference Mennonite Church triennial noted its growing corporate support for war tax resisters in its congregations:

G.C. Mennonites to challenge tax collection for the state

The General Conference Mennonite Church will “initiate a judicial action seeking exemption from withholding taxes from the income of its employees” and take its case to the U.S. Supreme Court if necessary. It is planned to base the case on the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which embodies the separation of church and state. The action was approved by delegates to the church’s triennial sessions at Estes Park, Colo., held July 12–19.

Duane Heffelbower, a Mennonite attorney from Reedley, Calif., and member of the conference’s task force on tax withholding, said that the suit would be aimed at seeking an injunction against the Internal Revenue Service, which presently requires the church’s central offices to withhold the income taxes of its employees. “We hope to move the suit to the district court level within a year,” he said.

The Estes Park resolution stated further that all General Conference churches in the U.S. and Canada support the Task Force on Taxes through special offerings or budget allocations and that U.S. congregations support efforts for the passage of the World Peace Tax Fund. This proposed fund would allow those who object to paying taxes in support of military causes to channel their taxes toward peaceful and humanitarian projects. The church hopes to find some support for its tax collection test case among its fellow historic peace churches; namely, the Church of the Brethren, the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), and the Mennonite Church.

The newly adopted resolution grew out of a motion passed at a special conference session in Minneapolis, Minn., in 1979 which asked the General Board of the conference “to engage in a serious and vigorous search to use all legal, legislative, and administrative avenues for achieving a conscientious objector exemption from the legal requirement that the conference withhold income taxes from the wages of its employees.” Should the GCMC be successful in gaining the injunction against forced tax collection, the conference’s employees would receive their wages in full and then follow their individual consciences in deciding whether to pay or not pay war taxes.

A pair of commentaries from Peter Farrar (29 July and 23 December 1980) urged Mennonites to “Refuse war taxes! Refuse registration!” without waiting for the government to grant them special conscientious objector status. Farrar wrote of the traditional Mennonite “nonresistance” position: “We may choose not to resist aggression against our persons. We cannot countenance being the means of aggression against others.”

Pax Christi continued to highlight how taxpaying made citizens complicit in the arms race, and continued also to encourage war tax resistance as a response (23 September 1980):

Meatless Fridays suggested as “penance for arms race”

A Catholic peace group has called on the U.S. bishops to reinstate meatless Fridays as “a penance for and protest against the arms race.” The statement, issued by Pax Christi U.S.A., at a two-day meeting in Maryknoll, N.Y., also calls for the establishment of a National Catholic Peace Week to promote disarmament, and urges American Catholics to “refrain from the manufacture or use of nuclear weapons” and to “support those people who refuse to pay for the war machine with their taxes.” Pax Christi U.S.A., is a branch of the international movement founded in France at the end of World War Ⅱ. The American unit was begun in 1971.

“A New Call to Peacemaking” met again in October:

Spurred by the return of draft registration, a number of Christian groups have increased their continuing efforts to counter what they see as a growing tide of militarism in the United States.

Some members of the Society of Friends, disregarding possible penalties of fines and imprisonment, have advised young men to refuse to register with the Selective Service System when they come of age. The Church of the Brethren has affirmed “open, nonevasive withholding of war taxes as a legitimate witness to our conscientious intention to follow the call of discipleship to Jesus Christ.”

Going one step further, the General Conference Mennonite Church, meeting at Estes Park, Colo., in July, committed itself to go to the Supreme Court, if necessary, to secure release from its current obligation to collect from its employees income taxes used in large part to support military programs.

All three bodies work together in the New Call to Peacemaking. This coalition has invited 400 delegates to a national conference in Green Lake, Wis., Oct. 2 to 5, to devise additional ways for its members to reply to conscription, war taxes, and what they see as the growing hazards of so-called military security.

Larry Cornies reported on the conference:

Envisioning a future world of peace, a necessity

Approximately 300 Mennonites, Brethren, and Friends from across the U.S. have called on their meetings and congregations to intensify efforts in the search for alternatives to militarism, conscription, and the payment of war taxes.

The conference’s eight-page findings report was written and revised by a committee which attempted to integrate the minutes of 27 discussion groups which met regularly throughout the weekend. The final statement dealt with the tasks of envisioning peace, nurturing peacemakers, countering militarism, responding to the conscription of youth and taxes for war, and witnessing to peace.

With respect to the issue of payment of taxes used for war purposes, the New Call restated its 1978 commitment to urge Christian peacemakers to “consider withholding from the Internal Revenue Service all tax monies which contribute to any war effort.”

The statement of findings recommended the following as alternatives to the payment of war taxes: (1) active work for the adoption of the World Peace Tax Fund bill which, if passed by the U.S. Congress, would serve as a legal alternative to payment of war taxes just as conscientious objector status is a legal alternative to military service, and (2) individuals are urged to consider prayerfully all moral ways of reducing their tax liabilities, including sizable contributions to tax-exempt organizations and reduction of personal income.

The concern that New Call not issue a declaration more radical than meetings and congregations would be willing to hear was raised at several points during the four-day meeting.

The Mennonite Church general board met in November 1980 and cautiously decided to throw its support behind the General Conference Mennonite Church’s legal challenge to withholding taxes from objecting employees. This was one of the earliest examples of corporate support for war tax resistance from a Mennonite Church institution:

Support of GC judicial action.

One other action of significance had to do with an invitation from the General Conference Mennonite Church to join in its effort to “initiate a judicial action seeking exemption for the General Conference Mennonite Church from withholding taxes from the income of its employees.”

On the basis of action taken at the last Mennonite Assembly in Waterloo, Ont., which reads: “We encourage our congregations and institutions to seek relief from the current legal requirement of collecting taxes through the withholding of income taxes of employees, especially those taxes which may be used for war purposes. In this effort we endorse cooperation with the General Conference Mennonite Church in the current search for judicial, legislative, and administrative alternatives to the collection of military related taxes.”

The Board acted to: (1) support the judicial action of the General Conference Mennonite Church to seek exemption of our institutions from withholding taxes from the income of employees with the understanding that this implies an invitation to Mennonite members to join in financial support for this judicial action and (2) we encourage the MBCM to the task force on taxes to seek to generate a wide support for the World Peace Tax Fund throughout our constituency by appropriate General Assembly action and encouragement.

The Board was careful to clarify that this action does not constitute civil disobedience but rather attempts to work within the domain of the first amendment in the U.S. constitution.

This is the twenty-sixth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of Gospel Herald, journal of the (Old) Mennonite Church.

The debate about whether or not to pay war taxes, and about whether Mennonite institutions should be more accommodating of the requests of their employees not to have war taxes deducted from their salaries, continued in 1985, and edged ever closer to the Mennonite Church itself.

Ron Kennel explained his war tax resistance in the 8 January 1985 issue:

For over ten years I have openly withheld a portion of my federal income taxes because I’m a conscientious objector to participation in war. This action has sometimes resulted in face-to-face conversations with Internal Revenue Service representatives. I have on several occasions written to legislators on issues of peace and justice or facilitated similar communication by our congregation.

As I see that Christians have contributed to the injustices, my faith compels me to speak. There are many professing Christians who are in public office who make government policy. There are many professing Christians whose votes helped to put them into office and whose tax dollars by the millions pay for the administration of their policies. Because of this I want to invite my Christian brothers and sisters to let the Prince of Peace train their consciences and to take these trained consciences to work whether in the private or public sector.

The Mennonite Central Committee held its annual meeting in January:

The board discussed a request by several staff members that MCC not withhold their income taxes, to allow them to withhold a portion of their taxes as a protest of the dollars used for military purposes.

They agreed that the executive committee should appoint a task group to consult broadly within the MCC constituency to review historical positions on this matter, to examine alternative responses, and to bring a recommendation to the executive committee and annual meeting on alternative courses of action.

This approach “moves from a simple decision of whether MCC should withhold taxes to stepping back and reflecting on the overall situation before recommending any one solution for the MCC board to accept or reject,” it was said.

Members noted that the Mennonite Church and the Conference of Mennonites in Canada are studying this issue, that the General Conference Mennonite Church has completed such a study, and that efforts will be made to learn from those studies.

The “Conversations on Faith Ⅱ” seminar, “The church’s relationship to the political order”, was held in March 1985, and war tax resistance was one of the topics discussed:

Friday evening — Case Study 3: Conscientious objection to military taxes — a case presentation, by John and Sandra Drescher Lehman and Paul Gingrich.
— A panel— James R. Hess, Stephen Dintaman, and Bob Detweiler.

A report from the conference read in part:

The other case was conscientious objection to military taxes. John and Sandy Drescher Lehman of Richmond, Va., told how they followed their conscience and decided a few years ago to withhold the part of their income taxes that they figure goes for the military.

The complication now, though, is that they have become employees of Mennonite Board of Missions in their role as codirectors of the Richmond Discipleship Voluntary Service program. “What should an institution do when its employees ask that we stop withholding taxes from their paychecks?” asked MBM president Paul Gingrich.

A panel of four attempted to answer the question, including Robert Hull, a soldier-turned-tax-resister who is peace and justice secretary of the General Conference Mennonite Church. He explained how his denomination, with the instruction of its members, is now breaking the law by not withholding taxes from the paychecks of seven of its employees who have requested that.

The tensest moment of the conference came when James Hess, a Lancaster Conference bishop who served on the war taxes panel, was asked whether he would have paid all his taxes in Nazi Germany even though some of it went to kill six million Jews. He hinted that the Jews may have brought judgment on themselves for their crucifixion of Jesus. This caused a minor uproar and led to a public apology the next morning by Hess. He said that his statement was speculative, trying to defend the sovereignty of God, and quoted from Jacques Ellul that everything man does is within the global plan of God.

Energetic war tax resistance foe D.R. Yoder couldn’t stand to see his position dragged through the mud like this, so he responded in a 21 May 1985 letter to the editor:

I would not in any way seek to defend the position reportedly taken by James Hess during the recent Conversations on Faith Ⅱ linking the Jewish Holocaust with Christ’s crucifixion… Such notions are the misguided, though not necessarily unnatural, projections of his fundamentalism.

It is hardly fair, however, that the person who posed what seems the quite irresponsible as well as irrelevant question which provoked Hess’s intemperate response is not also identified in the report. For this questioner should be asked whether he/she paid (or would have paid) taxes to the United States or Canada during World War Ⅱ.

If the questioner would not have paid, given the assumptions of tax resistance theory, would not he/she also have been guilty of contributing to the prolongation of Nazi atrocities against the Jews and others, just as he/she charges a taxpaying German citizen Hess would have been?

If, on the other hand, the questioner would have paid his/her federal taxes, again given the assumptions of tax resistant theory, wouldn’t that be embracing the “just” war position? For how else is the “financing” of one set of military activity, but refusing to “finance” another, to be interpreted?

We Mennonites are already rushing pell-mell along the broad way, having sanctified “just” resistance, “just” legal suits, “just” civil disruption, and even the “just” destruction of public and private property. It doesn’t take a very astute reading of the winds a-blowing to expect conferences in the very near future to consider the inherent “justice” of “defensive” wars and of wars of “liberation.”

War tax resisters Ray and Wilma Gingerich shared their letter to the IRS in the 23 April 1985 issue:

A letter to our IRS officer

Here are excerpts of a letter we sent to our regional Internal Revenue Service officer recently. An ongoing conviction of ours is that our most significant witness in the political-ethical arena is to the church itself. This is a matter of policy in our local “Christians for Peace” organization. Whenever we plan an “action,” we do it deliberately with the church “looking over our shoulders.”

