Some historical and global examples of tax resistance →
religious groups and the religious perspective →
Catholic churches →
Raymond Hunthausen
From the West Seattle Herald:
Local professor notes Hunthausen’s influence
by Mavis Amundson
A speech by Raymond Hunthausen, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Seattle, was powerful enough to have major repercussions in his life as well as influence in others.
That’s the view of West Seattle resident Robert Chamberlain, associate professor of speech and communication at Seattle Pacific University, who recently completed a study of the speech, which Hunthausen delivered to Lutheran ministers and laity in Tacoma.
Ironically, Hunthausen, who is not generally considered “radical or immoderate,” intuitively knew that for his speech to be effective, his stance on the nuclear arms issue had to be strong, said Chamberlain.
What Hunthausen had yet to discover, according to Chamberlain, was what the speech would do to himself.
The archbishop called the Trident nuclear submarine, with its “extraordinary accuracy and explosive power,” a “first strike” weapons system.
As such, he said, Trident is “immoral and criminal.”
“We must take special responsibility for what is in our own backyard,” said Hunthausen, referring to the Trident base at Bangor.
“I say with a deep consciousness of these words that Trident is the Auschwitz of Puget Sound.”
Hunthausen suggested actions individuals might take as solutions, such as writing letters and demonstrating.
His speech is remembered most, however, for what he said next:
“I would like to share a vision of still another action that could be taken: simply this — a sizable number of people in the state of Washington, 5,000, 10,000, 500,000 people refusing to pay 50 percent of their taxes in nonviolent resistance to nuclear murder and suicide.
I think that would be a definite step toward disarmament.”
The speech was “worded strongly — possibly more strongly” than Hunthausen intended, Chamberlain wrote in a 10-page paper.
In a Seattle Times interview cited in Chamberlain’s study, the archbishop said he “really wanted” to change what he said about his “vision” of many people withholding taxes and put it in the form of a speculation (“I wonder what would happen if this many people…”)
“It would have taken me off the hook a little,” Hunthausen said at the time.
The result for Hunthausen was that “he was driven to consider taking action that he might not otherwise have taken,” explained Chamberlain.
“The speech and the public reaction were significant factors in determining the course of his actions in the succeeding months.”
Hunthausen recalled to Chamberlain that, “It forced me to say, ‘How honest am I about this?
What am I personally going to do?’
“Did it force me to withhold taxes?
No, I don’t think so.
But it forced me to analyze whether or not I should… I really challenged myself — more, I believe, than I believe I intended, but in making the decision ultimately to withhold taxes I did so with a peacefulness.
I realized that if I’m going to be consistent, this is a step that I must take.”
News of the speech was carried in Seattle-area weekly and daily newspapers as well as a national wire service.
The Times’ religion editor called the speech “the strongest statement” on the nuclear arms race by a Pacific Northwest church leader, and more than a year later, Time magazine called it “outrageous.”
Chamberlain perused letters to the editors in local newspapers and discovered a “clear pattern” among supporters and detractors of Hunthausen’s speech.
“In short, the opposition letters opposed civil disobedience as a method much more consistently than any other aspect of Hunthausen’s rhetoric.
This is true despite the face that he clearly spent most of his own energy… pointing out the significance of the issue,” Chamberlain wrote.
“Those who accepted his position, on the other hand, by and large found it courageous.”
Chamberlain concluded that, on balance, Hunthausen’s speech contributed to the growing opposition to nuclear arms.
“It seems that his advocacy and use of civil disobedience, as a cautiously applied method, did not affect his cause negatively among large segments of the populace.
It may actually have called attention to the issue of nuclear armament more effectively than would a less drastic rhetorical measure.”
Two Seattle-area religious leaders, asked by a reported if Hunthausen’s speech changed their lives, confirmed the results of Chamberlain’s study.
William Cate, president and director of the Church Council of Greater Seattle, said he and his wife became war-tax resisters 10 months after the speech.
“We wouldn’t have done it without the archbishop.”
Pastor Jon Nelson of the Lutheran Campus Christian ministry in Seattle, who attended the Tacoma gathering where Hunthausen spoke, said, “It was a dramatic moment for those of us who heard it, realizing that a leader in the community and the church was risking everything… to express his revulsion to the nuclear arms race.”
The speech apparently is not a factor in a recent Seattle-based Vatican investigation of Hunthausen.
The investigation, a response to criticism of Hunthausen within the western Washington diocese regarding issues such as homosexuality and abortion, found “tremendous support” for Hunthausen, according to Maury Sheridan, communications director for the Seattle archdiocese.
The Vatican “went out of its way” to let people know the nuclear arms issue was not included in the investigation, he said.
Chamberlain was invited to present his study to the annual convention of two academic groups, the Speech Communication Association and the Religious Speech Communication Association, held in Washington D.C. .
He says he expects to refine the study for journal publication.
The study may also be included in a book Chamberlain intends to complete .
Here’s a war tax resistance flashback from North Country Catholic:
Archbishop to withhold tax to protest arms race
Seattle — Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen of Seattle has announced that he will withhold 50 percent of his federal income taxes as “a means of protesting our nation’s continuing involvement in the race for nuclear arms supremacy.”
The archbishop’s announcement, first in a local television interview and then in a pastoral letter, came seven months after he suggested to delegates to the Pacific Northwest Synod Convocation of the Lutheran Church in America that one possible non-violent form of Christian resistance to “nuclear murder and suicide” would be to refuse to pay 50 percent of one’s income taxes.
In his letter, dated and released in the issue of his archdiocesan newspaper, the Catholic Northwest Progress, the archbishop stated that he is “aware that this action will provoke a variety of responses,” but urged all persons to “continue to discuss this nuclear arms issue in a spirit of mutual openness and charity.”
He also said that he was not suggesting that all who agree with his peace and disarmament views should imitate his action of income tax withholding.
“I recognize,” he said, “that some who agree with me in their hearts find it practically impossible to run the risk of withholding taxes because of their obligations to those personally dependent upon them.
Moreover, I see little value in imitating what I am doing simply because I am doing it.
I prefer that each individual come to his or her own decision on what should be done to meet the nuclear arms challenge.”
Citing a previous pastoral letter he wrote on the subject, Archbishop Hunthausen stated that certain laws may he peacefully disobeyed under serious conditions, and that there may be times “when disobedience may be an obligation of conscience.”
“I believe,” he said, “that the present issue is as serious as any the world has faced.
The very existence of humanity is at stake.”
What he hopes his words and actions will do, the archbishop continued, is “to awaken those who have come to accept without thinking the continuation of the arms race, to stir even those who disagree with me to find a better path than the one we now follow, to encourage all to put in first place not the production of arms but the production of peace.”
The federal income tax which he withholds, the archbishop said, will be deposited in a fund to be used for charitable purposes.
When Archbishop Hunthausen called for unilateral nuclear disarmament by the United States in an address to the Lutheran synod meeting and suggested nuclear tax resistance as one possible response to nuclear arms spending, his comments received national news coverage.
His speech led Catholic and non-Catholic church leaders in the state of Washington to begin programs of prayer, study and discussion on war and peace issues in their churches.
Archbishop Hunthausen, 60, did not reveal the amount of federal taxes he usually pays or how much one half of his taxes would be.
His chancellor, Father Michael Ryan, said he did not think the archbishop would publicize the amount because it was the symbol of the action that was important rather than the amount of money involved.
Father Ryan also said the archbishop “realizes he’s responsible for facing the consequences” of civil disobedience, but “I don’t think he’d want to speculate on” the penalties he may face (See accompanying article).
An “accompanying article” follows:
Hunthausen could face prison, fine for tax evasion, according to IRS
Washington — If Archbishop Ray mond Hunthausen of Seattle holds back half of his federal income tax in protest over U.S. nuclear arms policy, as he has said he will, the Internal Revenue Service could prosecute him.
In addition to having his assets attached to pay the taxes and interest or penalties on them, the archbishop could face up to five years in prison and $10,000 in fines for each year that he refuses to pay.
“We’ve got to administer the law regardless of the political or philosophical persuasion of the taxpayer,” said Larry Batdorf, an official of IRS’s national media relations office in Washington.
Archbishop Hunthausen said in a TV interview in Seattle that he planned to withhold 50 percent of his federal income taxes to protest U.S. involvement in the nuclear arms race.
In a pastoral letter to his archdiocese a few days later he stated his position more fully and explained it.
Batdorf, following IRS policy, declined to comment specifically on Archbishop Hunthausen’s action or how the IRS would respond, but he outlined the general IRS position and policy regarding those who try to resist or evade their taxes.
He cited the court case of Autenreith v. Cullan, in which a tax resister was trying to withhold part of his taxes in protest over the Vietnam War, as a key legal precedent for IRS policy in such cases.
Batdorf quoted the pertinent part of the judge’s ruling: “The fact that some persons may object on religious grounds to some of the things that the government does is not a basis upon which they can claim a constitutional right not to pay a part of the tax.”
“We feel that the court has ruled very clearly” on that type of protest of conscience, said Batdorf.
He said that during the Vietnam War one popular form of tax protest was to refuse to pay the excise tax on one’s telephone bill.
The IRS assessed and collected the taxes from “about 700 to 800 a year” who engaged in that protest, he said.
He said in most cases the procedure is to try for a civil settlement first.
If the person refuses to file a return or files a low return, the IRS computes the tax, informs the person of its findings, and notifies the person that he has 90 days to make corrections or petition the findings in court.
If the person does not petition, said Batdorf, the tax is presumed correct.
After the court decides in favor of the IRS or the person fails to go to court, the IRS is free to collect the money and can use various means to do so, including attachment of wages or assets.
If the case goes to criminal prosecution, he said, the maximum penalty upon conviction for tax evasion, which is a felony, is five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
The actual penalties in each case are determined by the courts, not by the IRS, he said.
Google is starting to do for newspaper archives what it has been doing for books: putting scanned images on-line and making them text-searchable.
Hooray for Google, says I.
Here are a few articles I found while browsing around today:
A couple of pieces regarding a reconstruction-era dispute over the legitimacy of the Louisiana state government (in which tax resistance played a role):
The Nixon Administration asked the Supreme Court today to rule out draft exemptions for men who are conscientiously opposed to the Vietnam war but not to all wars.
…
Besides, the Administration argued, if selective exemptions are approved people could refuse to pay their taxes on religious grounds or could defy other laws.
Washington [D.C.] Official Urges Tax Refusal to Push Statehood The New York Times (“Walter E. Fauntroy, the District of Columbia’s Delegate to Congress, has urged residents here not to pay their Federal taxes until Congress makes Washington the 51st state.”
[C]ollection will be a formidable challenge after years in which taxes
were identified by Palestinians with foreign occupation.
Tax resistance is strong in the territories. It spread during a seven-year
uprising against Israeli rule, when Palestinians working in the tax
department resigned. According to Israeli estimates, only 20 percent of
Palestinians taxed in the West Bank met their payments in 1993, when tax
revenues totalled some $90 million.
The Palestinian Authority has already run into difficulties collecting
taxes in Gaza and Jericho, and it has published appeals in recent weeks
urging tax payment as a national duty. Outside of Jericho, it has no
police powers in the West Bank, and the legal system there remains under
Israeli control.
“Taxes are the dowry of independence and the key to democracy,” said Atef
Alawneh, director general of the Palestinian finance department, at the
ceremony today in Ramallah.
“Nonpayment of taxes under occupation was a national struggle worthy of
praise,” he added. “Now it is 180 degrees different. Now delay in paying
means a delay in building the Palestinian state.”
Zuhdi Nashashibi, the finance minister in the Palestinian Authority, said
he was confident Palestinians would now “hurry to pay” their taxes.
Mr. Alawneh argued that collection by Palestinians would be more effective
because it would lack the coercion of military occupation, would extend to
places the Israelis were unable to reach because of security concerns, and
would create new revenue sources. The tax authorities will not use force,
he said, but will rely instead on friendly persuasion and public goodwill.