Dear Mr. Smith:

According to your records we now owe the IRS $1491.92 in accumulated taxes, interest, and penalties for the fiscal years of 1981, 1982, and 1983. What you fail to recognize is:

1. That the monies withheld represent the military portion of our income taxes. (We have not withheld veterans’ benefits.)
2. That the amounts withheld have already been paid to church institutions engaged in nonviolent justice-and-peace activities. (We are not seeking to evade carrying our fair share of the public burden for a peaceable and life-giving society.)
3. That we are acting out of our religious convictions fostered in the tradition of the historic peace witness of the Mennonite Church.

You are asking us to do what in good faith we cannot do — to violate our consciences and our understanding of obedience to Jesus Christ by paying for murder.

I, Wilma, am a nurse dedicated to making lives whole, not to destroying them. I find preparation to kill and destroy abhorrent and inconsistent with what my whole life as a mother, as a nurse, as a human being, as a follower of Jesus Christ is about.

I, Ray, am a professor of church history and ethics. In my teaching and in everyday life I seek to underscore that if we are to become persons and create communities of noble character and life-giving quality, we must live lives consistent with our beliefs.

To you as a law-enforcer, and to our congressmen and senators as law-makers, we ask: What is being done to our people and to our nation by enforcing the practice of violence upon those whose conscience and religious convictions are opposed to violence? Why do you insist that pacifist citizens act contrary to their conscience by coercing them to pay for weapons of death? Would it not be a healthier, stronger nation if these people were granted freedom of religion and allowed to practice economic nonviolence by channeling their funds into constructive, nonviolent, humanitarian aid?

To Mennonites war is murder. For Mennonites, and for all Christians who take seriously the lordship of Jesus in their daily living, there is no government that can override the teachings and example of Jesus Christ. For Mennonites, therefore, and for all pacifist Christians, the payment of military taxes has always posed a dilemma. Some, psychically numbed by continued rationalization, comply with the state’s demands for death money. Others choose the way of noncompliance, following the example of Jesus Christ that leads to persecution — military tax penalties, confiscation of property, and imprisonment.

Finally, Mr. Smith, allow us to address you personally. What role will you have in all of this? All of us are in the system. And all of us are morally obligated to say “no” to death and “yes” to life. You undoubtedly have thought about these questions many times. We would count it a privilege to meet with you to discuss these grave matters in a more personal way.

There were some letters to the editor in response to this wave of articles on the topic. Joe Cross wrote that he was generally against war tax resistance, but didn’t say anything particularly notable. Curt Ashburn didn’t care for the put-down of taxpayers in the Gingeriches’ letter (“psychically numbed by continued rationalization”) and felt that they should keep such “witness” in the family rather than dragging IRS agents into it. He also asked if the Gingeriches refused to pay taxes to support state-funded abortion, police violence, capital punishment, and so forth or if they thought war was somehow special?

The 7 May 1985 issue brought this news brief:

Churches increase involvement in question of tax resistance

Exploring new territory in religious opposition to nuclear arms, a number of major religious denominations have begun to contemplate whether they should throw their support behind the growing movement to resist payment of taxes in protest of the arms race. While increasing numbers of individuals within the churches have joined the ranks of “war tax” resisters, only a handful of denominations have encouraged or lent support to such resistance. However, as peace activists within the churches have demanded tougher antiwar stands at the highest church levels, denominations have begun to wrestle with the biblical, theological, and historical questions raised by war tax resistance. The churches are using the examination as a basis for deciding whether to take, as corporate bodies, any of a variety of actions — both legal and illegal — in support of the movement. What is moving churches is the growing realization that they have been “praying for peace while paying for war,” said Marian Franz, a Mennonite who is executive director of the Washington-based National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund. “For many people, the arms race has just gone too far. And they’re saying, ‘Oh my God, I’m involved in it.’ ” While several mainline denominations have begun to study the issue, the strongest support for war tax resistance has come from the historic peace churches, particularly Quaker and Mennonite bodies. In an unprecedented move, the 60,000-member General Conference Mennonite Church voted, in August 1983, not to withhold federal taxes from the paychecks of employees who are tax refusers. This is punishable by fines and imprisonment.

The Mennonite Church General Assembly was held, 9–14 August 1985, and war tax resistance was on the agenda:

Seminars on singleness and sexuality, marriage and sexuality, and silent devotions were also well attended, indicating a rising concern among Mennonites for personal growth and self-understanding. On the other hand, seminars on such topics as war taxes, Central America, and church-state relations received relatively less attention.

But apparently it didn’t get much time (at least according to this 17 September 1985 letter to the editor from Don Schrader):

I heard that the conference moderator gave only six minutes of floor time to deal with the question of the church withholding federal income tax from the paychecks of church workers who conscientiously resist war taxes.

Perhaps to some, war tax resistance is more personally uncomfortable than homosexuality! Remember that for any government to exploit and massacre, two things are required from the majority of its citizens — silence and paying taxes.

The cover story of the 1 October 1985 issue — “Paying a Price for Peace” by Jim Bishop — concerned Mennonite responses to the war tax issue:

Praying for peace while paying for war? It’s an irony that Ray and Wilma Gingerich and James and Leanna Rhodes of the Harrisonburg, Virginia, area refuse to accept.

Ray and Wilma are in their early 50s. He teaches theology and ethics at Eastern Mennonite College; she is completing a master’s degree in community health nursing at the University of Virginia and works part time at Virginia Mennonite Home. Their four sons of college age or older no longer live at home. One might think it’s time to slow down, settle in, go with the flow.

Not so. The Gingerichs are wrestling with an issue they believe is increasingly urgent for Christians — how to respond to the fact that over 50 percent of all income tax monies go to pay for past and present wars and to prepare for future wars. As one response, they began in 1977 to withhold the portion of their federal income tax that pays for war.

“We deduct an estimated amount for veterans’ benefits, then send a check for the amount we are withholding to Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section or some other church agency,” Ray explained. “We don’t try to hide anything. The Internal Revenue Service receives a letter that outlines our position along with a photocopy of the check being sent to the church agency.”

For the past three years, the couple has also withheld the federal excise tax from their monthly telephone statement. This tax began during the Vietnam War as a “quick source of revenue” for that conflict, Ray pointed out.

Slightly different tack.

Several miles southwest of Gingerich’s Harrisonburg home, in the rolling countryside of western Rockingham County near Dayton, James and Leanna Rhodes are taking a slightly different tack to the military tax issue.

The couple, in their mid-30s, is making a conscious effort to live at a nontaxable income level. For them, it means trying to raise their family of six children on $12,000–$13,000 a year.

It’s easier said than done, the couple admitted, but several things are in their favor.

The family rents the large frame house where they’re living. They care for dairy heifers and beef cattle for their landlord. The old station wagon they drive is registered in Leanna’s mother’s name so the IRS can’t put a lien on it.

James works for his brother in a new and used farm machinery business. Leanna, a nurse, works on and off for Homecall, a local home health care agency.

The family has no accessible bank account or other personal property that the government could claim to satisfy unpaid military taxes. This leaves the IRS only one option — to go after Rhodeses themselves.

Rhodeses have refused to pay the portion of their federal income tax for military purposes for three years in which they earned slightly over their nontaxable limit. They have been audited and warned of collection procedures, but nothing has come of it.

Like Gingerichs, Rhodeses refuse to pay the federal excise tax portion of their monthly phone bill.

Acquiring peace convictions.

The families didn’t acquire their peace convictions overnight or in isolation. Gingerichs point to a stint of mission work in Luxembourg, 1961–1968, as a time when they were confronted with the realities of war.

“We heard stories and saw photos from Vietnam that never made it into the North American press,” Ray recalled. “We also met people who lived through the experiences of Nazi Germany and realized that much of what happened in World War Ⅱ was largely the result of good people following orders.”

In 1968 Gingerich enrolled at Goshen Biblical Seminary, where he was challenged by the teachings of John Howard Yoder, a tax resister himself. When the family moved to Nashville, Tennessee, for Ray to pursue a doctorate at Vanderbilt University, the couple began attending a United Methodist church that was deeply involved in urban ministry.

“I got my theology at Goshen Seminary but we saw how it could be lived out at that church in Nashville,” Ray said. “Our time there made us realize that peacemaking is a Christian mandate — not just a Mennonite ideology!”

Family peace initiatives have not been restricted to Ray and Wilma. When President Jimmy Carter reinstated the military draft in 1980, sons Andre and Pierre both decided not to register.

“Here’s a case of children and parents teaching each other,” Wilma said. “We had been through a lot of painful and joyful growth experiences together. To them, not to register was the logical way to live out the convictions we shared.

“As the cost for not paying our military taxes increased we could only move ahead. To do otherwise would have been a betrayal of our sons and their convictions.”

More than lip service.

Although James and Leanna had long felt a commitment to blend personal faith and active social concern, their awareness of the need to give more than lip service to their beliefs was heightened during 1975–1979 when they helped to start a Mennonite church in San Francisco.

In that setting James got involved with a number of peace causes and groups, including counseling military personnel who wanted to claim conscientious objector status.

“That was a fantastic experience,” James said of their time in the Bay Area. “I was impressed by the aggressive and committed efforts of many peace activists, even though many may have acted from purely humanitarian motives.”

Both couples are quick to draw on their understanding of Jesus’ teachings and example to support their actions.

“The gospel addresses our relationship to other human beings,” Ray said. “Salvation is a personal response but it is also communal. It means ‘wholemaking.’ War and preparation for war is the epitome of death and destruction.”

“I hold to an evangelical faith that includes the message of peace and nonresistance,” James added. “I believe that Jesus can save us from militarism, hateful attitudes, and a spirit of revenge in the same way he delivers us from other sins.”

“Our church has failed to see the logical progression from the conscientious objector stance and Mennonites’ refusal to buy war bonds in the 1940s to the war tax resistance stance of the 1980s,” Ray stated.

Added Wilma: “Our peace witness dare not be limited to nonconscription. Why put most of the burden on 18-to-20-year-olds to take a CO stand while we middle-aged men and women go on paying for war? At the same time we expect our young people to believe that participation in war is wrong.”

Stance is costly.

Both Gingerichs and Rhodeses have paid a price for their stance.

For the Gingerich family, it has included repeated threats from the Selective Service System and a lien placed on all their personal property.

James Rhodes earned tuition money to attend Eastern Mennonite College and Seminary by working as an artificial inseminator for dairy farms up and down the Shenandoah Valley. He later lost that job as a result of local pressure, but he “feels no animosity” toward those who called for his ouster.

James noted that the harshest criticism has come from other Mennonites at a time when interest in Christian peacemaking and nonresistance is gaining momentum in a number of mainline denominations.

Both couples indicated they have had “valuable and redemptive” talks with IRS officials. According to James, these encounters “allow us to move from systems to individuals and open the door to exchange viewpoints.”

“A certain amount of understanding has developed,” he added. “The IRS people seem to empathize with our position and apparently don’t know what to do with us.”

Gingerichs have journeyed to Charlottesville, Virginia, to meet with IRS officials and have encountered “extremely personable people… there’s a feeling of mutual respect.”

The two families commend each other’s positions, but cited the need for other people who are involved in varied forms of tax resistance to “become more visible.” They are active in a local “Christians for Peace” group that has about a dozen members.

“I often feel like we are pretty much going it alone,” said Wilma. “We long for the day when the focus shifts from our having to defend our position to the real question of how pacifist Mennonite Christians can go on paying for war and claim to be followers of Christ. We need greater accountability to each other in the church.”

“There’s a need to develop an open forum and network for people who are at different places on the war tax issue to get together and learn from and encourage each other,” Ray said. Added Leanna: “I would feel a lot more secure in our position if we knew for certain that a dozen Mennonites in this community would be willing to take a public stand with us if at some point we’d be taken to court.”

The couples emphasized that their methods of war tax resistance are not the only valid approaches, and both expressed a desire for more dialogue and sense of solidarity with the larger Mennonite Church.

Whatever course one pursues for the cause of peace, it is important to do it “with a sense of joy,” Ray noted. “Lose your sense of exuberance and it becomes an overwhelming burden. At that point one must back off to gain fresh perspective.”

Witness will continue. Ray and Wilma expect to continue withholding that percentage of their federal income taxes that goes for direct military purposes and to continue talking and working with individuals and within their professions to keep the issue alive.

James and Leanna, meanwhile, “feel comfortable” with their simple living approach, recognizing that it doesn’t allow them to confront government officials and others as directly as Gingerichs have.

“When our children get older, we’ll need to adjust our strategy,” James said. “For now, our fear of what could happen to us has gone from near paranoia to a real sense of peace and freedom.

“Our response, however small, is at least a symbolic effort to say ‘no,’ to refuse to contribute toward the ultimate destruction of God’s people and his beautiful creation.”

Jep & Joyce Hostetler responded in a 22 October 1985 letter to the editor:

“Paying a Price for Peace”… is one of the most encouraging articles you’ve published recently. It is encouraging to see two families who take their faith in Jesus Christ very seriously. In my mind, they are acting out the very core of the gospel message to love, to be peacemakers, and — above all — to be obedient.

On the other hand the article can cause one to be depressed because of the lack of support and criticisms Rhodeses and Gingerichs have received from fellow Mennonites. Mennonites, of all people, should be cheering these families on, even if they are not in complete agreement with their tax witness.

Joyce and I have also withheld portions of our federal income tax payment, making it necessary for the Internal Revenue Service to put liens on our checking account. It is a lonely feeling. To me, any action that lessens another human being, lessens me. It is sin for me to sit in the safety of a protected home and claim no responsibility for what my money buys. To tell someone we love them and apologize for the fact that nearly half our tax dollar is being spent in preparation to kill them, is the ultimate lie and irony. I cannot love you if I am preparing to kill you.

On the other hand, Harry Shenk wasn’t as thrilled. He started off with the traditional Render-unto-Caesar line that Jesus had never discouraged paying taxes to militaristic Rome, and then ended on this curious note:

Jesus never challenged the state on these practices, nor did he indicate that paying taxes implied responsibility for these heinous crimes.

I don’t think Jesus paid any war tax. I think he probably lived below a taxable level, and I affirm anyone who chooses this path. I also pay no war tax. Our tax checks are not divided into portions by the Internal Revenue Service, but are thrown together into a central fund, against which huge government checks are drawn. I simply decide in my heart which huge government check I want my money to be a part of. For me, it’s food stamps and interstate highways.

This news brief could be found in the 26 November 1985 edition:

Scottish Presbyterian leader calls for peace army and war tax resistance

The former moderator of the Church of Scotland (Presbyterian), Lord MacLeod of Fuinary, has called for the creation of a peace army committed to withholding the 13 percent of income taxes which the British government spends on defense.

MacLeod hopes such an army will be able to persuade the government to allow people to give an equivalent amount of their taxes to starving countries instead. Even if the government refuses to go along with the idea, he said, taxpayers should still withhold the money and spend it on famine relief.

War, MacLeod said, is no longer “a disciplined conflict between nations”; instead it has become “mutual mass murder of women and children between hemispheres. The church must go radical about war.”

The Mennonite Central Committee held an executive committee meeting in December 1985 and shot down the proposal to stop withholding war taxes from the paychecks of objecting employees:

The committee also heard a report from a task force established after several staff members asked MCC not to withhold their federal income taxes. This was to allow them to keep a portion of their taxes as a protest of taxes used for military purposes.

Committee member Phil Rich reported that the task force had met with leaders from eight Mennonite denominations over the past year to seek counsel on how to respond to the tax-withholding issue. None of the denominations counseled MCC to honor the staff members’ request.

The Executive Committee voted 7-1, with three abstentions, to accept the task force’s recommendation that the staff members’ request be denied. The recommendation will go to the MCC annual meeting for final action.

Staff member H.A. Penner expressed appreciation for MCC’s serious attention to the issue, but asked if the process might be only half done. “Have we listened to persons on the other end of our bombs and our guns? Are we listening to the church in Central America, the Philippines, and South Africa? What would they say?”

This is the twenty-eighth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of Gospel Herald, journal of the (Old) Mennonite Church.

When I hit 1987 in the archives it seemed to me that I started seeing a lot more mentions of how “our tax dollars” were financing this or that government-sponsored horror, but much less followup from there about how such a thing might lead one to resist paying. Maybe that was seen as an obvious corollary by then, or maybe some people had abandoned the idea of war tax resistance as impractical and had just become resigned to complaining. It’s hard to tell from the record.

That’s not to say there wasn’t war tax resistance content. Plenty of it. The “Taxes for Peace” war tax redirection fund, run by the Mennonite Central Committee’s (U.S.) Peace Section, announced it’s annual drive in the 17 February 1987 issue. The fund would be redirecting money to the Lancaster County (Pa.) Peacework Alternatives Project, and announced that they had redirected $4,600 to a project to aid victims of violence in Guatemala the previous year.

A curious story, “The parable of the taxpayers” by John F. Murray appeared in the 27 March 1987. It was a sort of updating of the “parable of the talents” from the Bible. It included a character who was a war tax resister but the parable chided him for hiding his money away from the tax collector rather than spending it on good churchly stuff. Perhaps this indicates that this was one stereotype of war tax resisters — as miserly sorts — that was prevalent in Mennonite circles.

The emerging war tax resistance movement in Japan took the offensive in 1987, according to this 27 March article:

A Mennonite pastor is among 22 Japanese tax resisters who have sued the government for what they say was an “unconstitutional” collection of their taxes in 1980. The 22 are all members of Conscientious Objection to Military Tax (COMIT), and 12 of them are Christians — including Michio Ohno, a Mennonite pastor in Tokyo. The 1980 government action involved the seizing of the bank accounts of Ohno and two others. The 22 charge that Japan’s so-called Self-Defense Forces is a violation of the post-World War Ⅱ constitution, which forbids the country to have an army, navy, and air force. So, they charge, the collection of taxes for the military is also unconstitutional.

John K. Stoner promoted war tax resistance just before (U.S.) tax day:

To pay or not to pay war taxes

Nine to five

by John K. Stoner

Members of the Mennonite Church in the United States contribute $9 to the federal government for military purposes for every $5 they contribute to the local church for the cause of Christ.

Nine to five is the proportion of military support to local church support. Nine to five is also a traditional eight-hour workday. The fruit of our labor is paying for the arms race.

The nine-to-five calculation is based on 1984 figures from the current Mennonite Yearbook, p. 190. The contributions given by U.S. Mennonite Church members through the congregational treasury in 1984 totaled $57,269,704. This figure does not include individual gifts that were not channeled through the congregation. The estimated military tax paid by the same people in 1984 was $105,800,000.

Stanley Kropf, churchwide agency finance secretary, estimates that the pretax income of Mennonite Church members in 1984 was $1,602,600,000. I have calculated a 12 percent tax rate paid on that income, with 55 percent of the taxes going to past and present military costs, including a portion of interest on the federal debt attributable to inflationary military spending. I believe that these figures are correct within a margin of 5–10 percent.

No great concern?

Maybe it isn’t a matter of great concern. Some say that the government is responsible for what it does with tax monies. We are not accountable.

Bernard Offen, a Jewish survivor of Auschwitz, thinks differently. His letter of war-tax protest came across my desk recently, and I share it as a stimulus to reflection on our war taxes in 1987:

The guards at Auschwitz herded my father to the left and me to the right. I was a child. I never saw him again.

He was a good man. He was loyal, obedient, law-abiding. He paid his taxes. He was a Jew. He paid his taxes. He died in the concentration camp. He had paid his taxes.

My father didn’t know he was paying for barbed wire. For tattoo equipment. For concrete. For whips. For dogs. For cattle cars. For Zyklon B gas. For gas ovens. For his destruction. For the destruction of 6,000,000 Jews. For the destruction of 6,000,000 Jews. For the destruction, ultimately, of 50,000,000 people in World War Ⅱ.

In Auschwitz I was tattoo #B‒7815. In the United States I am an American citizen, taxpayer #370‒32‒6858. I am paying for a nuclear arms race. A nuclear arms race that is both homicidal and suicidal. It could end life for 5,000,000,000 people, five billion Jews. For now the whole world is Jewish and nuclear devices are the gas ovens for the planet. There is no longer a selection process such as I experienced at Auschwitz.

We are now one.

I am an American. I am loyal, obedient, law-abiding. I am afraid of the Internal Revenue Service. Who knows what power they have to charge me penalties and interest? To seize my property? To imprison me? After soul-searching and God-wrestling for several years, I have concluded that I am more afraid of what my government may do to me, mine, and the world with the money if I pay it… if I pay it.

I do believe in taxes for health, education, and the welfare of the public. While I do not agree with all the actions of my government, to go along with the nuclear arms race is suicidal. It threatens my life. It threatens the life of my family. It threatens the world.

I remember my father. I have learned from Auschwitz. I will not willingly contribute to the production of nuclear devices. They are more lethal than the gas Zyklon B, the gas that killed my father and countless others.

I am withholding 25 percent of my tax and forwarding it to a peace tax fund.

Offen gives permission to reproduce or publish his letter and says he may be contacted at Sonoma County Taxes for Peace, Box 563, Santa Rosa, CA 95402.

No simple answer. What is the answer to the war-tax dilemma? I offer no simple one. I simply identify a challenge to our faith which will not go away. And I think it is helpful to have some idea of how much money, and in what proportion, we are giving to the death machine.

St. Augustine said, “Hope has two sisters: Anger and courage.” Beautiful women, these, in an age of despair.

That prompted a 5 May 1987 letter to the editor from Lester L. Lind:

Thank you for printing the article by John Stoner, “Nine to Five”… It is good but uncomfortable for us to be reminded of our involvement in military and war-related activity. I wonder how much longer the Mennonite Church can remain so silent and still carry the distinction of being a peace church. In a democracy, silence gives consent. In light of Scripture, our history, and the present reality that Stoner points out, how can we Mennonites give our consent to spending so much for war?

Withholding federal income tax for conscience’ sake is still a lonely and often misunderstood act, even within the church. True, there are individuals and small segments of the Mennonite Church who have taken positions similar to the Stoners. But I long and pray for the time when such actions of civil disobedience will be strongly supported and encouraged by the majority of Mennonites.

A war tax redirection ceremony and tax day protest was covered in the 15 April 1987 issue:

The existence of a mutual aid fund for war tax resisters was made known to readers of the 28 April 1987 issue:

“Even if you are not a war tax resister, you can help those who are,” say a group of Christians who operate the Tax Resisters Penalty Fund. Based in North Manchester, Ind., it helps resisters when they suffer financial loss through the seizure of penalties and interest by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service. The fund, started in 1982 as a project of the local chapter of Fellowship of Reconciliation, is currently trying to broaden its base of support because of the increasing number of requests for assistance. More information is available from the North Manchester Fellowship of Reconciliation…

While war tax resistance seemed mostly a U.S. phenomenon during the Vietnam War era (and this led to some chagrin when Canadian Mennonites felt like they were being dragged into disputes about it), Canadians were also getting in on the act by this time (19 May 1987):

Canadian war-tax resisters hold first national conference

Conscience Canada, a Victoria, B.C.-based organization objecting to Canadian military taxes, held its first national conference recently. Several participants reported that they sent the military portion of their taxes to Peace Tax Fund — a trust account administered by Conscience Canada which is not approved by the government.

Member of Parliament James Manley told the participants how they could be more effective in lobbying their MPs. Motions favoring peace tax legislation were introduced in the House of Commons by Manley in 1983 and 1985 and by MP Simon De Jong in 1986.

Reporting on war-tax resistance in the United States, Robert Hull, a Mennonite who chairs the Washington, D.C.-based National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund, said his group has enlisted 55 representatives and four senators as sponsors of peace tax legislation in the U.S. Congress.

“Conscience Canada is part of a movement in 17 countries, from Finland and Spain to Australia and New Zealand,” said Edith Adamson, the organization’s coordinator.