Remember what this sort of thing used to be like? You’d get yourself down to
the library, and then you’d look through each volume of the
Reader’s Guide to Periodical Literature or whatever,
one at a time, hoping that what you were looking for was among the things the
editors of that guide felt was worth indexing. Then with luck, some of what
you were looking for was available in bound volumes, microfilm, or microfiche
on-site (elsewise you could always try for inter-library loan, but that might
take a couple of weeks). In the case of the first, you could find it on the
shelves or ask the reference librarian, and then thumb through the pages, but
in the case of the latter two, you’d have to haul your film over to a reader
(one that wasn’t broken or occupied) and then spend five minutes or so just
trying to locate the pages you were interested in. Then, if it turned out to
be good, you’d have to scribble things down or drop in some coin for a
barely-legible photocopy.
I like the future.
Today: some things from hither and yon that have caught my eye, but that I haven’t managed to weave into a Picket Line post yet:
Thanks to Amazon’s on-line reader, you can read excerpts from Gregory Vistica’s Fall From Glory: The Men Who Sank the U.S. Navy concerning the anti-WMD activism of Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, and the FBI / Naval Investigative Service / Knights of Malta campaign to discredit him.
Hunthausen at one point resisted a portion of his federal taxes to protest against the United States government’s policy of threatening to attack its enemies with nuclear weapons.
Here’s an old article from The Libertarian Forum about a property tax strike in Chicago in that bears a lot of resemblance to the organized Chicago property tax strikes of the 1930s. I wonder if we’ll see more of this during the current economic troubles.
Here’s an undated report about Australian war tax resister Robert Burrowes.
“Robert has been refusing to pay part of his taxes in ‘legal tender’ (as stipulated by Regulation 58 made pursuant to the Tax Act ) because he does not want to contribute to military expenditure.
Instead he has attempted to pay ‘in kind’ with such constructive and symbolic items as shovels, trees and Aboriginal land… and by donating the balance of the claimed money to various peace and development organisations.”
There’s other stuff on-line about Burrowes’s case but I haven’t had time to look into it yet.
Glenn D. McMurry wrote up some memories of his time at Bethel College in the 1930s, including his recollections of Benny Bargen.
I had the opportunity of living in the Bargen home for an entire summer session.
That experience further confirmed my knowledge of Bennie’s character.
He was a dedicated Christian and a staunch pacifist, believing and practicing all forms of non-violence.
In conversations with Bennie one could almost be persuaded that all wars in which our country had participated could have been prevented by pacifist methods.
Non-violence for Bennie didn’t end with his war philosophy.
He didn’t want any of his money to be used for violence of any type.
Therefore, in order not to pay federal tax on his income, he would accept only a very low salary.
The Bethel administration wanted to raise his salary.
They tried every loophole in the book to help Bennie, and still conform to his desire to pay no income tax.
He remained content to live on his meager salary in order to be true to his moral beliefs.
To live out such a life style, Bennie had to make decisions that made life difficult for his family.
Near poverty became the family’s lot!
The administration gave the most meager housing.
Usually it meant an upstairs apartment requiring his climbing to the top with great difficulty [Bargen’s legs were paralyzed from polio].
It didn’t bother him, but it bothered Esther, his very dedicated wife.
She had high aspirations for herself and her two children, and she found it difficult to attain them because of Bennie’s demands.
Even his eating habits were affected.
He would figure his calories and eat only the minimum amount of food he felt he needed to keep alive.
In excerpts from his book Experiments in Moral Sovereignty, taxpatriate Jeff Knaebel investigates the link between war and taxes, as exemplified in Thomas Paine’s observation that “In reviewing the history of the English Government, its wars and its taxes, a bystander would declare that taxes were not raised to carry on wars, but wars were raised to carry on taxes.”
Before Catholic Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen decided to begin resisting taxes himself in protest against U.S. nuclear weapons policy, he delivered a speech on at the Pacific Northwest Synod Convention of the Lutheran Church in which he foreshadowed his decision.
I’ve had a hard time finding the text of this speech, but finally excavated a copy.
Here it is, for the first time on-line:
I am grateful for having been invited to speak to you on disarmament because it forces me to a kind of personal disarmament.
This is a subject I have thought about and prayed over for many years.
I can recall vividly hearing the news of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima in 1945. I was deeply shocked.
I could not then put into words the shock I felt from the news that a city of hundreds of thousands of people had been devastated by a single bomb.
Hiroshima challenged my faith as a Christian in a way I am only now beginning to understand.
That awful event and its successor at Nagasaki sank into my soul, as they have in fact sunk into the souls of all of us, whether we recognize it or not.
I am sorry to say that I did not speak out against the evil of nuclear weapons until many years later.
I was especially challenged on the issue by an article I read in by Jesuit Father Richard McSorley, titled “It’s a Sin to Build a Nuclear Weapon.”
Father McSorley wrote:
The taproot of violence in our society today is our intention to use nuclear weapons.
Once we have agreed to that, all other evil is minor in comparison.
Until we squarely face the question of our consent to use nuclear weapons, any hope of large scale improvement of public morality is doomed to failure.
I agree.
Our willingness to destroy life everywhere on this earth, for the sake of our security as Americans, is at the root of many other terrible events in our country.
I was also challenged to speak out against nuclear armament by the nearby construction of the Trident submarine base and by the first-strike nuclear doctrine which Trident represents.
The nuclear warheads fired from one Trident submarine will be able to destroy as many as 408 separate areas, each with a bomb five times more powerful than the one used at Hiroshima.
One Trident submarine has the destructive equivalent of 2,040 Hiroshima bombs.
Trident and other new weapons systems such as the MX an cruise missile have such extraordinary accuracy and explosive power that they can only be understood as a build-up to a first-strike capability.
First-strike nuclear weapons are immoral and criminal.
They benefit only arms corporations and the insane dreams of those who wish to “win” a nuclear holocaust.
“Trident is the Auschwitz of Puget Sound.”
I was also moved to speak out against Trident because it is being based here.
We must take special responsibility for what is in our own back yard.
And when crimes are being prepared in our name, we must speak plainly.
I say with a deep consciousness of these words that Trident is the Auschwitz of Puget Sound.
Father McSorley’s article and the local basing of Trident are what awakened me to a new sense of the Gospel call to peacemaking in the nuclear age.
They brought back the shock of Hiroshima.
Since that re-awakening five years ago, I have tried to respond in both a more prayerful and more vocal way than I did in .
I feel the need to respond by prayer because our present crisis goes far deeper than politics.
I have heard many perceptive political analyses of the nuclear situation, but their common element is despair.
It is no wonder.
The nuclear arms race can sum up in a few final moments the violence of tens of thousands of years, raised to an almost infinite power — a demonic reversal of the Creator’s power of giving life.
But politics is itself powerless to overcome the demonic in its midst.
It needs another dimension.
I am convinced that a way out of this terrible crisis can be discovered by our deepening in faith and prayer so that we learn to rely not on missiles for our security but on the loving care of that One who gives and sustains life.
We need to return to the Gospel with open hearts to learn once again what it is to have faith.
We are told there by Our Lord: “Blessed are the peacemakers.
They shall be called children of God.”
The Gospel calls us to be peacemakers, to practice a divine way of reconciliation.
But the next beatitude in Matthew’s sequence implies that peacemaking may also be blessed because the persecution which it provokes is the further way into the kingdom: “Blessed are those who are persecuted in the cause of right.
Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
To understand today the Gospel call to peacemaking, and its consequence, persecution, I want to refer especially to these words of Our Lord in Mark:
If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let that person renounce self and take up the cross and follow me.
For anyone who wants to save one’s own life will lose it; but anyone who loses one’s life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.
(Mark 8:34-35)
Scripture scholars tell us that these words lie at the very heart of Mark’s Gospel, in the watershed passage on the meaning of faith in Christ.
The point of Jesus’ teaching here is inescapable: As his followers, we cannot avoid the cross given to each one of us.
I am sorry to have to remind myself and each one of you that by “the cross” Jesus was referring to the means by which the Roman Empire executed those whom it considered revolutionaries.
Jesus’ first call in the Gospel is to love of God and one’s neighbor.
But when He gives flesh to that commandment by the more specific call to the cross, I am afraid that like most of you I prefer to think in abstract terms, not in the specific context in which Our Lord lived and died.
Jesus’ call to the cross was a call to love God and one’s neighbor in so direct a way that the authorities in power could only regard it as subversive and revolutionary.
“Taking up the cross,” “losing one’s life,” meant being willing to die at the hands of political authorities for the truth of the Gospel, for that Love of God in which we are all one.
As followers of Christ, we need to take up our cross in the nuclear age.
I believe that one obvious meaning of the cross is unilateral disarmament.
Jesus’ acceptance of the cross rather than the sword raised in his defense is the Gospel’s statement of unilateral disarmament.
We are called to follow.
Our security as people of faith lies not in demonic weapons which threaten all life on earth.
Our security is in a loving, caring God.
We must dismantle our weapons of terror and place our reliance on God.
I am told by some that unilateral disarmament in the face of atheistic communism is insane.
I find myself observing that nuclear armament by anyone is itself atheistic, and anything but sane.
I am also told that the choice of unilateral disarmament is a political impossibility in this country.
If so, perhaps the reason is that we have forgotten what it would be like to act out of faith.
But I speak here of that choice not as a political platform — it might not win elections — but as a moral imperative for followers of Christ.
A choice has been put before us; Anyone who wants to save one’s own life by nuclear arms will lose it; but anyone who loses one’s life by giving up those arms for Jesus’ sake, and for the sake of the Gospel of love, will save it.
Giving up the weapons would mean giving up more than our means of global terror.
It would mean giving up the reason for such terror — our privileged place in the world.
To ask one’s country to relinquish its security in arms is to encourage risk — a more reasonable risk than constant nuclear escalation, but a risk nevertheless.
I am struck by how much more terrified we Americans often are by talk of disarmament than by the march to nuclear war.
We whose nuclear arms terrify millions around the globe are terrified by the thought of being without them.
The thought of our nation without such power feels naked.
Propaganda and a particular way of live have clothed us to death.
To relinquish our hold on global destruction feels like risking everything, and it is risking everything — but in a direction opposite to the way in which we now risk everything.
Nuclear arms protect privilege and exploitation.
Giving them up would mean our having to give up economic power over other peoples.
Peace and justice go together.
On the path we now follow, our economic policies toward other countries require nuclear weapons.
Giving up the weapons would mean giving up more than our means of global terror.
It would mean giving up the reason for such terror — our privileged place in the world.
How can such a process, of taking up the cross of nonviolence, happen in a country where our government seems paralyzed by arms corporations?
In a country where many of the citizens, perhaps most of the citizens, are numbed into passivity by the very magnitude and complexity of the issue while being horrified by the prospect of nuclear holocaust?
Clearly some action is demanded — some form of nonviolent resistance.
Some people may choose to write to their elected representatives at the national and state level, others may choose to take part in marches, demonstrations or similar forms of protest.
Obviously there are many ways that action can be taken.
We have to refuse to give incense — in our day, tax dollars — to our nuclear idol.
On April 15 we can vote for unilateral disarmament with our lives.
I would like to share a vision of still another action that could be taken: simply this — a sizable number of people in the State of Washington, 5,000, 10,000, ½ million people refusing to pay 50% of their taxes in nonviolent resistance to nuclear murder and suicide.
I think that would be a definite step toward disarmament.
Our paralyzed political process needs that catalyst of nonviolent action based on faith.
We have to refuse to give incense — in our day, tax dollars — to our nuclear idol.
On April 15 we can vote for unilateral disarmament with our lives.
Form 1040 is the place where the Pentagon enters all of our lives, and asks our unthinking cooperation with the idol of nuclear destruction.
I think the teaching of Jesus tells us to render to a nuclear-armed Caesar what that Caesar deserves — tax resistance.