And the 18 August 1987 issue noted:

Study packet on militarism in Canada from Mennonite Central Committee Canada. It includes pamphlets, articles, and a fact sheet. The packet helps Canadians struggling to discern a faithful Christian response to militarism, including the issue of whether or not to pay war taxes. It is available for a suggested donation of $3 from Information Services at MCC Canada…

David Charles wrote a commentary for the 9 June 1987 issue in which he went on at length about the horror of nuclear war and said “Some have even come to recognize our complicity in the situation through silence and the payment of war taxes.” And: “Our continued silence to a government that is not merely content to collect tax but is mortgaging the entire country to pursue a ridiculous ambition is conveying a message of acceptance.” But his suggested response was hilariously pathetic:

We can write on the bottom of our tax returns that our money is to be used to build peace, not more arms.

In the 30 June 1987 issue, Edgar Metzler wrestled with “Following Christ in a militaristic world” and tried to nudge the Mennonite Church toward a bold decision:

For an increasing number of Christians the conscription of their taxes for military purposes is becoming a problem of conscience as clear as the conscription of their bodies for military service. The question will not fade away. Are the excuses offered by Nazi collaborators or Iran-contra conspirators that someone else is making the decisions that much different than washing our hands of responsibility for how the state uses the resources God has given us?

Challenge and action.

The study suggested by MCC and the militarism resolution — “Growing in Stewardship and Witness in a Militaristic World” — which will be considered by the General Assembly at Purdue 87 arose directly out of the struggle of conscience about war taxes by some members of the church. The proposed resolution is intended to alert us to the broad scope of this challenge and suggest appropriate actions.

The decision, bold or not, would be adopted at the Mennonite Church General Assembly on 9 July 1987: “Growing in stewardship and witness in a militaristic world” Here are some excerpts that concern taxes:

Let us expand our support for proposed Peace Tax Fund legislation in both the United States and Canada, recognizing that legal recognition of conscientious objection to payment of taxes destined for military use will require the same patient persistence which resulted in legal recognition of conscientious objection to military service.

Let us prayerfully examine the practice of church organizations withholding and transmitting income taxes of church employees who themselves are conscientiously unable to pay taxes for military use. As part of that effort, we will participate in a conference planned for February 1988 for Mennonite, Brethren, and Quaker employers to share their experiences relating to tax withholding and conscience and to develop a strategy for relief of this ethical dilemma.

Let us continue to support those whose conscience prevents them from paying taxes destined for military use or from registering with the U.S. Selective Service System.

A report from the conference, carried in the 28 July 1987 issue, carried the ominous quote “Personally, I think the Peace Tax Fund is a way out of this” as a way of excusing why the Mennonite Church seemed to be waffling rather than taking any committed stand:

A statement on “Growing in Stewardship and Witness in a Militaristic World” was approved more quickly. It offers suggestions to congregations for ways to counter the increasingly pervasive “evil” of militarism in North America and around the world.

Ed Metzler, who presented the statement, said one of the best ways Mennonites can oppose militarism today is by supporting the campaign for “Peace Tax Fund” legislation in both the United States and Canada. Metzler, who is peace and social concerns secretary at Mennonite Board of Congregational Ministries, said this would permit conscientious objection to war taxes in the same way that Mennonites and others won the right to conscientious objection to war. He called to the podium the executive director of the campaign in the U.S. — Marian Franz, a Mennonite. “Conscience is contagious,” she said, “and peace concerns are spreading far beyond the historic peace churches.”

Approval of the statement did not end the discussion on militarism. Especially after Mennonite Board of Missions president Paul Gingrich reminded the delegates that his agency is still waiting to hear what it is supposed to do about employees who request that taxes not be withheld from their paychecks so that they can resist war taxes. “I wish this body would act on this,” he said.

Metzler agreed, pointing out that the Mennonite Church General Board “ducked the issue” by calling for a general statement on militarism. “We wish the issue would go away,” he said, “but it won’t.” Moderator-Elect Lebold defended General Board inaction, noting that the church is deeply divided on the subject. “Personally, I think the Peace Tax Fund is a way out of this,” he said.

Nondelegate Ray Gingerich, an Eastern Mennonite College professor who is a war tax resister, challenged the notion of having to wait on the government to make legal a matter of conscience. Many delegates seemed to agree, and by majority vote, they instructed General Board to take immediate action on tax withholding and give a clear answer to MBM and other agencies seeking guidance.

The 21 July 1987 issue carried an interview with Thomas L. Shaffer (a Catholic law professor). Excerpt:

Q:

Are you a pacifist?

A:

Well, I think so. It is an odd question for a 53-year-old person because nobody’s asking me to wreak violence on anybody else. We are all very fortunate to have that little dialogue about paying over the coin to Caesar because otherwise we 53-year-olds, if we thought of being pacifists, would have to think of financing nuclear weapons. I guess that little dialogue lets us out, or at least in some people’s minds it does. But I figure that by now the taxes I paid have bought a lot of destructive weaponry, if I am paying my share.

The Church of the Brethren (Anabaptist cousins of the Mennonites) also held their annual conference. The 4 August 1987 issue reported:

An agenda item on “taxation for war” prompted little debate, since a study committee said the church has written enough about war-tax resistance, and that it is time for members to study seriously what has been written.

That issue also carried this news:

Church asks forgiveness of antiwar activist defrocked 25 years ago

The Presbyterian Church (USA) has publicly asked the forgiveness of an 81-year-old Cincinnati minister who was defrocked by a regional church body 25 years ago for his antiwar activism. Maurice McCrackin, pastor of the nondenominational Community Church of Cincinnati, was deposed from the ministry by the Cincinnati Presbytery in 1961 after he refused to pay the portion of his income taxes that would go for military spending. Meeting in Biloxi, Miss., the denomination’s highest governing body, the General Assembly, formally confessed error in removing McCrackin from the ministry and endorsed an action taken in May by the Presbytery of Cincinnati restoring him to clergy status.

The attempts to get the Mennonite Church to take risks on behalf of war tax resisters got the goat of of Elmer S. Yoder, who wrote the following for the 20 October 1987 issue — again suggesting the Peace Tax Fund as a way of sidelining the problem:

Whose conscience is to be respected?

The concluding appeal by a delegate at Purdue 87 to “respect the individual conscience” in regard to church institutions not withholding “war taxes” failed to address a key question. The appeal sounded simple and persuasive, on the surface, but it is much more complex and far-reaching. Whose conscience is to be respected? The conscience of the individual employee of an institution or the collective conscience of a board of directors, or perhaps even General Assembly?

The corporation is a legal entity and owes its continued existence to statutory provisions. The centralized management of the corporation can and does express the collective conscience of the institution. Our major church institutions are incorporated and directed by boards. The directors have been charged with the optimum operation of the institutions. The institutions (corporations) are faced with options different from those of an individual in respect to a refusal to pay the tax in question.

An individual refusing to pay what he considers is the war tax would be confronted by an agency of the government. The result might be the placing of some financial restrictions upon him, or additional legal action, such as seizure of property, or in extreme cases, imprisonment. Noncompliance by a church corporation would almost certainly result in governmental measures amounting to a substantial loss of freedom. This loss could well include its legal base to perform the objectives and purposes included in its charter and given by the Mennonite Church.

An individual Christian respecting the conscience of a war-tax resister suffers no detrimental consequences legally. A trustee of a church institution is in a completely different situation. By consenting with fellow trustees not to withhold the tax in question, he and the trustees are inviting various restrictions on the institution via legal action.

Legal alternatives of not withholding the war tax have been researched thoroughly by the General Conference Mennonite Church, without finding any legal recourse. This means that trustees of church institutions would engage in civil disobedience by not withholding from any employee’s salary the part of the tax he protests, but in addition, would push the institution into a morass of legal restrictions and extended court procedures that would severely hamper the operation of the institution or drain its resources through protracted legal fees.

This is not a plea to act only on the basis of potential consequences. The call to faithfulness supersedes consequences. But faithfulness in great diversity of understanding, such as the war tax issue and the legal consequences, is difficult to achieve. It is not in the interests of brotherhood to create or foster an institutional versus individual conflict, but neither is it proper or ethical to evade the issue of an institutional conscience. In church institutions that conscience is molded by the larger brotherhood and those directly charged for the operation of the institutions — the trustees.

Nearly 100 years ago, the Mennonite Church began forming institutions (corporations) to carry out more effectively its tasks of nurture, education, and evangelism. The institutions have served well and have contributed in many ways to the mission of the Mennonite Church. Shall this servant role of the institutions continue? Trustees of the institutions can, by openly defying the law over an issue on which such a diversity of opinion exists within the Mennonite Church, shackle the institutions, rather than performing as stewards.

Perhaps the time is coming, in the United States, when the church may again need to preach, to teach, and to evangelize without the legal entity of the corporation. Perhaps there again will be the time for the fabled school with the professor on one end of a log and the student on the other. The church corporation, which makes possible educating larger numbers, would be conspicuously absent, because of legal ramifications. But, in my opinion, that time is not yet.

Perhaps, rather than urging a course of action which would eventually eliminate faculty and staff positions in the institutions, the energies and efforts devoted to this should be channeled into making possible a legal alternative, such as the Peace Tax Fund. Devoting one’s energies to making it possible for larger numbers to step out and take advantage of the Peace Tax Fund certainly would be preferred to potentially reducing the church institutions into ineffectiveness.

The “New Call to Peacemaking” initiative was still active, but seemed to be deemphasizing war tax resistance. It is not until the penultimate paragraph of this 20 October 1987 story that war tax issues are mentioned:

Some of New Call’s limited resources do go to renewing the vision within the historic peace churches. In February a conference will be cosponsored with the Quaker War Tax Concerns Committee on the challenge to church organizations from employees requesting their federal taxes not be withheld so they can exercise their conscience in relation to war taxes.

This letter to the editor, from Edgar Metzler, appeared in the 3 November 1987 issue:

Thank you for sharing Ike Glick’s courageous decision of conscience to resign from a company that might be involved in military contracts (Oct. 13). All of us in North America are inextricably involved in an economy addicted to huge military expenditures. Ike’s conscience challenges especially all of us who think that the taxes we pay to build weapons of war are something for which we have no responsibility. Our stewardship teachings tell us it is God’s money. How we use that resource surely must be a matter of conscience as much as the way we use our God-given talents in our occupations.

This is the twenty-ninth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of Gospel Herald, journal of the (Old) Mennonite Church.

In 1988 the Mennonite Church danced right up to the brink of committing to corporate war tax resistance, as other church bodies around them considered their own similar actions.

The traditionalists were increasingly restive, though. For example, in the 12 January 1988 issue, a letter to the editor from Robert L. Beiler took the traditional Romans 13 line and then went on to pointedly ask why war tax resisting Mennonites don’t seem to make any noise about taxpayer-funded abortions — and anyway the United States is a great country and we should be happy to pay taxes here.

The 19 January 1988 issue reported on how another Christian group was dealing with war tax resisters in the fold:

Quaker denomination supports staff war-tax witness

The General Board of Friends United Meeting — a Quaker denomination based in Richmond, Ind. — has adopted a policy of not withholding the federal taxes of employees who are conscientious objectors to paying taxes used for military purposes. This means the denomination is willing to violate Internal Revenue Service tax regulations in order to support the conscience of its employees.

The policy requires employees who desire to participate in the witness of military tax refusal to first participate in a “clearness process” with their local congregation. They are encouraged to compute the military percentage of their income tax, using the figures of the Friends Committee on National Legislation, and voluntarily deposit that sum in a special denominational account held for that purpose. The remainder would be submitted to the IRS.

In taking this action. Friends United Meeting is pursuing a long Quaker tradition of recognizing all outward warfare to be inconsistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ. It joins one other denomination in taking this action — the General Conference Mennonite Church. Friends United Meeting is also seeking legislative remedy through the U.S. Peace Tax Fund bill in Congress. This legislation would permit tax payers morally opposed to war to have the military part of their taxes allocated to peacemaking.

Representatives of several “traditional peace church” denominations met to try to swap ideas about how to cope with the war tax resistance issue (Paul Schrag reporting):

Historic peace churches tackle thorny issue of tax withholding

Praying for peace while paying for war is a contradiction that historic peace churches must oppose by speaking out and taking action, representatives of those churches agreed at a consultation Feb. 15–17 in Richmond, Ind. For some people, war tax resistance — refusing to pay the portion of one’s taxes that goes to the military — is a moral imperative. Their consciences will not allow them to help pay for machine guns and nuclear bombs.

The question of how church organizations can help their employees follow their consciences — and how to deal with the risks involved for both employees and employers — were the issues that nearly 40 Mennonites, Brethren, and Quakers struggled with at the meeting.

The church leaders, agency representatives, and lawyers affirmed their support for individual military tax resisters and for efforts to seek a legislative solution by working toward passage of the Peace Tax Fund Bill in the U.S. Congress.

They agreed to organize a peace church leadership group to go to Washington sometime in the future to support the peace tax bill and to express concerns about tax withholding. They also agreed to help each other by filing friend-of-the-court briefs if tax resisters are prosecuted and by sharing the cost of tax resistance penalties, if necessary.

“You may think the world will little note nor long remember what has happened here,” said Marian Franz, a Mennonite who is executive director of the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund. “But I regard it as a historic meeting.”

People from churches that have policies of breaking the law by not withholding the federal taxes of employees who oppose paying military taxes shared their experiences with people from churches considering adopting such a policy. The General Conference Mennonite Church and two Quaker groups are in the first category. The Mennonite Church is in the second.

Mennonite Church leaders, including Executive Secretary James Lapp and Moderator-Elect George Brunk Ⅲ, came to the meeting to explore church policy options on military tax withholding. The General Assembly of the Mennonite Church asked the General Board last July to develop a recommendation on the issue for consideration at the next General Assembly in 1989.

“This roots us in a larger movement,” Lapp said of the meeting. “It gives us ideas and handles about how other people have addressed it. We don’t have to start from ground zero.” General Board plans to formulate questions about tax withholding for congregations to discuss. It will prepare its 1989 recommendation based on congregations’ responses.

The meeting, held at Quaker Hill Conference Center, took place in an atmosphere of excitement generated by a gathering of people from different traditions who share a vision. In the long and lively discussions, participants challenged each other and their churches to recommit themselves to active peacemaking and prophetic witnessing on the war tax issue.

Robert Hull, peace/justice secretary for the General Conference Mennonite Church, said it was frustrating that many members of historic peace churches are not willing to witness against financial participation in preparing for war although they are opposed to physical participation in war.

When a church or organization decides to honor employees’ requests not to withhold their federal income tax, it assumes serious risks. Any “responsible person” who willfully fails to withhold an employee’s taxes theoretically could be punished with a prison sentence and a $250,000 fine. An organization could be fined $500,000.

But such penalties have never been imposed on legitimate religious organizations, nor are they likely to be, said two lawyers at the meeting. The usual Internal Revenue Service response to war tax resistance is to take the amount of tax owed, plus a 5 percent penalty and interest, from the employee’s bank account.

IRS has not taken even this action against the four GC employees who are not having their taxes withheld. They pay the nonmilitary portion of their taxes themselves and deposit the 53 percent that would have gone to the military in a designated account. IRS has not touched that account since it was established after GC delegates approved the policy in 1983. All GC personnel who could be subject to penalties have agreed to accept the risk.

The Friends World Committee for Consultation, which has had a nonwithholding policy since 1982, has had tax money seized, plus interest and penalties, from its resisters’ bank accounts. The Friends United Meeting adopted a nonwithholding policy last October. The Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of Friends will decide in March whether it should have such a policy. Charles Boyer of the Church of the Brethren said he would use the input from the meeting to work toward helping his denomination develop a policy on tax resistance.

Participants made suggestions for improvements on a draft of “A Manual on Military Tax Withholding for Religious Employers” written by Hull, Linda Coffin of the Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns, and lawyers Peter Goldberger and J.E. McNeil. The manual is expected to be available later this year.

The consultation was sponsored by the Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns and New Call to Peacemaking. The latter is a cooperative peace organization of the historic peace churches. New Call to Peacemaking plans to sponsor a military tax withholding meeting for a wider range of church groups sometime in the future.

Whether or not military tax resistance “works,” participants agreed that people’s moral imperative to follow their consciences must be respected. “No conscientious objector ever stopped a conflict,” said William Strong, a Quaker representative. “But they had to explain what they did, and the vision was kept alive, and those ripples — you don’t know where they stop.

The Mennonite Church was playing catch up with their cousins the General Conference Mennonite Church when it came to deciding how to react to employees who were conscientious objectors to military taxation, but now it was their turn to begin the process. From the 1 March 1988 issue:

General Board considers issue of church agency tax withholding

As the result of a General Assembly mandate last July at Purdue 87, Mennonite Church General Board has initiated a plan to consider church agency tax withholding. The General Assembly action calls for General Board to bring to the 1989 assembly a proposal for how the church should respond to questions of conscientious objection to the payment of military taxes and the institutional withholding of the military portion of employees’ income taxes.

Steps in the consideration process, as approved at the board’s November meeting, began in February with participation in the interdenominational Employers Tax Withholding Consultation in Richmond, Ind. Then a working document, clarifying the issues and enumerating possible responses, will be prepared for General Board study.

Board members will devote a day to the issue prior to their regular April meeting. The discernment process will continue as revised copies of the working document are available for conference and congregational study between April 1988 and March 1989.

A summary of conference responses will be included in the General Board docket in April 1989, when the board will develop a recommendation to be presented for General Assembly action in August 1989.

The 29 March 1988 issue noted that the “first major public event” of the Peace and Justice Center at Stirling Ave. Mennonite Church in Kitchener, Ont. “was a… seminar to explore alternatives to paying taxes for military purposes.”

In a letter to the editor in the 22 March 1988 issue, Jurgen Brauer wrote that after reading Tolstoy he came to feel that “it is high time that the issue of tax withholding (or redirecting) becomes the major issue of the church.”

The “Taxes for Peace” fund gave its annual update in the 29 March 1988 issue. They’d decided to donate all of the taxes redirected through the fund to the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund that year, and announced that the previous year they’d redirected about $4,000 to “the Lancaster County, Pa., Peacework Alternatives project.”

A note in the 5 April 1988 issue:

Poster on war tax resistance from Mennonite Central Committee. The words on the poster are by John Stoner: “We are war tax resisters because we have discovered some doubt as to what belongs to Caesar and what belongs to God, and have decided to give the benefit of the doubt to God.” It is available from MCC at…

The General Board of the Mennonite Church met in April 1988:

General Board takes step in non-withholding of war taxes

In a decision that will lead to breaking the law if approved by the General Assembly next year, the General Board of the Mennonite Church has recommended that war taxes not be withheld from the paychecks of denominational employees who request that. The 32-member board passed the recommendation unanimously, with a few abstentions.

The action, which came during the board’s Apr. 6–9 meeting in Kitchener, Ont., was a long-awaited response to several people at church agencies and schools who, because of conscience, do not want to pay the portion of their taxes — about 50 percent in the United States — that goes to the military. It was also a response to an impatient 1987 General Assembly that instructed General Board to take a stand on the issue.

“This has been an area we have been reluctant to move in,” said General Board executive secretary Jim Lapp in introducing the matter. Ed Metzler, the denomination’s peace and social concerns secretary, said the main reasons for taking the non-withholding action are to allow individual expressions of conscience and to witness against militarism. “But is this the best way to witness against militarism?” asked Tim Burkholder of Northwest Conference. Other board members wondered if the church corporately should break the law to satisfy the consciences of a few individuals.

The board members, meeting at Pioneer Park Christian Fellowship, gathered a day earlier than usual to take up the war tax matter. Metzler arranged for a variety of speakers to address the subject, including two persons who have requested non-withholding — Chris Longenecker of Eastern Mennonite Board of Missions and Carman Albrecht of Mennonite Central Committee Ontario.

John Stoner, executive secretary of Mennonite Central Committee U.S. Peace Section, delivered a ringing “call for courage” based on the book of Revelation. “It is unthinkable that John the Revelator would not see, in our time and place, the war tax demands of Western democratic militaristic capitalism as a challenge to our faithfulness to the witness of Jesus,” he said.

Bob Hull, peace/justice secretary for the General Conference Mennonite Church, explained the lengthy process that led to his denomination’s 1983 decision to honor requests for non-withholding. It included a four-year effort to explore all legal channels — legislative, judicial, administrative — for avoiding the payment of war taxes. Finally, at their convention in Bethlehem, Pa., 72 percent of the GC delegates voted to defy the law — the first denomination to do so. (Several Quaker groups have since done the same.) To date, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service has not moved against the GC Church.

In the discussion that followed, several people argued that consistent conscientious objection to war should include a refusal to fight as well as to pay for fighting. Others wondered why the Mennonite Church — and other denominations — agreed so easily to a 1943 law in the U.S. (and earlier in Canada) that required them to withhold taxes from employees’ wages, thus putting the church in the role of tax collector for the government.

For a while it looked like the board members might postpone action on the issue or pass the buck to the 22 conferences of the Mennonite Church. But Moderator Ralph Lebold reminded them of their instructions from General Assembly, and Dean Swartzendruber of Iowa-Nebraska Conference urged the board to “decide here today.”

In the end, the decision was made after much deliberation and considerable rewriting of the proposed action. In addition to honoring requests for non-withholding, it includes support for the Peace Tax Fund bill in the U.S. Congress that would provide conscientious objection to war taxes and a call for “serious attention” to the question of the church as tax collector.

The recommendation will now go to the conferences for review. A year from now, General Board will take the responses from the conferences and shape a final recommendation for submission to the 1989 General Assembly. The board members agreed that the recommendation will be introduced in person to the leaders of each conference by a denominational staff person.

Gospel Herald kept readers up on the news of other denominations struggling with the same issue (26 April 1988):

Quakers agree to aid workers who refuse to pay “military” taxes

Philadelphia-area Quakers took a historic step recently to aid employees who were opposed to paying taxes for war purposes. The Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, in its 308^th annual session, agreed to withhold but not forward to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service the estimated military portion of its employees’ federal income taxes. This money will be set aside in a special fund and paid to IRS with interest when there is assurance the money will not go for military spending.

Currently the organization has 42 employees, of which an average of seven are tax resisters at any time. The decision to establish the set-aside fund for war tax resisters augments the 1975 decision to refuse cooperation with IRS levies on salaries of war tax resisters employed by the Yearly Meeting. The policies could make the group liable for sizable fines and penalties for breaking federal law. The Yearly Meeting also could incur liability for employees’ unpaid taxes.

And some Mennonite congregations were taking stands on their own (31 May 1988, Cindy Hines Kurfman reporting):

Indiana congregation supports its members who don’t pay “war taxes”

War-tax resistance is an important subject at Lafayette (Ind.) Mennonite Fellowship — important enough that members commit themselves to “support for those who, for reason of conscience, resist ‘war tax’ payment.”

To Ken Nagele, who began refusing to pay a portion of his taxes in 1982, war-tax resistance originally meant not paying “the percentage associated with nuclear weapons.” He now refuses to pay for “all current and past military spending,” but still pays the portion that benefits veterans in the belief that he is “helping those scarred by killing.”

Nagele uses a Friends Committee on National Legislation document each year to determine how much he will withhold. This year the figure is 53.1 percent. The refused portion will be deposited in the Near Eastside Community Federal Credit Union of Indianapolis. This community-development credit union makes loans to low-income persons and small businesses in an economically depressed portion of the city.