And to begin to render to God alone that complete trust which we now give, through our tax dollars, to a demonic form of power.
Some would call what I am urging “civil disobedience.”
I prefer to see it as obedience to God.
I must say in all honesty that my vision of a sizable number of tax resisters is not yet one which I have tried to realize in the most obvious way — by becoming one of the number.
I have never refused to pay war taxes.
And I recognize that there will never be such a number unless there are first a few to give the example.
But I share the vision with you as a part of my own struggle to realize the implications of the Gospel of Peace given us by Our Lord.
It is not the way of the cross which is in question in the nuclear age but our willingness to follow it.
I fully realize that many will disagree with my position on unilateral disarmament and tax resistance.
I also realize that one can argue endlessly about specific tactics, but no matter how we differ on specific tactics, one thing at least is certain.
We must demand over and over again that our political leaders make peace and disarmament, and not war and increased armaments, their first priority.
We must demand that time and effort and money be placed first of all toward efforts to let everyone know that the United States is not primarily interested in being the strongest military nation on earth but in being the strongest peace advocate.
We must challenge every politician who talks endlessly about building up our arms and never about efforts for peace.
We must ask our people to question their government when it concentrates its efforts on shipping arms to countries which need food, when it accords the military an open checkbook while claiming that the assistance to the poor must be slashed in the name of balancing the budget, when it devotes most of its time and energy and money to developing war strategy and not peace strategy.
Creativity is always in short supply.
This means that it must be used for the most valuable purposes.
Yet it seems evident that most of our creative efforts are not going into peace but into war.
We have too many people who begin with the premise that little can be done to arrange for a decrease in arms spending since the Soviet Union is bent on bankrupting itself on armaments no matter what we do.
We have too few people who are willing to explore every possible path to decreasing armaments.
In our Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle, I have recommended to our people that we all turn more intently to the Lord this year in response to the escalation of nuclear arms, and that we do so especially by fasting and prayer on Monday of each week.
That is the way, I believe, to depend on a power far greater than the hydrogen bomb.
I believe that only by turning our lives around in the most fundamental ways, submitting ourselves to the infinite love of God, will we be given the vision and strength to take up the cross of nonviolence.
The nuclear arms race can be stopped.
Nuclear weapons can be abolished.
That I believe with all my heart and faith, my sisters and brothers.
The key to that nuclear-free world is the cross at the center of the Gospel, and our response to it.
The terrible responsibility which you and I have in this nuclear age is that we profess a faith whose God has transformed death into life in the person of Jesus Christ.
We must make that faith real.
Life itself depends on it.
Our faith sees the transformation of death, through the cross of suffering love, as an ongoing process.
That process is our way into hope of a new world.
Jesus made it clear that the cross and empty tomb didn’t end with Him.
Thank God they didn’t. We are living in a time when new miracles are needed, when a history threatened by overwhelming death needs resurrection by Almighty God.
God alone is our salvation, through the acceptance in each of our lives of a nonviolent cross of suffering love.
Let us call on the Holy Spirit to move us all into that nonviolent action which will take us to our own cross, and to the new earth beyond.
From the Spokane Daily Chronicle:
Irwin Hogenauer ()
Tax Protest Techniques Told
Military expenditures take up 53 percent of the national budget, “a disproportionate amount,” but there are ways to protest it, Irwin Hogenauer, a war tax resistance counselor, said here .
“Resistance can take two directions: Personal, by not paying taxes to carry out your convictions, disengaging yourself from the production of war material; and public, making it a political effort to raise the social consciousness of others,” Hogenauer said in an interview.
Some methods of tax resistance are legal and others are not, he added.
One that is legal is to file a return with a letter of protest, saying the money is being paid under duress, he said.
“Let your employer and your friends know how you feel,” Hogenauer said.
“But the government still gets the money.
That’s one of the difficulties.”
Hogenauer, 66, has been a volunteer war tax resistance counselor in Seattle for 30 years.
Before he retired four years ago he said he showed his resistance to use of tax money for war materials by refusing to file a yearly tax return.
He was never prosecuted, Hogenauer said, although from time to time an Internal Revenue Service employee would appear at his door.
“But that’s not unusual,” he said.
“Thousands of people across the nation don’t file a tax return and there are no efforts at prosecution of most of them.
It is selective and hit-and-miss.”
Hogenauer is in Spokane today to lead a “Personal Responses to War Taxes Workshop” sponsored by the Spokane Fellowship of Reconciliation.
He said he was one of about a half dozen conscientious objectors during World War Ⅱ who formed a tax refusal committee.
He said there is no way of knowing how many people refuse to pay income tax, but said the number is increasing.
Hogenauer cautioned that there is always the potential for prosecution and incarceration of war tax resisters.
The IRS can get the tax payments and penalties from bank accounts, wages and seizure of property.
“But even for refusal to pay the telephone tax, the amount is so small, say $12 a year, that it would cost the government a minimum of $50 or more to begin to collect it.”
He said he advocates total disarmament of the United States, and unilateral disarmament of the rest of the world [sic].
Asked if he would approve of disarmament if the United States were the only country to go through with it, Hogenauer said:
“That’s fine.
It’s about time some country take the lead.
The strongest need to do it because the weakest won’t.”
Hogenauer was among that group of World War Ⅱ conscientious objectors who qualified for civilian work camps but then soured on the idea and decided that they could not accept being conscripted even into civilian work tangentially-related to the war effort.
He went AWOL from his civilian work camp and ended up doing 10 months of a two year sentence in prison.
Seattle (AP) —
Irwin Hogenauer doesn’t fret or fume as tax deadline nears.
The 70-year-old Quaker and war protester just keeps doing what he’s done — refuse to pay.
To protest spending taxes on the military, Hogenauer hasn’t filed a tax return for 35 years.
“I’ve lived a life of principle and I’ll continue to stand by it,” he says.
Occasionally, the Internal Revenue Service checks up on him.
“Once they came to my door and asked me to sit down with them and fill out a form,” he says.
“I told them I wasn’t interested.”
Another time, he had a chat with an IRS official in Tacoma, who said “he would be sure my papers would come across his desk and I’d be hearing from him.
I never heard a single thing from him,” says Hogenauer.
He is one of a small but committed group of people who resist paying income tax because of moral objection to war.
Few, however, are so extreme.
Most file proper 1040 forms and, like Roman Catholic Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle, withhold a port of their tax equivalent to the budget’s percentage of military spending.
Others wind up paying when the IRS closes in.
But Hogenauer feels that even filing a return cooperates “with the system of war.”
Why hasn’t the IRS grabbed him?
One reason is that his income usually hasn’t been taxable.
Hogenauer, who is retired, has held a variety of jobs, including milk truck driver, bowling alley attendant, school janitor, children’s program director, carpenter, and YMCA executive secretary.
“People who are conscientious objectors often mold their lifestyles so they don’t have any taxes to pay,” said Helen Provost-Kees, IRS spokeswoman.
Seattle (AP) — Seattle’s Roman Catholic archbishop says he will withhold half of his personal income tax to protest “our nation’s continuing involvement in the race for nuclear arms supremacy.”
In announcing his decision , Rev. Raymond G. Hunthausen acknowledged that some people will support him while others “will be puzzled, uncomprehending, resentful and even angry.”
The archbishop said he reached his position “after much prayer, thought and personal struggle.”
The amount of income tax he withholds will be deposited in a fund to be used for charitable, peaceful purposes, he said.
“I believe that the present issue is as serious as any the world has faced,” he said in a pastoral letter to the people of the Seattle archdiocese.
“The very existence of humanity is at stake.”
The prelate’s action was not unexpected.
In a speech at Pacific Lutheran University, he had suggested the possibility of tax withholding as a protest against nuclear arms escalation.
In that speech, Hunthausen said he would “share a vision of yet another action… of a sizable number of people in the state of Washington — 5,000 or 10,000 or half a million people — refusing to pay 50 percent of their taxes in non-violent resistance to nuclear murder and suicide.”
The stand propelled the archbishop into a national role in the peace movement.
A spokeswoman for the archdiocese said she did not know the amount of tax that would be due from the archbishop on , the deadline for filing federal income tax returns.
According to the Internal Revenue Service, persons who refuse to pay taxes on constitutional, religious or moral grounds “can anticipate strict civil and criminal enforcement of the laws.”
Conviction can mean fines up to $10,000 and up to five years in prison.
In the pastoral letter, Hunthausen said he could not “support or acquiesce to a nuclear arms buildup which I consider a grave moral evil.”
He cautioned: “I am not suggesting that all who agree with my peace and disarmament views should imitate my action… I prefer that each individual come to his or her own decision on what should be done to meet the nuclear arms challenge.”
The archbishop disputed the charge by some that it would be immoral to disobey the law of the state for a good end.
He said that in certain circumstances, civil disobedience may be an obligation of conscience.
[Hunthausen] said in a statement to the archdiocese, “I am not attacking my country.
I love my country.…”
Father Michael Ryan, chancellor of the archdiocese, said the archbishop pays income tax on his personal salary, which he would not disclose.
In his letter… Hunthausen said…
“I urge all of you to pray and to fast, to study and to discuss and then to decide what you shall do to combat the evil of the nuclear arms race.”
Dick Wighman, public affairs spokesman for the IRS in Seattle, described Hunthausen’s decision as an “ineffective action.”
“All tax money goes into the general fund and is divided in proportion to different programs. You are withholding from aid to schools, roads, from all programs,” he said.
Admitting that the $450 or so in taxes he won’t pay is mainly symbolic, Seattle Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen said that tax protest is a response to the arms race.
But it is not the response, he said.
Hunthausen, in Spokane for a speech at Gonzaga University, said in an interview that his personal protest — withholding half of his federal income taxes — will not become official until , the tax deadline.
He has not heard from the Internal Revenue Service, and IRS officials say he won’t until after the deadline passes.
His tax forms have not been completed, but he expects to have about the same tax liability as , about $900 for a salary of $9,000. Half of that, about $450, is what he said he will refuse to pay in protest over the nuclear arms race.
“The 50 percent figure is somewhat arbitrary,” Hunthausen said.
The federal government estimates that 29 percent of its budget will go for defense related spending.
Critics of the military content, however, that because of differences in accounting procedures between various federal programs, military spending accounts for nearly 60 percent of the tax dollar.
About one third of all defense spending goes for nuclear arms research, development and deployment, some military analysts have estimated.
Hunthausen said he was prepared to take the consequences of his action.
He has studied other tax protests by religious groups, but has not discussed his decision with an attorney.
The maximum penalties for failure to pay income taxes are fines of up to $10,000 and jail terms of up to five years.
But an IRS official in Seattle said she knew of no one in the Pacific Northwest who has been jailed for a tax protest.
A tax protest would not work for everyone concerned about nuclear arms proliferation, Hunthausen said.
Since he is self-employed, he has control over his payroll deductions that the average worker does not.
But Hunthausen said he isn’t advocating that everyone follow his action.
“I’m trying to arouse people,” said the archbishop, who called the nuclear arms buildup a “grave moral evil.”
His announcement has aroused many people in his congregation.
Hunthausen said he was currently “getting more register of support than resistance” from people in his archdiocese.
“I’m asking people to find their own personal way.”
If they agree that such weapons are needed, then their personal way would be to pay their taxes and support the arms race, he said.
Those who want an end to the arms race might consider prayer, fasting or writing their Congressional delegates, he said.
Hunthausen also said he is not encouraging those who wish to avoid paying taxes to use such action for their own personal gain.
He plans to deposit the unpaid portion of his taxes in a charitable fund that promotes peace.
To those who would say it is dangerous for the United States to unilaterally drop out of the arms race, Hunthausen says such action requires “a dimension of faith.”
“We’re putting our faith in this weaponry.
We just don’t seem to let God into the equation.”
Hunthausen said that dropping the country’s nuclear weapons may be risky, but continuing to build weapons that can destroy hundreds of thousands of people is even riskier.