Another member, Mary Ann Zoeller, is refusing to pay war taxes for the first time. “As a Christian, I knew I could not, in good conscience, support the killing of others,” she says. “Yet the existing tax laws require me to do just this, by asking me to pay taxes that finance military services. Following Christ’s teachings of love of his persecutors, even to the loss of life, I have been led to question my support of our military.” Zoeller sends the war-tax portion to Amnesty International, a human rights organization.

Alternative methods of war-tax resistance are also demonstrated by several families in the Lafayette congregation. One family, whose income is below the taxable level, has written a letter to their tax commissioner since 1980 which explains their belief that paying for war is a sin. Another couple keeps their payment to a minimum by following the example of their parents; live simply and give a large percentage of income to the church.

Another example (7 June 1988):

A Virginia congregation has decided to officially support its members who refuse to pay the military portion of their taxes. Community Mennonite Church in Harrisonburg, Va., has 20 members who illegally withhold some of their tax money as an act of conscientious objection to war taxes or are seriously considering it. “The congregation’s decision grew out of the desire and concern of a few of us that our action be more than the isolated action of individual conscience,” said Orval Gingrich, one of the 20. The congregation is encouraging all its members to include letters of protest with their income tax returns and has notified Internal Revenue Service that it fully supports its members who don’t pay war taxes.

By June 1988 it was time for another backlash letter to the editor. Titus Martin hit the predictable Romans 13 notes and warned readers against relying on their consciences when conscience and scripture disagree. As a compromise he suggested that readers use charitable deductions rather than civil disobedience to lower their taxes.

Even the Presbyterians were getting in on the tax resistance act, according to this 19 July 1988 news brief:

The document describes obedience to civil authority as normative for Christians but asks the denomination to set up a special fund to support Presbyterians who suffer financial losses because of a stance of resistance. The paper argues that withholding taxes to protest U.S. military policy is proper under certain circumstances. Such activists are entitled to emotional support from the church, the paper says.

The IRS went on the offensive against the Philadelphia Yearly meeting, which may have been frightening news for a Mennonite Church which was contemplating taking a similar stand (18 October 1988):

Employees’ tax protest prompts IRS lawsuit against Quakers

The Internal Revenue Service has filed two suits against a Quaker group in Pennsylvania because the organization has refused to attach the wages of two employees who have withheld part of their income taxes as a conscientious protest against military spending. The lawsuits against the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends seek $17,000 in connection with federal taxes that were not paid by William Grassie and David Falls. IRS said it takes such action against the employer of anyone who fails to pay taxes on the ground that salaries are property that can be levied by the government in such cases.

Finally, a note in the 20 December 1988 issue read:

A new resource is available on the war-tax issue for Mennonite Church conferences — and others — that are currently considering whether church institutions should be instructed to not withhold taxes from the wages of employees who express conscientious objection to the military portion of their taxes. Conferences are to submit their counsel to General Board before April in preparation for a proposal to General Assembly at Normal 89. The resource is a just-published book called Fear God and Honor the Emperor: A Manual on Military Tax Withholding for Religious Employers. Each purchaser of the book will be on a mailing list to receive future updates on the subject. The book is available at a special price of $11 from Mennonite Board of Congregational Ministries…

This is the thirty-first in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of Gospel Herald, journal of the (Old) Mennonite Church.

General Board Follies

So if you remember from our last episode, the board of the Mennonite Church was dragging its feet about supporting employees who did not want war taxes withheld from their paychecks. Then the whole Church, in its General Assembly, forced their hand by voting to honor the requests of such employees.

But apparently the board still saw that as advisory and not binding, because they kept right on dragging their feet:

General Board tables military tax question

After several years of study and discussion, the Mennonite Church General Board brought the military tax question to a vote — and tabled it. Normal 89 attenders will recall that a majority of General Assembly delegates voted to “support” the efforts of church board employees who do not wish their taxes deducted so that they can deal with the government in regard to military taxes.

The issue came back to the General Board as such issues will and it was given extended attention at the spring meeting which convened at Kalona (Iowa) Mennonite Church, Apr. 5–7. An early straw vote strongly favored going ahead, but when decision time came, a majority voted to table the motion.

As presented, the motion called for agreeing “in principle” to honor requests of employees who ask that their income tax not be withheld. However, such approval was intended to be reviewed in the 1991 session of the board after a congregational study process which is now being initiated. No taxes were to be withheld prior to April 1991.

Motion to table, it was suggested, was related to the pending congregational study process. The board was concerned not to prejudice the case before the study process. Also there was concern that the possible consequences of such withholding be better understood. What action might the government take toward board officers?

Moderator George Brunk Ⅲ and Executive Secretary James Lapp indicated that they were not unhappy about the motion to postpone action. “Some of us thought ‘in principle’ could be helpful in the study process,” said Brunk. “The board position has been in the direction of the proposed motion,” he continued. “But there are different ways to capture this.”

Yet another Military Tax Consultation was held to allow for more jaw-exercise and to cover for the delay:

Mennonite Church General Board is holding a Military Tax Consultation in response to actions taken by General Assembly at Normal 89 last August. It will be held May 11–13 at Goshen College. Mennonite Church conferences are invited to send teams of persons to the event. Since General Assembly called for “continued study of issues raised by taxation for military purposes,” General Board is currently preparing a study guide for use by congregations. It is being prepared under the direction of Robert Hull and will be ready in time for the consultation. The most controversial — and potentially illegal — action taken by General Assembly was its permission to denominational agencies and schools to honor the request of employees who don’t want taxes withheld from their paychecks so they can refuse to pay the portion (about half) that goes to the military. More information about the consultation is available from General Board…

Daniel Hertzler reported on the consultation:

War tax resisters tell their stories at General Board consultation

Some 30 people met at Goshen College, May 11–12, for a “Consultation on Military Tax Withholding.” The military tax question has been on Mennonite Church agenda since 1977, General Board executive secretary James Lapp told the group. But now it has become focused on the issue of “tax withholding” by church agencies for people who wish to deal with the Internal Revenue Service on their own.

Avowed purpose of the consultation was to introduce a study guide, “As Conscience and the Church Shall Lead,” being prepared for use in congregations. To this end Marlene Kropf of Mennonite Board of Congregational Ministries led the group in an educational experience.

In the beginning, and alternatively throughout, there was story telling. Military-tax resisters told how they got into it. All referred to a variety of spiritual influences and life-changing experiences. Seven persons told personal stories. Among them was Dan Hunsberger of Hesston College, who worked one summer for a contractor without taxes withheld and got a tax bill for $1,700. “I considered this use of money wrong, not only from a peace standpoint, but also bad business.”

David Weaver, a teacher at Central Christian High School, grew up in a family that eschewed political involvement. But in 1984 he went on a student tour to the Middle East and spent some time on the West Bank of the Jordan River, the home of persecuted Palestinians. Then, in 1986, he wrote a paper on the issue of war taxes and in the same year he went to Nicaragua with Witness for Peace. “I saw the Nicaraguan people and looked into their eyes,” he said. That year he decided to withhold 55 percent of his income taxes.

“At the beginning I felt very heavy about this. In November when they came and took money from my account, it was like a burden was lifted. What really can they do to harm me? We’re in the world for a short life. There are little things we can do. This doesn’t mean my hands are clean. But it is a small action.”

Ray and Wilma Gingerich from Harrisonburg, Va., gave a joint report which recounted a decades-long, growing concern over the issue of war taxes. When they first became aware of the issue, they had no income taxes to pay. But by 1977 they finally had enough income to be taxed and began to withhold 50 to 59 percent. “Our son Andre refused to register under Carter,” they said. “We saw some relation between this and middle-aged people not paying for war. We cannot continue to pay taxes while applauding our young who resist the draft.”

Ray expressed concern that Mennonite Church leaders have not been more forthright about the issue. “We need to try to draw our leaders into the discussion. Leaders generally get their authority from the people, not from the poor or the Bible. In some respects, tax resisters must lead the leaders.”

Among the leaders present was Paul Gingrich, president of Mennonite Board of Missions. He acknowledged that MBM first faced this issue as long ago as 1984, when John and Sandra Drescher-Lehman asked that their taxes not be withheld. The MBM board of directors is divided. Some threaten to resign either way.

But Gingrich concludes that some corporate action needs to be taken as an object lesson, a parable so that younger Mennonites may learn firsthand about resisting militarism. “We have a generation that only hears the stories of those resisting World Wars Ⅰ and Ⅱ and the Korean conflict,” he said. “The institution can become a symbol. In the action is a tremendous teaching moment.”

He continued, “In every generation we need to discover the issue on which we will not compromise. For what will we be ready to die? Is this the place to stand? Is this the way to stand? If an institution takes such an action, it may be that the institution will not survive. But maybe that is not the most important thing.”

No clear-cut answer to Gingrich came out of the consultation. But from small-group settings a cautious consensus emerged. Most groups encouraged church agencies to respect the consciences of persons who do not wish their taxes deducted by the agency, even though such honoring would involve the agency in illegal action.

Several groups pointed out, however, that there are ways for persons to gain access to enough tax money to make a symbolic protest without implicating their agency in illegal action. It was urged that they explore these first.

James Lapp, who called the consultation, and Marlene Kropf, director of the educational experience, both expressed satisfaction with the session. “We need to recognize that there is a complex set of issues here,” said Lapp. “Our goal is to help people to see that there is more than one way to be faithful.”

All this dithering prompted a letter to the editor from Dannie Otto (22 May 1990):

Although I have not been involved in the issue, I believe the issue of military tax deductions of church employees has been around for at least a decade. I am concerned about the continued reluctance of General Board to implement the will of General Assembly to support church board employees who as a matter of conscience do not wish to have their taxes deducted.

As reported in “General Board Tables Military Tax Question”… the eagerness with which the board embraces broad “visions” while avoiding concrete actions is striking. Whatever the possible actions of the government toward board officers if tax withholding is stopped, it would surely be mild in contrast to the price paid by Mennonite leaders during World War Ⅰ who refused to financially support the war effort. “A Pastor Pays a Price for Peace” in the same issue of Gospel Herald is an illustration. [See ♇ 1 September 2018]

Discussion of visions is fine, but no vision is more catching than one demonstrated through faithful action. My sympathies are with the General Board employees who have patiently gone through the lengthy process required to have their concerns embraced by General Assembly, only to have the issue kicked back into a “study process” by General Board.

The board’s apparent relief at being able to postpone action on this issue should be juxtaposed with Moderator George Brunk Ⅲ’s concern stated in his “state of the Mennonite Church” address that “We are not facing conflict as a people of God. The question of our faithfulness calls for eternal vigilance.”

Daniel Hertzler tried to put the whole thing in context with a 29 May 1990 editorial:

Why is it so hard to get to the bottom of the war tax question?

The issue of paying military taxes has been knocking about in the Mennonite Church for close to a generation. At the “Consultation on Military Tax Withholding” (Goshen College, May 11–12) it was reported that John Howard Yoder was writing about this already in the 1950s.

Perhaps these writings were not published. The earliest material on this subject which I could find in the Gospel Herald was “Dare We Pay Taxes for War?” by John Drescher (Oct. 10, 1967). I found this editorial with help from Swartley and Dyck’s Annotated Bibliography of Mennonite Writings on War and Peace: 1930–1980 (Herald Press, 1987). This book has 16 pages on the topic “War Tax Resistance,” so the subject has clearly been one of concern among us. Some of the references go back into the ’50s, but not in the Gospel Herald.

Drescher’s editorial indicates that concern about the issue arose during Mennonite General Conference and that “delegates asked for direction on the matter of paying taxes designated for war purposes.” A resolution was passed calling for “a fresh study of the biblical teaching”! Has anything changed among us in 23 years?

At the Goshen consultation I listened to Willard Swartley declaim on Romans 13:1–7, and I suddenly got a clue as to why this issue keeps grinding on with no resolution in sight. “Pay all of them their dues,” writes Paul, regarding the authorities, “taxes to whom taxes are due…”

So there it is. If Paul wrote to the Romans that they should pay their taxes, why do modern Mennonites sit around debating whether they may pay the military part of their taxes? We are known as people of the Bible. Isn’t the Bible plain enough?

Not so fast. At Goshen, Willard Swartley presented a 12-point outline entitled “Method for Bible Study.” The first three points were entitled “Observation: What does the Bible say?” The second five he captioned “Meaning: What is the text saying?’ The final four he called “Significance: What says the text?” Beyond these I think the most important thing he said was that Romans 13:1–7 should be interpreted as part of a longer unit in the letter (certainly a basic Bible study principle) and that probably there was a local controversy in Rome over the payment of specific taxes. Paul’s counsel to the Romans was to pay these specific taxes and was not intended as a general principle, regarding all taxes in all times and all places.

Willard pointed out that the New Testament has a number of normative texts on this subject. He mentioned the following: Colossians 2:15; Ephesians 1:19–23; 3:10; 1 Peter 3:22; 1 Corinthians 15:24–26; Romans 8:35–39; Ephesians 6:12–20. Romans 13, he said, should be interpreted in dialogue with this longer stream of texts. In the end, said Willard, there is “ambiguity in the biblical tradition over the place of authorities: respect for their responsibility for order versus awareness that they represent evil.” In other words, by simply paying taxes without thinking, we may be selling out.

Two others at Goshen discussed the issue from a theoretical standpoint: ethics professor J.R. Burkholder and Pastor John F. Murray. Murray proposed that the answer to the war tax problem is to be found in generous giving to the church. Since in the U.S. one can contribute up to 50 percent of one’s income, or $50,000, he proposed that reducing our income through contributions is a more effective response than tax resistance. Further, he pointed out, anyone who saves money and puts it in the bank is supporting the military just as much as the person who pays taxes. “When we give only 5 percent of our income as a denomination, we are not faithful.”

Burkholder stressed the reality of ambiguities. “We will have to learn to live with pluralism in the Mennonite Church,” he asserted. “We do not have the same position on war taxes.”

Clearly we do not. And as James Rhodes responded to Burkholder, “There is danger in an emphasis on ambiguity of diluting our basic foundation of biblical obedience.”

So it is important that we not give up just because we come with different perspectives on the issue. It is urgent that those with different points of view listen to each other under God and under the Scriptures. We have no other place to go.

Readers responded:

Robert V. Peters (10 July 1990)

In response to your editorial, “Why is it so Hard to Get to the Bottom of the War-Tax Question?”… and the news article piece on the war-tax consultation in the same issue, let me note the following: Why is it that the Mennonite Church can so easily reach clarity that homosexuality is a sin and ban any dialogue whatsoever with gay members of our community but yet find the war-tax issue “contains a complex set of issues” and that it is “filled with ambiguities”?

Why must we accept pluralism and ambiguity on this issue when we can so easily reach apparent consensus on the gay question? Is this not rather self-serving and hypocritical, for on the one hand our church fathers tell us we must accept differing biblical interpretations, pluralism, and ambiguity on war taxes but somehow the gay issue is crystal clear!

It seems to me that there is no ambiguity, for as you note, Romans 13 is not intended as a general principle that we must pay all taxes to government. Further the whole text seems to make clear that we must clarify our loyalties and choose whom we serve, God or Caesar. Further it seems clear that if we follow the way of peace, we can have no part in allowing our money to pay for killing and war. If there is room for ambiguity I think it is more apparent on the gay question. On war taxes it seems clear.

Perhaps our leaders wish to keep it plural, for only a minority can support our historic peace witness these days, while they know that pluralism is unacceptable for the gay question given the majority in our community who are convinced that homosexuality is sin. Wake up, leaders, and be fair! You can’t have it both ways. Either we seek clear standards and follow them or we become Unitarians or Quakers, where everything is ambiguous.

Robert J. Schultz (10 July 1990)

Schultz started off with the typical Render-unto-Caesar / after all Rome was a militaristic government / Jesus never complained about paying taxes line. Then he finished off with the “silent majority” gambit:

I urge all of those conservative Mennonites who usually remain silent to “send the General Board a message” — mainly, not to be tempted into politicking with the liberal pacifist elements, and to remain within the boundaries of biblical nonresistance. If there are those who want to withhold taxes, let them do it without having the actions of the General Board as a shield.

John M. Eby (21 August 1990)

“Why Is It So Hard to Get to the Bottom of the War Tax Question?”… Maybe because there is no bottom — only a bottomless chasm between two irreconcilable views.

In my own imagination I see the story told in Matthew 22 in modem “dress.” The Pharisee digs through the pockets of his custom-tailored suit. From a jumble of temple contribution receipts and credit cards (Pharisee-controlled banks) he produces a $50 bill.

“Whose portrait is on that bill?”

“General and President Ulysses S. Grant.”

“If you deal in portraits of deceased generals and presidents, you owe a commission to those who occupy their offices today. But don’t forget that you owe even more to God.”

Again, we know that Caesar does not divide his tax collections between two baskets labeled “war” and “peace.” It all goes into one basket, and then is divided out as Caesar wishes. And so, if 50 percent (or whatever) goes for “war,” then 50 percent of anything that an individual deposits into the basket goes for “war.” The persons who pay 50 percent of their taxes are in fact paying half of their “war” tax and half of their “peace” tax.

I admire those who for conscience’ sake voluntarily live at the “poverty” line so that they do not owe the tax that they object to paying. They have adjusted their lifestyle to put their (lack of) money where their “mouth” is. I’m not willing to do that — a character flaw, perhaps, but one that I seem to share with many others. Is it wrong to want to share in at least part of the standard USA lifestyle without paying for Caesar’s expenses in maintaining conditions that promote this lifestyle?

Do we want a “free lunch”? And, of course, Caesar’s money can do God’s work, or so we are told by those responsible for keeping church agencies and institutions in the black. Those who have the spirit of generosity also need something to be generous with. And Caesar pays a part of the gift.

If we deal in portraits of deceased generals and presidents, what do we owe to those who occupy their offices today?

Richard E. Martin (4 September 1990)

Over a number of years I have read articles, pro and con, on the war-tax issue. Your May 29 editorial on the same subject has rekindled my interest. A large percentage of the arguments have been of a theological or theoretical nature. However, I have not seen the following point of view mentioned.

Many of us in the Mennonite Church are no longer independent farmers and/or businessmen or self-employed.

(At age 48 I have witnessed this transition.) Therefore, we have little or no control over the deductions from our pay checks. No company, business, or public institution that I know of would seriously consider a request not to withhold a certain percent of taxes due. Some firms that are operated by Christians may grant us their understanding and be sympathetic in attitude, but simply are not willing to get into the legal and business ramifications of a tax fight with the federal government.

Consequently, the war-tax issue, while perhaps valid, is to many simply a moot point lingering in a gray mist on the edge of our consciousness. Could this be why the 1989 General Assembly vote on the General Board war-tax recommendation went 142 for and 100 against?

For me, if the federal government would institute a special, separate, extra-budget war tax (as done in the American Revolution, for example), that is a horse of a different color. I would try to resist in some way as my ancestors collectively did in Lancaster County, Pa., in the Revolutionary times. Having written my Indiana senators and representative on the war-tax issue, I see no change in federal tax regulations to be soon in coming.

The 30 October 1990 issue announced that if “continued study” was the order of the day, the Mennonite Church General Board was equipped:

Study guide on military tax withholding from Mennonite Publishing House. Prepared at the request of Mennonite Church General Board, it is designed to facilitate discussion of the 1989 General Assembly request for “continued study of issues raised by taxation for military purposes.” It is entitled As Conscience and the Church Shall Lead. A response form is provided so that Sunday school classes, small groups, and individuals may provide feedback.

The Mennonite Church General Board met in mid-November and tried to pretend that the General Assembly hadn’t voted to go ahead with corporate tax resistance:

Question was also raised about the Normal ’89 decision regarding war taxes. Board members noted a lack of clarity on what the decision meant. Slightly more than half the delegates had agreed that churchwide agencies need not withhold the military portion of taxes for employees who request this. Moderator George Brunk Ⅲ noted the decision is valid but that it can be reconsidered following a churchwide study on war taxes currently underway.

They also issued a “Statement to our Mennonite churches on the Persian Gulf situation” that included this:

[T]he Mennonite Church and the General Conference Mennonite Church General Boards take the following action:

That the General Boards express deep concern about and opposition to the military buildup and the growing threat of war in the Persian Gulf, reaffirm their biblical understanding that the will of God is for humankind to live in peace and harmony and that war and militarism are counter to God’s intentions, and call our congregations to the following:

To confess our own complicity and selfishness in utilizing more than our share of the world’s supply of oil and other resources and for our limited concern for long-standing injustices in the Middle East, and also to confess and reexamine our complicity in paying for the military buildup through our taxes.

The Mennonite Church General Board met again in mid-April 1991 and continued to put off making a firm decision in response to the mandate given them by the General Assembly:

They focused on the question of withholding war taxes for their employees. Two years ago delegates to Mennonite General Assembly had authorized churchwide boards to honor requests of employees not to withhold the military portion of their income taxes; final decision was up to each board. Though it had been previously discussed in several meetings, General Board had made no decision on the issue.

Nor did it come easy this time. Board members raised questions about their financial liability. They acknowledged the burden of leadership: other churchwide boards were awaiting the General Board decision for help with their own.

In the end General Board agreed “to honor the request of an employee who for conscience’ sake requests that the military portion of his or her federal income tax not be withheld.” But they hedged. They made the action subject “to development of acceptable policies for implementation approved by the board.”

Miscellany

There was also plenty of content around this time that wasn’t directly prompted by the Mennonite Church board’s inaction.

For example, there was a series of letters-to-the-editor around the beginning of the year debating war tax resistance. Here are a pair of them, side-by-side:

Adam R. Martin and Ervin Miller also chimed in, largely agreeing with Wengerd.

The “Taxes for Peace” fund gave its annual update in the 13 February 1990 issue:

MCC invites contributions to Taxes for Peace Fund

Mennonite Central Committee U.S. Peace Section is inviting contributions for the 1990 Taxes for Peace Fund. The fund, established in 1972, gives people who want to withhold war taxes a way to contribute their money toward peaceful purposes. While contributing to this fund is a symbolic action and not a legal alternative to paying the tax, many people have found it a meaningful way to demonstrate their commitment to peace.

Last year, $5,750 in Taxes for Peace money was divided between the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund and Christian Peacemaker Teams. This year’s contributions will be divided the same way.

The National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund seeks to enact the U.S. Peace Tax Fund Bill, which would give those conscientiously opposed to war a way to pay 100 percent of their taxes by designating the military percentage to a separate fund for peace-enhancing programs. Christian Peacemaker Teams is an initiative of North American Mennonite and related churches to develop and support more assertive peacemaking.

Since 1977 MCC constituents have contributed more than $75,000 to the Taxes for Peace Fund. Among other projects, the money has funded reconstruction efforts in Indochina, aided victims of violence in Guatemala, and supported the MCC U.S. Peace Section.

The following excerpt is from one of several dozen letters sent to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service in 1989 by contributors to the Taxes for Peace Fund: “We will sleep better tonight than if we would be helping to keep the murder machine going for the United States. And hopefully, all the people of the world will sleep better when we can all stop financing their death threats and death squads.” (John and Sandra Drescher-Lehman, Richmond, Va.)

Checks for the Taxes for Peace Fund should be made payable to “MCC, Taxes for Peace.”…

An information packet on military-tax opposition is available for $3 from MCC U.S. Peace Section. It contains varying theological positions on the war-tax issue and materials about tax laws and legal concerns for the tax resister. Updated materials are available for those who purchased earlier editions of the packet.