Seattle — While Seattle Catholic Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen may be the best known, the Internal Revenue Service estimates there are 60 persons in Washington state who withhold a portion of their income tax to protest U.S. military spending.
Carolyn Stevens has been withholding at least 50 percent of her federal income tax as part of her personal protest.
Stevens worked as a clerk at the Seattle Public Library.
She wasn’t earning a high income nor, as a Quaker, did she have extravagant tastes.
Shortly before , Stevens said the IRS seized the majority of her library paycheck for non-payment of taxes.
The government subsequently placed a federal lien on all her property or property she might acquire.
For Stevens, the path was clear.
Rather than pay taxes that went to the military, she quit her job and began living a life of frugality.
“I had to change my lifestyle so I didn’t need much income, since it could be seized.
The lien has deterred me from purchasing valuable capital goods, like a home or car.
As a Quaker who believes in a simple lifestyle in order to feel closer to God, I’ve been challenged very directly to live in accordance with my beliefs,” she said.
Other war-tax resisters may be more subtle than Stevens, deliberately keeping their incomes below tax levels or through a variety of other devices.
A new batch of resisters may join the fold this year.
At a war-tax resistance seminar at the University Friends Center over , more than 75 people showed up, and nearly half of them said they are thinking about withholding their taxes for the first time.
JoAnne Washington, a Seattle accountant, said she could no longer support the use of her tax dollars to build nuclear weapons.
Though she hasn’t made up her mind definitely, she is leaning toward tax resistance.
“I’m very afraid.
I own property.
I have a good job.
If my wages were garnished, that would not be looked upon favorably by my company.
But I don’t approve of the way the government is spending our money (on the military),” she said.
Dick Wightman, public-affairs officer for the IRS in Seattle, said the IRS follows a standard procedure in tax collection cases.
First the agency sends out a series of letters informing the taxpayers they are behind in paying taxes.
After the final notice is sent and no payment is received, collection action begins.
It could range from levies against bank accounts or wage sources — the employer — or liens could be placed on property.
In extreme cases, said Wightman, the government could sell the property, collect the tax monies from the sale, and return the remaining proceeds to the property owner.
The entire notification and collection process could take 18 months or more.
Tax-resisters at conference revealed elaborate cat-and-mouse games they play with tax collectors.
Joe Marinello, a Quaker and a war-tax counselor, said some people in the [sic] have changed jobs periodically to make it more difficult for the IRS to keep track of them.
Others have worked out arrangements with their employers so that they aren’t salaried, but rather work as self-employed consultants.
Around the middle of April as the federal income tax filing deadline
approaches, tax resistance articles hit the media frequently. Here are some
examples from past years:
War tax resister Irwin Hogenauer hasn’t filed a tax return for 35 years. (don’t miss the ad below the article for a special on the Sony Walkman: only $89.00)
An op-ed piece by Horace G. Davis on personal entanglement with the military-industrial complex includes notes on Raymond Hunthausen and some of the publications of the war tax resistance movement.
Clare Hanrahan is redirecting her taxes to a group that helps the homeless. “We’re not evading taxes. We’re redirecting them and putting them where they’ll do the most good, immediately.” Also quotes Karen Marysdaughter.
Karl Meyer and Ruth Benn are quoted in this piece on the war tax resistance movement.
The 8 August 1981 Nashua Telegraph carried an article by Associated Press “Religion Writer” George W. Cornell.
Some excerpts:
A-bomb anniversary brings peaceful fight
New York (AP) —
In a time of military buildup, the “peace” people are marching, praying, fasting and signing petitions.
Several denominations have made “peacemaking” a current priority.
And some church leaders, including a bold bishop, have advised refusing to pay the portion of taxes that goes for arms.
[A]dvocacy of withholding so-called “war taxes” — the share of federal income taxes that go for military equipment — came not just from traditional “peace” denominations, but from a Roman Catholic archbishop.
Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen of Seattle, in a speech that has since evoked wide and varying reactions, suggested Christians refuse to pay the half of their federal income taxes going for armament.
“We have to refuse to give our incense — in our day, tax dollars — to the nuclear idol,” he said.
“I think the teaching of Jesus tells us to render to a nuclear-arms Caesar what Caesar deserves — tax resistance.
“Some would call what I am urging ‘civil disobedience.’
I prefer to see it as obedience to God.”
Similar suggestions have come from some other Christians, most solidly from leaders of three relatively small, but historic “peace” denominations — The Church of the Brethren, the Friends and Mennonites.
A joint meeting of them under the banner of “New Call to Peacemaking” said paying for war is wrong and asked members to “consider refusal to pay the military portion of their federal taxes, as a response to Christ’s call to radical discipleship.”
In separate denominational actions, the Church of the Brethren has supported “open, massive withholding of war taxes” and the Mennonites general conference is fighting in court against being required to withhold taxes partly used for military purposes from employes’ income.
The New York-based War Resisters League estimates 2,000 to 10,000 Americans annually hold back part of their taxes, some eventually being forced to pay but continuing to repeat the protest.
Does the name Cosmas Raimondi ring a bell? Yeah, me neither.
And you’d think a name like that would stick in the memory.
So I was surprised to see his name in an op-ed piece on tax resistance published :
Washington —
What’s remarkable about the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Seattle refusing to pay part of his income tax in protest of U.S. nuclear arms policy — thus risking jail — is that so few of the 95 million Americans who file returns protest at all.
In , according to the Internal Revenue Service, 26,925 people withheld all or part of their taxes in protest, their objections ranging from constitutional reasons to the argument that since the Republic is off the gold and silver standards, why pay taxes?
These protesters represent an infinitesimal fraction of that huge, compliant herd of 95 million.
In , there wasn’t one protester who cited pacifist reasons for refusal to pay up.
In , there were 20 such souls.
But in , there are likely to be hundreds because the “peace” movement inspires this sort of civil disobedience.
Seattle Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen announced that he was holding back $125, or half of the tax money he owed the federal government as “a means of protesting our nation’s continuing involvement in the arms race for nuclear supremacy.”
Archbishop Hunthausen, 60, is known to be soft-spoken and low-key, about as friendly and open as anyone who came out of Montana — as he did.
But he feels great moral upset over the construction of a Trident nuclear submarine base close to Seattle, and points out that one Trident has the destructive equivalent of 2,040 Hiroshima bombs.
Thus it is “immoral and criminal… the Auschwitz of Puget Sound.”
Now IRS doesn’t take such protesters lightly.
First, they write to get them to file a correct return and pay what they owe.
If they don’t respond, an IRS representative tries to make a personal visit.
If that fails, IRS goes to the Justice Department.
, one such protester, Armen B. Condo of Huntington Beach, Calif., was convicted in federal court on 41 counts of tax violations.
The government argued that Condo urged members of “Your Heritage Protection Association” — which he founded — to avoid paying federal tax on the grounds that U.S. money is no longer redeemable in gold or silver.
Tsk, tsk.
So, Archbishop Hunthausen and the eight priests in Pittsburgh who stood up — “Income Tax Day” — to announce that they were withholding part of their taxes to protest “the militaristic priorities of the federal budget and to resist our country’s obsessive participation in the arms race,” are sticking their necks out.
They can also create a ripple effect. When the Pittsburgh declaration reached Indianapolis, a reporter from the local Catholic paper phoned an associate pastor in a “socially active” parish to see if he knew of any area priests who were also protesting.
According to National Catholic News Service, the priest, Father Cosmas Raimondi, said yes, he knew one — “me.”
Father Raimondi said his expression of conscience was better called “divine” rather than “civil” disobedience.
Another priest, Father James A. Schexnayder of Oakland Calif., said he was “stimulated” by Archbishop Hunthausen’s action, so he, too was withholding half his 1981 taxes — the miserable amount of $60.
Father Schexnayder said he “will not be part of a plot to incinerate humanity.”
And so it goes.
There are deep rumblings in the Catholic Church, particularly in the clergy, about spending on nuclear weapons.
In Amarillo, Texas, the
United Way recently stopped funding the Catholic Family Service because Bishop Leroy T. Matthiesen had established a counseling program for workers at the Pantex Nuclear Weapons Assembly Plant.
Pantex complained, charging that the Bishop’s anti-nuclear weapons views found their way into the operation of Catholic Family Service.
With nearly half the Catholic bishops in the U.S. backing a bilateral freeze on nuclear weapons, the Reagan administration is worried enough that it is dispatching Secretary of State Alexander Haig and Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger to meet with the bishop’s committee this week on the weapons issue.
Whenever a movement gathers momentum, as the anti-nuclear weapons campaign is now, the most committed often threaten to hold back on paying taxes.
But if every American who had strong feelings about issues which involve federal funding expressed those feelings by refusing to pay income taxes, millions of Americans would have a plateful of trouble.
But the record shows that this kind of protest is only occasional, and never is expressed in worrisome numbers.
The American taxpayer is the world’s most reliable.
Indeed some cynics claim that the American taxpayer is a sheep, always waiting patiently to get fleeced.
So I tried to find out some more about Cosmas Raimondi and his protest.
Here is something from :
Indianapolis (AP) —
A church council said it will not comply with an Internal Revenue Service demand to pay federal taxes owed by its parish priest, who withheld 50 percent of them to protest U.S. defense spending.
Kathy Wallace, president of the 13 member Holy Cross Catholic Church Council, said the decision to support the Rev. Cosmas Raimondi was based on “the sacredness of conscience.”
“Although we personally do not feel called to war tax resistance for ourselves, we do support the right of Father Raimondi to make that decision according to the dictates of his own conscience before God,” Miss Wallace wrote the IRS on .
The 32 year old priest began withholding half his federal tax bill in 1982, and he told the council that he had donated the withheld money to various social service agencies.
In , the IRS put a lien of $593.26 against the priest’s salary.
Miss Wallace said the council did not act on the first demand for payment by the IRS, and an IRS representative came to her home on and presented a demand for $604.18.
Council members later asked parishioners their opinions and consulted a lawyer-theologian from the Center of Law and Pacifism in Colorado.
“I really don’t know what’s going to happen now,” said Raimondi, who attended the news conference at which the council’s decision was announced.
“It’s up to the IRS.
“I feel relieved, and I feel good,” he said of the council’s support.
In an interview after the news conference, Raimondi said he began his tax protest last year because: “I decided in my conscience that if I’m going to pray and teach about peace, I couldn’t at the same time pay for war.”
Indianapolis (AP) —
The Most Rev. Edward T. O’Meara, archbishop of Indianapolis, says the Rev. Cosmas Raimondi’s tax protest is a “personal issue” between the priest and the Internal Revenue Service.
But O’Meara claimed the right to address the political issues which prompted the protest.
O’Meara, in a statement, responded to “a number of requests to offer some comment” on events surrounding Raimondi’s refusal to pay part of his federal income tax.
O’Meara said he neither supported nor rejected Raimondi’s decision to hold back half his income tax payments as a protest against the government’s military buildup and its policies in Central America.
But he upheld the priest’s right to take a stand on arms and other public issues, and reaffirmed his own endorsement of the recent pastoral letter from the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, calling for a halt to the nuclear arms race.
“Whether you agree or disagree with the tactic Father Raimondi has elected to use, make no mistake that the Roman Catholic Church does regard the questions of armaments in general, nuclear arms in particular, national budgetary priorities and basic human rights as issues which religious leaders have a right to address,” O’Meara said.
On , the parish council at Holy Cross Church, where Father Raimondi is pastor, announced that it would not withhold the back taxes from his paychecks and send them to the IRS.
The IRS filed a court lien against Raimondi for $604.18 in taxes and interest dating to last year, and had sought the money through the parish.
But the parish council said it would not “undermine” its pastor’s act of conscience.
Raimondi said the IRS had not informed him of its plans.
So the IRS, acting with uncharacteristic speed (due no doubt to the publicity surrounding the case), seized Raimondi’s car:
Indianapolis (AP) —
The federal government has taken the Rev. Cosmas Raimondi’s car, but the young Roman Catholic pastor remains driven.
His supportive parishioners make sure he gets around, and he still refuses to pay taxes to support the military.
Raimondi said three or four families who attend Holy Cross Church on the city’s poor near east side offered to loan him an auto permanently.
“I’m beginning to wonder why I even had a car,” he said.
Raimondi, an Indianapolis native known as “Father Cos” to parish schoolchildren, has withheld half his federal income taxes to protest U.S. military intervention in Central America, the nuclear arms race and draft registration.
, the Internal Revenue Service put a lien of $604.18 — the amount he owed plus interest — against his salary and seized his Honda Civic when his parish council refused to pay the amount.
The car was valued at $2,500, and Raimondi is to receive the difference between that amount and what he owed.
Raimondi says he will respond by taking a pay cut to reduce his taxes or avoid having any taxable income that can be used for purposes he doesn’t support.
He now earns $545 a month, plus a monthly stipend of up to $70.
Lack of a car has not hampered his duties, Raimondi said at his church, where parishioners were putting donated Thanksgiving food for the poor into 550 boxes lined up in the pews.
“I think it is a protest when you give and organize for the poor,” Raimondi said.
“It is showing what is happening to people’s lives because we don’t have enough in our budget to take care of people.”
In contrast, he said, money spent on the military is “sinful.”
Loss of a car has made him thankful for his friends and parishioners.
About a dozen have loaned him theirs at one time or another, and three or four have offered to lend him their third family car permanently.
“I’ve not had to ask one person,” he said.
Three people walked out of Mass in protest, and haven’t returned, when Raimondi announced to the parish’s 179 families that he wasn’t going to pay his taxes.
His pastoral assistant, John Girard, 23, said the church has gained more parishioners than it lost, although he cannot say how many.
Parishioner Mark Scott, 38, said weekly collections have increased about $200 since Raimondi’s protest gained publicity .
While young and old in his parish have supported him, Raimondi said the 40- to 50-year-old age group has had difficulty understanding his political views.
Mark Scott, coordinator of the parish food pantry, said: “I support him 100 percent.
I would have loved to do what Cos has done, but I have a family to think about.
I rebel by giving food to poor people.”
The priest said he believes that “by and large, a lot of people are not happy with our Government’s defense policies.”
Before withholding taxes, Father Raimondi said he protested by going to peace marches, organizing prayer services on behalf of the people of Nicaragua and El Salvador, and writing Congress.
He even met with Sen. Richard Lugar (R., Ind.) to discuss U.S. military policies.
Melissa Derrick, a teacher at the parish school, said the priest’s civil disobedience caused some concern among the 207 students who worried whether he was doing the right thing.
“James A. Schexnayder” is another tax resisting priest that I draw a blank on, but the on-line archives have been less forthcoming about his resistance.
Today, a few more data points about the tax resistance of Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen.
First, a short article by Robert McClory from an issue of In These Times dated .
Seattle Catholic Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen took a leap of faith in a speech before 600 delegates to the Pacific Lutheran convention at Tacoma, Wash.
“I think the teaching of Jesus tells us to render to a nuclear arms Caesar what that Caesar deserves: tax resistance!”
he said.
“We have to refuse to give our incense… to the nuclear idol… I believe one obvious meaning of the cross is unilateral disarmament.”
Within a few days, Hunthausen, a relatively unknown church leader in a relatively obscure section of the country, had become a prominent national figure.
To many it seemed incredible that a Catholic bishop would urge people to disobey the law.
Yet the reaction in letters and newspaper editorials across the land was anything but condemnatory.
He was consistently praised for “saying what had to be said” and for “sticking his neck cut an behalf of the future of the world.”
In fact, Hunthausen, 60, a balding, bespectacled, scholarly looking man, hadn’t meant to stick his neck out too far.
Personally, he was struggling with a decision on whether or not to withhold half his taxes as a protest, he explained to reporters, adding, “I don’t know what I’ll do.”
But as a crescendo of support built up , Hunthausen was emboldened to go all the way.
In a speech at Notre Dame University, he said yes, he intends to withhold his taxes, and yes, he is prepared to go to jail if the Internal Revenue Service decides to move against him.
“Our nuclear war preparations are the global crucifixion of Jesus…” he said.
Hunthausen’s radicalization has been going on for at least .
A native of Anaconda, Mont., he was ordained a priest in and remained a dutiful churchman in the Helena, Mont., diocese until appointed archbishop of Seattle in .
It was near Seattle — on Puget Sound — that the U.S. Navy was constructing a base for Trident submarines, renowned for their first-strike nuclear capability.
The new archbishop became acquainted with Jim Douglass, a young, anti-Trident activist associated with the Ground Zero Center for Non-Violent Action.
In when Douglass was involved in a public fast protesting the Navy base, he asked the archbishop for support.
Hunthausen replied by sending a letter and 50 pages of background material to all his priests, urging them to speak out about the Trident and its significance.
In the following years, he personally joined in demonstrations, praised Douglass and his colleagues and talked openly about the demands of the gospel in a nuclear age.
Yet when he spoke his boldest words , they were directly related to that with which he was most familiar.
“We must take special responsibility for what is in our own backyard,” he said.
“And when crimes are being prepared in our name, we must speak plainly.
I say with a deep consciousness of those words that Trident is the Auschwitz of Puget Sound!”
Hunthausen’s leadership on this issue seems to have pushed other bishops in the United States into adopting a tougher stance on nuclear weapons.
The Catholic Herald (of Britain) in 1983 noted that, on a 238 to 9 vote, a conference of U.S. Bishops released a pastoral letter calling for a halt to nuclear weapons production.
Excerpts from the article:
All American Catholics will be challenged by the US bishops’ war and peace pastoral, and many could be led by it to try changing US defence policies or even to civil resistance, said Auxiliary Bishop Thomas.
He added that some Catholics influenced by the letter may well be led to forms of civil resistance to US policy such as the tax resistance undertaken by Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle.
The letter does not counsel such resistance, he emphasised, but it is an option open to those who find themselves opposed in conscience.
Through successive drafts of the pastoral the Reagan administration showed an unprecedented interest in the outcome of a church document, lobbying persistently through Secretary of Defence Caspar Weinberger and William Clark, national security adviser.
The D.C. Gazette reported in :
A group of religious leaders in Washington state is supporting the proposal of a Washington Roman Catholic Archbishop who urged people to refuse to pay their income taxes to protest US spending on nuclear arms. In , Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle urged US citizens to refuse to pay fifty percent of the federal income tax they owe to protest what he calls the “demonic” nuclear arms race.
Now leaders of the Lutheran, United Methodist and United Presbyterian Churches, as well as officials of the United Church of Christ, have joined Hunthausen and vowed to stand publicly with him.
In a letter endorsing his proposal, the church leaders are urging clergy elsewhere in the nation to give a similarly call to action.
The Internal Revenue Service, in the meantime, says that disputes with government programs on moral and religious grounds do not give people the right to withhold taxes.
Colman McCarthy used Hunthausen’s action as the hook for an op-ed:
Washington — Is the Internal Revenue Service preparing a jail cell for Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle?
He told the IRS that for reasons of conscience (“I think the teaching of Jesus tells us to render to a nuclear-arms Caesar what that Caesar deserves, tax resistance”), he would be passing up the festivities of April 15.
Until , doubts had persisted that Hunthausen would actually follow through on his statement of : that he was tired of praying for peace while paying for war and that he planned to refuse to pay half of his taxes to protest his government’s militarism.
The archbishop’s resistance — which represents courage, enlightenment, and fidelity to the basics of his religion — gives the IRS two choices, both bleak.
If it jails him, the attending publicity assures that Hunthausen’s style of protest would be pushed further to the front of the surging peace movement.
A year ago, the nuclear freeze was seen as the idea of a few fringe radicals.
But then came the New England town meetings and the freeze is now moderation itself.
From behind bars, Hunthausen, a fatherly book-loving man, would lend immeasurable substance to conscientious tax resistance.
The IRS itself would likely be hit with a large levy of public ridicule: It jails a humble clergyman whose stated income is between $9,000 and $10,000 but it can’t track down legions of high-salaried tax cheats who help defraud the government of an estimated $80 billion a year.
The IRS is aware of another economic reality.
The cost of prosecution and jailing would be much greater than the small sum that the bishop owes.
It is known that within the IRS peer pressure exists among the agents to dog cases that promise large payments.
Nailing a near-impoverished churchman, while highrolling white-collar cheats evade the tax laws, is not the way to earn a place in the T-Man Hall of Fame.
The IRS hasn’t forgotten the last time it was scorned and laughed at when taking on a peace bishop in a tax resistance case.
In the late 1970s, agents in Richmond, Va., spent several months pursuing the taxes of a priest working under Bishop Walter Sullivan.
The prelate recalls that the agency eventually spent about $10,000 to get about $9.
Should the IRS ignore Hunthausen, it will give publicity to a fact it would rather keep little known: that few tax resisters are ever jailed.
The growing literature on the subject — from “People Pay for Peace: A Military Tax Refusal Guide” published by the Center on Law and Pacifism in Colorado Springs, Colo., to the newsletters of the Conscience and Military Tax Campaign in Bellport, N.Y. — reports that judges do not look on tax resisters as criminals acting out of greed but as honest and intelligent citizens seeking to demilitarize their government.
Hunthausen bears this out.
He has stated publicly that the money he withholds from the IRS will be given to such groups as the National Peace Academy, a Pro-life chapter and a charitable organization.
While the top minds of the IRS squirm as they choose a proper penance for the archbishop, Hunthausen has been warding off attacks in his hometown.
A reader of the Seattle Times rants.
“What breakdown in Catholic structure, what failure in Catholic leadership, has allowed the archbishop of the great city of Seattle to make such a fool of himself?”
Another mouthed the unofficial motto of the Pentagon: “We just cannot sit back and let the Russians build nuclear warheads and we do nothing.”
The challenge of Hunthausen is to resist being jailed not by the IRS but by the arguments of unreflecting critics like these.
The context of the debate on nuclear weapons can’t be limited to the political.
Nor can it be only a technological debate between hardware experts.
The moral context comes first, Hunthausen is correctly arguing: “I say with deep sorrow that our nuclear war preparations are the global crucifixion of Jesus.”
The supporters of Hunthausen also need to be reflective.
His stance should to be honored as something deeper than mere theological chic.
The truth is that since Hunthausen announced his tax resistance last summer not one bomb has been dismantled and not one dollar diverted from the arms race.
Hunthausen’s protest needs to be seen as a mild startup of moral pressure on the government, not a grand finale.
Washington — Raymond Hunthausen has observed by withholding 50 percent of his income tax and publicly proclaiming it.
He does not care for the way the Reagan administration would spend his money.
Hunthausen is not your run-of-the mill tax rebel, of which there is a growing number in the country, for a number of reasons.
He is the Catholic archbishop of the archdiocese of Seattle.
He suggested to Christians last spring that they withhold 50 percent of their taxes to protest increased spending on the arms race.
None of his flock, which is in the heart of the military-industrial complex, has publicly followed his example.
But His Eminence practiced what he preached and with his Form 1040-ES-1982 he enclosed a check for $125, which is half the amount due.
When asked at a Seattle Press Club meeting if he was ready to go to jail for tax evasion, he said he was.
He observed that the IRS had other ways of getting his money — perhaps confiscating his savings account or garnisheeing his salary, which amounts to $9,000 — a sum that probably wouldn’t cover a day’s supply of paper clips at the Pentagon.
Washington state’s economy is much tied to defense and nuclear enterprises: it has several nuclear power plants, Trident submarine bases and builds Boeing planes.
But since the archbishop made his startling suggestion of civil disobedience, he has received mail that has been predominantly favorable.
Paul Weyrich, a right-wing spokesman, calls Hunthausen “a radical of long standing.”