The 20 February 1990 issue announced a “Standing Up for Peace” contest in which young people (ages 15–23) “are urged to interview someone who has refused to fight in war, pay war taxes, or build weapons and then write an essay or song, produce a video, or create a work of art.” The MCC (U.S.) Peace Section was one of the sponsors.

One Mennonite congregation decided to take the lead and begin resisting the telephone excise tax as a group (6 March 1990):

St. Louis (Mo.) Mennonite Fellowship has decided to stop paying its telephone tax as a form of protest against military spending. Federal phone tax revenues, first collected in 1941, contribute directly to the U.S. Armed Forces. “Though the biblical basis for such action has been debated, we wish to respect the convictions of our members and Anabaptist forebears and foremostly to be disciplined followers of Jesus Christ,” said Scott Neufeld, who coordinates the congregation’s peace witness. The congregation will send its tax money instead to Mennonite Central Committee.

Five European Mennonite theologians are proposing changes in a World Council of Churches statement that is being discussed at WCC’s Convocation on Justice, Peace, and the Integrity of Creation in Seoul, South Korea, Mar. 5–13. One of them, Andrea Lange of West Germany, took the proposed revisions to Seoul as a representative of the Dutch Mennonite Church and the North German Mennonite Church, both of which are WCC members. The Seoul statement grows out of an extended “conciliar” process by WCC member churches. The Mennonite revisions call for the rejection of force and support for conscientious objectors to military service and those who refuse to pay war taxes. The revision also calls for the full use of women’s gifts in the church — and to “admit them to all church offices.”

The 1 May 1990 issue included an article on Mennonite martyrs of the World War Ⅰ period who were persecuted for refusing to buy war bonds (see ♇ 1 September 2018 for that article).

The Mennonite Board of Congregational Ministries board of directors met in August 1990, and took their cue from the Mennonite Church board by putting things off for another time:

The issue of military tax withholding for MBCM employees was discussed at length. However, no action was taken. Since no MBCM employees are currently requesting that the military portion of their taxes not be withheld, the board agreed to wait for such a request before responding to the military tax withholding question.

In November J. Lorne Peachey took over from Daniel Hertzler as editor. We haven’t heard from Peachey yet so I don’t know if he took any position in the war tax resistance debates that might influence his editorial positions.

A 11 December 1990 letter to the editor from John F. Murray used the war tax resistance issue as a rhetorical hook in the course of trying to prompt readers into tithing more to the Church.

Another letter, from Jim Leuba, in the 15 January 1991 issue, gave taxpaying Christians a pointed edge:

In reference to your suggestion in your editorial that we spend a day praying for “Peace in the Persian Gulf”…, I feel the following is an appropriate prayer:

“Lord, today I am praying for peace in the Persian Gulf. I pray our armies do not use the weapons I helped pay for with my tax dollars. Never mind. Lord, that I could live at an income level that did not require paying war taxes. And, Lord, a war will only increase the price of oil. I am so addicted to oil that I can’t imagine life without it. Never mind. Lord, that I use at least 10 times more fossil energy than 75 percent of the earth’s human population. Protect me. Lord; I am a North American Christian.”

The following syndicated news brief appeared in the 26 February 1991 issue:

Quaker group must garnish wages of tax-resisting employees

A Philadelphia Quaker organization must garnish the wages of its employees who fail to pay income tax for religious reasons, a federal judge in Philadelphia ruled. But Judge Norma Shapiro also said the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends cannot be penalized for failing to honor the levies imposed by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service. The case involved the refusal of three Friends employees to pay the full amount of their taxes because part of it would go to the military, and that would violate their religious antiwar beliefs.

In her decision, Shapiro cited the U.S. Supreme Court decision last year in Employment v. Smith, the controversial Oregon peyote case. In denying unemployment benefits to two residents, the high court ruled that since ingestion of peyote was a crime in Oregon, “the right of free exercise does not relieve an individual of the obligation to comply with a valid and neutral law of general applicability on the ground that the law proscribes (or prescribes) conduct that his religion proscribes (or prescribes).”

Eastern Canada Conference of Mennonites was struggling with the same issue of tax resisting employees that had troubled the General Conference Mennonite Church and the Mennonite Church (Ron Rempel reporting, 19 March 1991):

Canadian conference responds to military tax objectors

Waterloo, Ont. (Mennonite Reporter) — Two Ontario Mennonite leaders have declared their conscientious objection to the payment of military taxes. However, their employers have not yet decided whether or how to cooperate with the request to redirect military taxes for peaceful purposes.

Fred Martin, the student and young adult minister for Eastern Canada Conference, first raised the issue in the fall of 1989. Jean-Jacques Goulet, pastor of Wilmot Mennonite Church, took a similar stand the week that the Persian Gulf War started. His church is waiting to see how the conference will resolve the matter.

Last October, at its fall delegate meeting, the conference gave notice of a recommendation that will be dealt with at the annual meeting next month. That recommendation called on the conference to support Martin not forwarding to Revenue Canada the portion of his income tax used for military purposes.

Since the October meeting, the executive board of the conference has looked more closely at how to proceed if the fall recommendation is accepted. The board has prepared an alternative resolution, calling on the conference: (1) to “withhold no income tax from the salary of any conference employee who requests this on the basis of conscience”; (2) to inform Revenue Canada and members of Parliament of the decision; (3) to ask the government to introduce legislation recognizing conscientious objection to payment of military taxes and to provide peaceful alternatives for use of these tax dollars; and (4) to support other church boards, agencies, and congregations that may adopt similar policies.

“As far as we know, no one in Canada has gone this route,” commented Sam Steiner, secretary of the conference. Others who have asked for the cooperation of employers in not paying military taxes have become “contract employees,” or “self-employed contractors.”

Eastern Canada Conference, however, is proposing to treat military tax objectors as full employees, and to continue all regular benefits and deductions, except for income tax deductions. It would be left to the employee to remit income taxes to Revenue Canada after redirecting the military portion.

This procedure has been used by the General Conference Mennonite Church after that denomination decided in 1983 to support military tax objectors. The Mennonite Church has made a similar commitment in principle, but has not yet decided on a procedure to use.

According to Steiner, the conference would technically be Hable for breaking tax laws by deciding not to collect income taxes for the government.

Reporter Ron Rempel followed up on that report with this:

Eastern Canada Conference rejects proposal on military tax deductions

Baden, Ont. (Mennonite Reporter) — After a vigorous debate, delegates to the annual meeting of Eastern Canada Conference, Apr. 5–7, defeated a proposal calling on the conference not to deduct income tax from employees who want to redirect the military portion for peaceful purposes. They also tabled an alternative resolution.

The conference executive board developed its proposal in response to a request from its student and young adult minister, Fred Martin. He indicated in the fall of 1989 that he objected on the basis of conscience to paying military taxes. He asked the conference — which is required by law to deduct all income taxes and remit them to Revenue Canada — to help him find a way to express his conscience.

In the recent Gulf War, “my body was not being conscripted, but my money was,” commented Martin in a brief presentation before delegates. “How can I pray for peace but pay for war?”

In introducing the proposal, conference secretary Sam Steiner said the executive board had not been unanimous. Some abstained from voting; others were against the proposal. He also said the proposed action could make the conference legally liable for breaking the Income Tax Act.

The legal question dominated the Saturday afternoon discussion by delegates. For example. Ken Musselman said military tax objectors should use other options, like increasing charitable donations or cutting back their overall income to reduce taxes. A number of delegates said that individuals who want to redirect military taxes should assume the legal liability themselves — for example, as contract employees — rather than expect conference to bear it. Others supported the proposal. They cited historical precedents such as World War Ⅰ conscientious objectors choosing jail rather than the military uniform.

A number who lined up at the open mikes said they liked the second part of the executive board’s proposal — to seek legislation recognizing conscientious objections to payment of military taxes — but objected to the first part — asking conference to defy current income tax laws.

The delegates then faced two choices: either table the executive board’s proposal or look at an alternative resolution.

The alternative, presented by Margot Fieguth, began with the second part of the original proposal: an attempt to work through legislative and legal avenues to secure recognition of conscientious objection to payment of military taxes and to provide peaceful alternatives. This resolution also suggested that conference offer Fred Martin a contract position, so that he, rather than conference, would be responsible to make income tax payments.

Delegates decided not to table the original proposal. But before they started debating the alternative, there were voices calling for a vote on the executive board’s proposal.

“I would like to hear the truth of where the conference stands on this issue,” said Jean-Jacques Goulet, pastor of Wilmot (Ont.) Mennonite Church. During the Gulf War he had declared himself a conscientious objector to military taxes. And his congregation was waiting to see how conference would respond to Fred Martin.

In a ballot vote, the executive board’s proposal was defeated 159-48. It was late in the evening. The alternative resolution was on the floor. But someone proposed that it be tabled till the next session of conference. The motion carried.

The “Taxes for Peace” war tax redirection fund gave its annual report in the 16 April 1991 issue:

Taxes for peace.

The Peace Section of Mennonite Central Committee U.S. is inviting contributions for the 1991 “Taxes for Peace” fund. Established in 1972, it gives people who want to withhold war taxes a way to contribute their money to peaceful purposes. Donations last year totaled $3,700, and they were sent to the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund and to Christian Peacemaker Teams. More information is available from MCC U.S. Peace Section…

Nathan Zook Barge was quoted in a 30 July 1991 article as saying: “Can we say that we are pacifist when we are still paying taxes in support of war? Unless we are actively stopping that kind of support, I don’t think we are being heard as pacifists in Central America.”

Another General Assembly was held around the beginning of August, and I’m sure the board of directors were on tenterhooks hoping that the Assembly would let them off the hook about implementing the decision they’d made at the previous General Assembly to begin refusing to withhold war taxes from the salaries of objecting employees.

Unfortunately, I see nothing in the Gospel Herald coverage that indicates that issue was addressed at all. Instead, there was a lot of talk about encouraging Mennonites to contribute more to the Peace Tax Fund lobbying effort.

Delegates did look to themselves in reconsidering a 1989 statement on the Peace Tax Fund. The statement had called on individual Mennonites to contribute to this fund. Noting that less than one percent had done so, this time delegates took action to urge conferences and congregations to put the Peace Tax Fund in their budgets.

The Peace Tax Fund would allow conscientious objectors to pay their taxes by diverting the military portion to a special trust fund. Efforts are currently underway to have the Fund be considered by lawmakers in the U.S.; a comparable campaign is also being considered in Canada.

Weldon and Marg Nisly of Cincinnati told how they are refusing to pay the portion of their taxes that goes to the military. The Internal Revenue Service has frozen their bank accounts and life for them has become more inconvenient, but Nisleys said this is one way for them to “say no to the military monster.” Their call for 100,000 other Mennonites to join them was met with applause.

Peace tax fund.

In 1989 Mennonite General Assembly went on record to encourage individuals to contribute to a peace tax fund campaign. Less than one percent of us did. So in Oregon delegates made their action stronger: they are now “urging” district conferences and local congregations to put the peace tax fund into their annual budgets.

So your congregation will need to make a decision about that “urging” some time in the next two years. Will you give expression to your belief in peace by supporting a congregational budget item to contribute to a peace tax fund? The contribution will be used to help sponsor legislation in both Washington and Ottawa to legitimatize a peace tax fund as an option for persons opposed to having their tax money used for military purposes.

The 3 September 1991 issue profiled “Seniors for Peace” and included this detail:

Some Seniors for Peace withhold the military portion of their income taxes and contribute it to a peace fund. Many actively support lobbying for legislation for a peace tax fund to provide alternative service for tax dollars.

And finally, a 29 October 1991 letter to the editor from Tim Nafziger urged Mennonites not to stop, satisfied by redirecting their taxes to a peace tax fund. “The Mennonite Church is called to do more than be morally pure,” he wrote.