To the administration, of course, the archbishop represents a political threat that even the support of the extension of tuition tax credits to parochial schools and the support of the church’s stand on abortion do not begin to meet.
“I think the teachings of Jesus tell us to render to a nuclear-arms Caesar what Caesar deserves — tax resistance,” Hunthausen told his congregation.
He is one of many Catholic prelates who have taken a militant stand on the question.
Remembering Vietnam, the White House had expected the solid support of the hierarchy in its anti-Communist crusade.
But on both Central America and the “peace through strength” nuclear buildup, the prelates have proved a disappointment.
Hunthausen sent the other half of the $250 he owes the IRS to an escrow account for the World Peace Tax Fund, something that is not yet in existence but will be if a bill sponsored by Sen Mark Hatfield, R-Ore., is ever passed.
It provides for conscientious military tax objectors to put the “military tax portion” of their returns into the Peace Fund.
But it is not law yet, and His Eminence could go to jail if the IRS decided to make an example of him.
It poses something of a dilemma.
No administration would want to send a red hat to the slammer.
But about 75 percent of the American people share his views about the arms race, and they could, if frustrated, start following his lead.
Prosecution could be as dicey as nabbing the thousands who have failed to register for the draft.
Hunthausen supports the nuclear freeze, Ground Zero Week and the new “no first use” of nuclear weapons initiative.
He is one of the interdenominational group of Seattle clergymen who have engaged in extensive dialogue with members of the Washington state legislature in the hope of persuading it to pass a freeze resolution.
Many Americans share the archbishop’s views, although not his courage.
The fear of the sound of the tax collector’s step on the stair runs deep.
The terror of the IRS audit stays their rebellion.
Some take the coward’s way of dodging taxes, which is to give money to organized charities, some of whose blunt policies they find odious.
For instance, if you contribute to Amnesty International, you know they will turn in oppressive countries and help make the Reagan administration a little self-conscious on the subject of human rights.
Closer to home, if you give to a scholarship, you counter in a small way Reagan’s assault on college student loans.
It’s the wimp’s tax revolt — and deductible, of course.
The income tax forms are voluminous.
But nowhere on them is a place where a person such as Archbishop Hunthausen could specify what he did not want his money used for.
There is no way, for instance, where you could tell the IRS you would rather see a food stamp recipient have a vodka on you than to have your money go to a manufacturer of poison gas.
There’s no “preference” blank where you can write in: “Do not spend one dime finding a home for the MX — take care of orphans.”
Only one small box is set aside for choice.
It asks you if you want $1 to go to a fund for presidential election campaigns.
It is not enough.
The archbishop is using his tax return as a weapon in the battle against nuclear war.
He is telling Ronald Reagan that until he listens to what the country is trying to tell him about nuclear morality, he will get only half his allowance.
There’s another wave of “Tax Day” protests coming this year.
Here’s a press release from the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee about some of them:
Refusing to Pay for Cruise Missiles and Drone Strikes:
30 Years of Tax Day Antiwar Protests
On people in communities across the United States will be leafleting, marching, doing street theatre, committing civil disobedience, and picketing at post offices, IRS offices, federal buildings, among other public spaces, using materials calling attention to the harmful effects of military spending.
A list of U.S. Tax Day events with links to international actions can be found at www.nwtrcc.org/taxday2013.php.
is also the third annual Global Day of Action on Military Spending.
, during his first term, President Ronald Reagan set off a massive buildup in the U.S. armed forces that stands out on historical graphs of U.S. military budgets since World War Ⅱ.
This motivated thousands of taxpayers to resume the civil disobedience (begun during the Vietnam War) by refusing to pay taxes to buy cruise missiles and other weapons, and led to the formation of the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee (NWTRCC).
In that same year Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle, risking official censure, withheld half his income tax to protest nuclear weapons, calling on others to do the same.
The spike in military spending surpasses that of the Reagan years.
Today U.S. taxpayers are buying even more expensive weapons systems, new nuclear weapons plants, assassinations by unmanned drones, and soaring interest payments on the national debt along with burgeoning health care costs for thousands of wounded veterans.
On , an ad placed in a Massachusetts weekly began, “We refuse to pay taxes for the violence of war preparations and other military expenditures including present military involvement in other countries.
Over half of the federal income taxes are used for military expenses.”
Many of the 120 signers still refuse today and still protest on tax day, joined by newer activists who have been provoked into protesting taxes for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as well as the endless war on terror.
Massachusetts residents Randy Kehler and Betsy Corner were signers of that ad.
Despite a house seizure and other collection efforts by the IRS, Kehler and Corner say, “With the federal government running up huge deficits by spending trillions of taxpayer dollars on weapons and war, at the expense of its own people (especially its soldiers) and the people of other countries, we invite our fellow citizens to join us in saying ‘No!’ and to begin re-directing their federal tax money to local projects that meet genuine human needs.”
Contact NWTRCC to talk with individual war tax resisters and refusers.
Global Day of Action on Military Spending also has a list of actions being done around the world on .
Some links of interest:
The Nuclear Resister reprints some historical information about nonviolent resistance to U.S. nuclear
weapons in the Pacific Northwest. Prominent in this history is the
strong stand taken by Catholic Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, who called
the Trident nuclear submarines the “Auschwitz of Puget Sound” and rallied Christians to oppose it. Hunthausen also refused to pay a portion of his income tax to protest against U.S. military spending. While Hunthausen deserves credit for making a bold, forthright stand and following it up with action, this didn’t happen in a vacuum — the ongoing civil disobedience of the Ground Zero activists influenced him. But he in turn opened the floodgates for other religious leaders to come forward to strongly condemn the American “first strike” policy and nuclear weapons in general. Here’s some excerpts from an interview with Jim Douglass, conducted by Terry Messman:
Terry Messman
Why was Hunthausen such a significant voice in the movement for nuclear disarmament?
Jim Douglass
He gave a speech in which he stated to a very large number of religious leaders gathered in Tacoma, Washington, that Trident was the “Auschwitz of Puget Sound.” And he took a stand of refusing to pay his income taxes in order to resist Trident.
Terry Messman
After he made that statement, we invited him to speak at the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley where he urged hundreds of religious leaders to resist nuclear murder and suicide.
Jim Douglass
Yes. And as a result, roughly six months later, he actually stated publicly, “I have now decided to stop paying half of my taxes” — the half of his taxes that would have gone to military appropriations and nuclear weapons.
Terry Messman
It was such an important turning point when an archbishop actually called for massive civil disobedience.
Jim Douglass
Yes, and he not only called for it — he did it! His tax resistance was nonviolent civil disobedience in the most radical sense possible.
Terry Messman
When Archbishop Hunthausen declared that Trident was the Auschwitz of Puget Sound, what effect did it have on your work at Ground Zero? And what effect did it have on the general public?
Jim Douglass
It electrified the general public. And it profoundly encouraged us. We all knew Archbishop Hunthausen. We’d known him for years and he’d already done all kinds of things to support our work. He supported a 30-day fast that we engaged in. He sent information on the Trident campaign to his entire body of priests and religious leaders in the diocese. He brought over to Ground Zero all of his administrative leaders in the archdiocese for a retreat on the issue of Trident. He’d done everything he could — up to refusing to pay his own taxes — before he took that step. So we were one in community with Archbishop Hunthausen before he took that further step.
Terry Messman
What was the response of the Church hierarchy to Hunthausen’s call for massive resistance to the arms race?
Jim Douglass
Well, I would say it was a mixed response. A number of Catholic bishops within the United States made statements of their own against nuclear weapons in the months following Archbishop Hunthausen’s statement. I think they were to some degree, if not largely, inspired by his courage. I found that remarkable because there had been so much silence before then.
Terry Messman
In what way did Hunthausen’s statement play such a huge role in the bishops speaking out?
Jim Douglass
There was nothing vaguely like Archbishop Hunthausen’s statement before him. And following his statement there were many!
Jim Douglass
Archbishop Hunthausen really was a catalyst in a movement of religious leaders, not only Catholics but others as well. Remember that the statement by which he began to become so prominent was made to the Lutheran leaders of the Pacific Northwest. He wasn’t speaking to Catholics; he was speaking to the Lutheran leaders who had invited him to speak because he had already become a leader on this issue. That’s when he made the statement that gained national attention. He had an effect on everybody. In the Pacific Northwest, especially, he was meeting every week with all the other key religious leaders. They ate breakfast together. I joined them a number of times so I met these people and Archbishop Hunthausen was the most prophetic voice and the inspiration in their midst. These were all the most prominent religious leaders at that time in Seattle and everyone at these breakfasts was very supportive of Archbishop Hunthausen. The Jewish leaders were very supportive of Archbishop Hunthausen. So it was right across the board that religious leaders said, “This man is speaking out in a way that is both prophetic and pastoral.”
Wake Forest University is sponsoring something called “The Beacon Project.”
The theory behind the project seems to be that to discover more about how to be most ethical, it would be wise to pay close attention to people who exhibit uncommonly extraordinary moral behavior — moral “geniuses” perhaps.
I can think of some big challenges for an approach like this, but it also seems like it could be very promising.
On August 31, when first-quarter property tax was due in Rutland, we paid 49 percent of the amount due, covering our municipal tax liability, and withheld the 51 percent slated for education.
We will continue this practice every quarter until the Legislature gains the political will to pass meaningful and fair education reform.
I work at two part-time jobs, and my pay at one of those has recently been reduced.
My wife is self-employed.
We have no family members in public school.
Yet habitually frugal as we are, in order to pay the tax levied for the maintenance of Vermont’s education system, we are frequently forced to defer paying some bills or to put off filling some prescriptions.
We can purchase fuel only in small amounts.
In fact, we are denying payment precisely for the greater good, and for the good of Vermont, in the hope that even a small action will speak louder than words and bring to the attention of the Legislature the seriousness of the plight of those whom they are supposed to serve.
We are aware of the repercussions our action may have.
Governments tend not to smile on civil disobedience, especially when it affects their income.
Yet Americans have learned throughout history that when our governments do not act in the public’s interest it becomes necessary for the public to act for itself.
We hope that some other aggrieved Vermonters will join us in this action.
If not, we will stand alone, but we will stand.
Tax receipts in Greece continue to plummet as the government wavers about whether to stick with the euro and people decide to wait out the uncertainty with their money in their own pockets.
I keep waiting for the folks in the anti-abortion movement to catch on to the tax resistance idea, but when it comes to taxes, they’re mostly just talk.
Lately the talk is all about refusing to pay taxes that might end up going to Planned Parenthood, but it’s a rare day when I see a pro-lifer put money and mouth together.
Here’s an example — a video-blog or something of the sort from Garrett Johnson in which he advocates tax resistance in the anti-abortion cause.
Another example is that of Scott Roeder, currently serving a long sentence for murdering a doctor who performed abortions, who gave an interview in which he promoted Constitutionalist tax protest theories.
I’ll keep my ear to the ground and let you know if any of this catches on.
More links that have scrolled through my browser recently:
Scott Alexander has an insightful review of James Scott’s Seeing Like a State up at his always-mind-stretching blog Slate Star Codex.
In the New Republic, Kevin Baker promotes Bluexit: A Modest Proposal for Separating Blue States from Red.
He notes that the “blue states” tend to pay more into the federal treasury than they take out, and the “red states” on the other hand tend to be net recipients of federal money.
He suggests that the blue states stop subsidizing the red and that liberals reembrace federalism:
We won’t formally secede, in the Civil War sense of the word.
We’ll still be a part of the United States, at least on paper.
But we’ll turn our back on the federal government in every way we can, just like you’ve been urging everyone to do for years, and devote our hard-earned resources to building up our own cities and states.
We’ll turn Blue America into a world-class incubator for progressive programs and policies, a laboratory for a guaranteed income and a high-speed public rail system and free public universities.
We’ll focus on getting our own house in order, while yours falls into disrepair and ruin.
For starters, we now endorse cutting the federal income tax to the bone — maybe even doing the full Wesley Snipes and abolishing it altogether.
We will raise our state and local taxes accordingly to pay for anything we might need or want.
We ask nothing more from you and your federal government.
Nothing for infrastructure, or housing, or the care of the poor and sick — not that you gave us much, anyway.
All we want is our money, and you can keep yours, dollar for dollar.
Learn Liberty has a feature on feisty tax resister Vivien Kellems.
Seattle Weekly tells the story of the war tax resisting Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen.
The IRS considers bitcoin a kind of investment, and so if you buy or earn some, and later spend it, the difference between the value of the bitcoin at those times counts as a capital gain or capital loss, and you’re supposed to file a Form 8949 to report it.
But to bitcoin users, the stuff is a currency, and it would be folly to keep track of how much it’s worth every time you earn and spend it and keep an account book like that.
So it’s little surprise that only about 800 people report bitcoin transactions on Form 8949, according to the IRS.
Here are a few more items concerning tax resistance that I found in back issues
from of Friends
Bulletin, the journal of the Pacific Yearly Meeting of Quakers.
The issue included an announcement
from the Orange County Monthly Meeting of
the launch of “The Conscience and Military Tax Resolution.”
This sort of thing is frequently proposed in modern war tax resistance circles,
but has yet to show much success. In this incarnation people who “are not ready
to resist now” could sign on to the resolution to “show that you are at least
ready to begin when 100,000 others agree to do so.” Once that target was
reached, signers of the Resolution would begin to refuse to pay at least a
certain percentage of their taxes. The goal of this was to pressure the
government into passing “the World Peace Tax Fund Bill or similar legislation
which would provide a legal alternative for taxpayers morally opposed to war.”
The issue had several items on
war tax resistance, beginning with this statement and commentary:
We express our love for God and all the peoples of this earth. A vital act of
this love is to refuse cooperation with registration for the draft and
payment of our tax money for war. We testify against rendering unto Caesar
that which is God’s. We, the individuals who serve on the Pacific Yearly
Meeting Peace Committee, join with those Friends who refuse to cooperate with
war taxes and registration. As a result of this call, we have chosen to
protest war taxes, some refusing at least a “Token Ten” dollars.
Friend — what canst thou say?
Lonnie Valentine
Betsy Eberhart
Gladis Innerst
Mike Turner
Ellen Lyon
Duane Magill
Franklin Zahn
Ed Flowers
Bonnie Wells
The above statement, written by the Pacific Yearly Meeting Peace Committee and
others came with labor over several minutes on conscription and peace from
monthly meetings as well as Friends General Conference
minute, Philadelphia Yearly
Meeting’s statement, and Sarasota Monthly Meeting’s Statement of Peace. The
intent was a minute of action in which our Peace Testimony would be not just
words but applied to our lives in .
Two suggestions came out of a subsequent threshing session: 1) that the
statement be made available for others to sign and 2) that the Peace Committee
be available to labor with monthly meetings on this statement.
All monthly meetings have previously received Franklin Zahn’s “War Taxes–Minus
a Token Ten” of which develops the
idea and makes suggestions on alternative uses of the token ten dollars. In
essence, withholding $10.00 in objection to the federal government’s use of
our tax money for war is similar to withholding the
U.S. Tax from
telephone bills which was done during the Vietnam War.
I am raising the question within monthly meetings and among Peace Committee
members whether
PYM Peace
Committee should sponsor a weekend conference at Quaker Center. Your
suggestions and/or responses would be appreciated.
Also, I hope that monthly meetings, meanwhile, are taking advantage of Lonnie
Valentine’s availability to provide workshops on War Tax Objection.
In peace and love,
Ellen Lyon, Clerk
PYM Peace
Committee
How can we who are above the draft age support Friends faced with
registration? In Our Peace Testimony it says:
Our witness to the way of peace requires that we refuse military service of
any kind, and challenges us to consider whether we can in any way submit to
that involuntary servitude which is conscription. Friends should work to
abolish state conscription — whether for military or other purposes — and
should refuse personally to cooperate with the draft.
Since many of us do not have this opportunity to refuse to register for the
draft, we must look to those other ways in which we can refuse cooperation
with the draft.
One way is refusing registration of our money for war through the taxation
system. When we willingly submit a tax form, we are supporting registration
for the draft; when we willingly pay taxes of which over half is used for war,
we are supporting registration for the draft. When we do these things, we are
withdrawing support from Friends who are refusing to register for the draft.
Therefore, one unequivocal way we who are above draft age can support Friends
resisting the draft is to resist payment of those taxes which, in part, go for
registration and conscription.
If we recognize our “involvement in militarism through the payment of taxes
used for military purposes” but do not act to end such involvement, then are
we not hypocritical to tell Friends faced with registration to refuse military
service? If draft age Friends take the Peace Testimony to heart and refuse to
cooperate with the draft, then is it not time that we who are no longer of
that age refuse to cooperate with the drafting of our money for war?
Perhaps our Peace Testimony states what we believe too rigidly when it calls
on Friends to refuse cooperation with the draft. Perhaps, however, the
testimony does not state what we believe with regard to the payment of war
taxes strongly enough. If we agree that we should refuse cooperation with the
draft, then it is time we should refuse cooperation with war taxes.
That issue also included this on-point notice from one Quarterly Meeting:
In these times of draft registration and military buildup, many persons may be
led to actions in harmony with the Quaker Peace Testimony. College Park
Quarterly Meeting supports those who feel spiritually led, for reasons of
conscience, to perform such actions, including non-registration for the draft
and war tax refusal.
A letter to the editor from Walter Klein
in that issue suggested that Quakers, instead of resisting war taxes, should
pay twice their normal tax, but pay the extra amount for a non-military
purpose, perhaps one chosen as a group. “It would be legal, it would be a
statement of conscience, wars and armament would continue; but the message
might be loud and clear and perhaps more effective.” He suggested the program
be called “ ‘The Better Use of Government’ Fund or
‘BUG’ Fund
for short.”
Lonnie Valentine reminded Quakers of their historical tradition of war tax
resistance in the issue:
A.J. Muste once remarked that “The two decisive powers of the government
with respect to war are the power to conscript and the power to tax.” Now it
can be claimed that the government’s ability to wage war depends decisively
upon its power to tax. After all, our nuclear age began beneath one airplane,
twelve men, and millions of drafted tax dollars.
As early as American Friends recognized the
connection between taxes and war. In an epistle to Pennsylvania Friends, John
Woolman, John Churchman, and others wrote:
As we cannot be concerned with wars and fighting, so neither ought we to
contribute thereto… though some part of the money be raised… is said to be
for such benevolent purposes, as supporting our friendship with our Indian
neighbors, and relieving the distresses of our fellow-subjects… we could most
cheerfully contribute to those purposes, if they were not so mixed, that we
cannot in the manner proposed, show our hearty concurrence therewith, without
at the same time assenting to… practices, which we apprehend contrary to the
testimony which the Lord hath given us to bear…
Indeed, the Friends’ clear apprehension of the connection of money and war was
reflected in the Constitutional debates (about whether to include a
conscientious objector amendment) with regard to the conscription of men and
money. Roger Sherman of Connecticut remarked that “It is well know that those
who are religiously scrupulous of bearing arms, are equally scrupulous of
getting substitutes or paying an equivalent. Many of them would rather die
then do either one or the other.” How much are we now ready to do for our
scruples about conscription?
If we were all to be subject to the military draft in the next war, we would
not pay a fee to hire someone in our place. However, we seem to have forgotten
that with the payment of taxes we are hiring substitutes. We are paying to
have someone go in our place. In being unable to say “No!” to the payment of
taxes used to register and conscript others, we nullify our ability to say
“No!” in other ways. After all, the government cares little if we leaflet post
offices, learn draft counseling, or even advocate draft resistance as long as
we continue to pay our taxes. Simply put, when we pay our taxes, we enable the
government to conscript.
If other Friends are concerned enough about conscription to contemplate saying
“No!” to the drafting of our tax dollars, please write me at 27122 Cipres,
Mission Viejo, CA
92692 to let me know [sic] about the many ways we can protest and
resist paying war taxes. Also, please feel free to ask those Friendly
questions about justifying suffering for such a witness!
Joshua Evans reflected my feelings long ago when he said: “I found it best for
me to refuse paying demands on my estate which went to paying the expenses of
war, and although my part might appear at best a drop in the ocean, yet the
ocean, I considered, was made of many drops.” Are there other Friends who are
willing to be drops in this ocean?
[Lonnie Valentine has travelled in the ministry among Friends in Pacific
Yearly Meeting this past year under the auspices of the Fund for Concerns to
share with Friends his concerns about paying taxes for war.]
A letter from Harold Waterhouse
in the same issue warned Quakers against making their war tax resistance “an
act so private in nature that sometimes its sole impact falls on some harassed
IRS clerk
[and, a]s an act of witness… is chiefly between us and God.” While such an act
“relieves our conscience… if it reduces our drive for peace to the point that
we fail to act in more effective ways, then war-tax-withholding, on balance, is
counter-productive.”
A letter from David & Janet Hartsough to the
IRS,
reprinted in the issue, explained why
the Hartsoughs were refusing outright to pay $10.40 of their federal taxes
(redirecting that to the Oakland Catholic Worker “to feed the hungry and house
the homeless”), and paying the remaining $747.60 but in the form of a check
made out to the Department of Health and Human Services instead of to the
U.S. Treasury, in
the hopes of thereby keeping the money out of the hands of the Defense
Department.
A letter from Elinor Gene Hoffman to the
IRS,
reprinted in the issue, explained why
she was withholding 33⅓% of her taxes (“approximately the amount we are
spending for future wars and present armaments”), redirecting them “to
organizations I believe are dedicated to peace and to furthering life on this
planet,” and declaring this on her tax return as a “Quaker Peace Witness” tax
credit. She wrote, in part:
Please observe that by withholding only one-third of my taxes, I demonstrate
my willingness to pay for past wars and veterans’ benefits. I believe we
should honor past debts and that veterans of all wars should receive our
cherishing care.…
I take this stand in full recognition of the many benefits we all derive from
our representative form of government and the freedoms it enables me to enjoy.
But I firmly believe nothing good my government has done or will do can endure
if we do not halt our military pollution of the planet.
A reprinted letter from DeAnne Butterfield and John Huyler,
Jr. of Boulder Meeting to
the IRS
explained why they were withholding 39% of their taxes and declaring a
credit in a similar manner to Hoffman’s action explained above. Excerpt:
We hope most fervently that legal options (such as the proposed World
Peace Tax Fund) may be available in the future and would gladly pay into
such a fund. Until then we see war tax refusal as the only avenue which
allows us to follow our religious principles.
We welcome your scrutiny of this return. You will find that we have been
forthright and complete to the best of our ability. Furthermore, we hope
that this commitment on our parts can be a useful catalyst for dialogue.
We will welcome you our your agents into our home in hopes that,
together, in a spirit of mutual concern and respect, we may discover
better ways to bring about an end to all wars.
A note appended to this letter added: “Through the efforts of DeAnne
Butterfield, John Huyler, and others, Boulder Meeting adopted a one-year
trial program of reducing war taxes and diverting them to peaceful uses
through hiring a part-time Peace Secretary who will help stimulate activity
in the Meeting and in the community.” (See
♇ 7 June 2018 for more information
about this.)
A reprinted letter from Gerald Morsello of Eugene Meeting to the
IRS
explained his tax refusal, which involved redirecting “a portion of my
Federal Income Tax” to “the Oregon Urban Rural Credit Union for use by
people most affected by recent Federal domestic budget cuts.” He said he
was doing this although he would prefer “to be able to place the money I
owe the Federal government in a legally recognized alternative, such as the
World Peace Tax Fund.”
An letter from Constance Jolly of the Berkeley Meeting to the
IRS,
excerpted from the newsletter of the National Council for a World Peace Tax
Fund, explained her redirection of 35% of her taxes to “an organization
that works for peaceful reconciliation, for human rights, and for
disarmament.” Excerpt:
I am not one who breaks the law lightly, but for me the law that commands
its citizens to do evil is less binding than the higher law that commands
that “Thou shalt not kill.”
An announcement for an upcoming conference on “A Religious Response to
Growing Militarism” sponsored by College Park Quarterly Meeting said that
it “will be a nurturing and supportive gathering for those Friends and
others who are facing issues related to draft and tax resistance,
[etc.]”
A note read:
The 1981 Tax Resistance issue of Newsletter is
available (40¢ each) from 331 17th
Ave.
E., Seattle
WA 94112. Contents
include information about forms of tax resistance or refusal, possible
penalties, resources for decision-making, a national listing of
counselors, Centers, and Alternative Funds.
Those contents sound like the sort of stuff
NWTRCC
puts out nowadays. But
NWTRCC
wasn’t founded until , so I don’t know
who was putting out such a newsletter in
.
An article concerning statements by Episcopalian and Catholic bishops on
nuclear weapons included this section:
[I]n Archbishop Raymond G.
Hunthausen of Seattle proposed that “a sizable number of people in the
state” undertake a taxpayers revolt to protest the buildup in nuclear
arms. He argued that refusing to pay fifty per cent of income taxes “in
resistance to nuclear murder and suicide” would be “a definite step
toward total disarmament… Our paralyzed political process needs that
catalyst of nonviolent action based on faith. We have to refuse to give
incense — in our day tax dollars — to our nuclear idol.”
Brief summaries of the activities of various meetings included such notices
as these:
“Conscience and Military Tax Campaign [and] Consequences of Tax Refusal”
were among topics on the agenda of University Meeting’s “study
hour.”
“Eugene friends held a threshing session on tax resistance: ‘No consensus
was sought, and the Meeting was clearly divided on this difficult
issue.’ ”
“Conscription of Taxes” was discussed by the Phoenix Meeting in the
context of “discussions growing out of the New Call to Peacemaking
statement.”
The Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns is well on the way to working itself
out of a job. The committee was established early in
to accomplish three tasks: (1) to publish a
guidebook on war tax concerns; (2) to encourage consultation on war tax issues
throughout the Society of Friends; and (3) to develop queries and advices for
Quaker employers.
The proposed guidebook has become a series of pamphlets and a bibliography.
Three of the pamphlets, the ones on Quaker history and recent statements of
Friends, on the Biblical basis for conscientious objection to war taxes, and
on the spiritual and rational bases for war tax concerns, should be in print
by , along with the bibliography.
In mid-continent and mid- there will be
a conference for employers. Invitations will be sent to schools and religious
organizations operated by all the groups participating in the New Call to
Peacemaking. About 100 people are expected to gather and explore the positions
that can be adopted vis à vis the Internal Revenue Service
and the range of possible solutions to problems which may arise.
Two regional conferences, “Money and Conscience” and “Paying for War/Paying
for Peace,” were held in . Both were very
successful. Several more are planned for .
FCWTC
will provide resource material and assistance with program planning for
conferences wherever there are Friends who recognize the importance of war tax
issues and are willing to do the basic planning and arrangements. I hope this
means some of us.
Each of us on the committee represents a different Friends organization. Most
of us refuse to pay some or all of the taxes that pay for war. However, the
committee is concerned with “concerns,” not just resistance. We believe that
all Friends should go as far as they can, but not all are called to go in the
same direction. What aspect of this explosive issue do you most want to learn
more about, discuss with other Friends, make the subject of a conference? If
you can’t give time, can you give money? The basic program of the committee is
to prepare resource materials, distribute them where they are needed, help
people with similar problems and concerns to get in touch with each other and
then to lay the committee down, probably about .
I will try to get to any meeting in Southern California (maybe further) and
hope to get to Intermountain Yearly Meeting in
(Anne Friend, 836
N. Beaudry, № 5, Los
Angeles, CA 90012).
Lon Fendall at the Center for Peace Learning, Newberg,
OR 97132, is willing to
visit some meetings in North Pacific Yearly Meeting, as way opens, and/or to
help plan a conference. Linda Coffin is the staff at FCWTC,
P.O. Box 6441,
Washington,
D.C. 20009.
Any of us would like to hear from you.
If April 15 is getting to you more every year, think about what you can do
about it. And while you’re thinking about it, do something to get others
thinking about it, too.
Freund gives a brief overview of the history of conscientious tax resistance
that seems to me to understate it, though it’s possible that in
less evidence was easily available.
[I]t was not until the Vietnam War that tax resistance became a significant form of Christian witness against war.
One of the early Vietnam-era tax resisters was William Faw, a minister of the Church of the Brethren, one of the historic peace churches.
Faw had not come to my attention before, but Freund tells his story as follows:
William Faw: “Here I Stand; I Cannot Do Other”
William Faw was born in in Nigeria where his parents were missionaries for the Brethren Church.
His father took a post teaching at Bethany Seminary, and the family moved to Chicago where Bill grew up.
He went to college in Indiana and then attended the seminary until his graduation in .
While at school Faw was compelled to confront the issue of the draft. “Both my
parents were pacifists so I had decided early on that I would either be a
resister or a conscientious objector; I could not accept a student or
ministerial deferment in good conscience,” explains Faw. Despite his religious
background it still required a two-year battle with the draft board to obtain
his CO
status. By the time he received
CO status
he had a family and was never required to perform alternative service.
He received his first assignment in at the Douglas Park Church of the Brethren, a poor, multiracial community on the West Side of Chicago.
It was during this period that Bill Faw became a tax resister.
Faw explains that decision, saying, “I was a self-employed pastor and my wife was not working so we had control over our tax payments.
Since my wife was also a pacifist, we felt that it was necessary to protest the Vietnam War.
The question was, ‘How can we do this together?’ We spoke with several other Brethren who had been refusing taxes and listened to political leaders who opposed the war.
By early we decided to refuse to pay our taxes in full knowledge that it could lead to criminal punishment.”
When the time came to file their income tax
return, the Faws sent the
IRS a
long letter explaining why there was no check enclosed. Other resisters had
engaged in resistance by refusing even to file a return, but Faw believed that
a religious witness should be made in an open and public manner. The Faws’
letter made clear the personal struggle which accompanied their decision:
We refuse to willingly contribute to a “war machine” which is engaged in the very brutal war in Vietnam… In the past we felt that the ambiguities of tax paying outweighed the war-tax issue.
That is, our government’s expenditures for foreign aid, law enforcement, programs in health, education, and welfare, agriculture, urban redevelopment, and poverty fighting are worthy of support… Events have occurred which lead us to reconsider our responsibilities as citizens.
We feel we can be true to our national citizenship only if we oppose a so-called “non-war” that has not been constitutionally declared.
We feel that we can be true to our international citizenship as spelled out at the Nuremberg Trials only if we disassociate ourselves from and actively protest our unjust, illegal, morally deplorable, aggressive offensive against human beings in Vietnam.
But most basically we feel that we can be true to our Christian discipleship
only if we oppose… the seizure of God’s prerogative by the United States in
attempting to become the philosophical, theological, executive, legislative,
judicial, and policing agency for the entire world; only if we oppose the
exploiting of American “racism” by
A-bombing, napalming,
scatterbombing Asians; only if we oppose the mode of “evangelistic effort”
our nation is making in Vietnam to show the Buddhists what being a
“Christian” nation means…
Thus we are led to withhold our income tax and to seek constructive alternative ways of sharing our income… In God’s name, and under his judgment, we pray that we might choose the best path to make our witness.
…As a result, they chose to donate the tax money to the Canadian Friends Service Committee for the relief of war victims.
They were well aware that some of those victims who would be helped by their money were North Vietnamese and Viet Cong; they believed this action to be consistent with Jesus’ command to “love your enemy.”
The Faws refused to pay their income taxes for the next five years, donating
the funds to various international relief agencies. The Internal Revenue
Service sent an agent to attempt to obtain the taxes directly. When this
failed the
IRS
placed a levy on the Faws’ bank account and was able to collect the back
taxes. The Faws were not threatened with criminal penalties.
Freund says the Faws were also resisting their phone tax, but returned to being taxpayers in the wake of the Paris Peace Accords.
However, as of the writing of the book, they were planning to become resisters again by refusing a percentage of their income tax:
The continuing military buildup, especially nuclear weapons, has led us to resume tax resistance… We are being lulled into accepting more and more.
Johnson tried to give us guns and butter, but Reagan’s policy of sacrificing butter for guns represents a barbaric reversal of priorities.
Freund asked about the practical effectiveness of individual tax resistance.
…Faw conceded that it would be far more powerful if institutions were to openly advocate and practice tax resistance. “If one church did it, even a small one like the Brethren, the Mennonites, or the Quakers, it would have a tremendous impact on some of the liberal mainline denominations,” Faw believes.
However, even the New Call To Peacemaking, a grassroots movement within the historic peace churches begun in , of which Faw was the local chairman for two years, has failed to adopt a position of total resistance to war taxes.
This has been a source of frustration for Bill Faw, but he nevertheless believes in the importance of individual witness, “I would still do it even if no one else did.
There comes a point, with Vietnam or the arms race, where you say, ‘I’m not going to participate in that, no matter what the cost.’ It’s kind of like Martin Luther saying, ‘Here I stand; I cannot do other.’ ”
Freund then briefly described “A Simple Methodology” for Christians who were considering war tax resistance, covering the options of 1) paying taxes under protest, 2) voluntary poverty, 3) refusal to pay.
He then tried to discern what sort of guidance might be found in the Bible, considering the difficult “Render unto Caesar” and “the powers that be are ordained of God” sections in particular.
Then he returns to the problem of the lack of institutional support for war tax
resistance among Christian churches:
War Taxes: Where the Churches Are
Bill Faw and tax attorney William Durland express frustration that the churches, as national institutions, have not taken clear positions in support of tax resistance.
Durland, who counsels tax resisters, says, “Some church body will have to declare that it stands by the Gospel and not by the IRS.
This could have a chain reaction effect and lead to a coalition of churches to make it work.”
What holds them back? According to Faw, many Brethren have expressed “concern
for the biblical ambiguities regarding taxes, concern over the maintenance of
a certain respectability, and fear of the consequences.” Durland is somewhat
more cynical, “The Pope speaks out against war and then honors the Italian
Army.”
What is the position of the churches?
The historic peace churches, representing 400,000 members in the United States, have been discussing the issue since .
In , the Church of the Brethren recommended that, “Although the Brethren cannot agree as to whether tax withholding is proper, they can all recognize the propriety of using the means of dissent which the social order itself recognizes… We recommend that all who feel concern be encouraged to express their protests through letters accompanying their tax returns, whether accompanied by payment or not.” Many employees of these churches have not been satisfied with this position and have urged church agencies to refuse to withhold their federal taxes, a violation of the law.
The American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), responded by challenging the constitutionality of withholding as an infringement on the right of religious expression.
In the Supreme Court ruled in AFSC v. U.S. that a lower court ruling in favor of the AFSC was invalid and ordered AFSC to continue to withhold.
The AFSC has complied with that order since.
Pressure from employees of the Mennonite Church to refuse to withhold led to the following resolution adopted in , “We request the General Board to engage in a serious and vigorous search to pursue all legal, legislative, and administrative avenues for achieving a conscientious objector exemption from the legal requirement that the conference withhold income taxes from its employees.”
The New Call to Peacemaking
(NCP), a
more radical caucus within the three peace churches, has gone somewhat
further. In and again in
the
NCP
called upon members of the historic peace churches “to seriously consider
refusal to pay the military portion of their federal taxes, as a response to
Christ’s call to radical discipleship.” However, attempts to go further and
adopt a position which called “paying for war a sin parallel to the sin of
fighting war” was rejected. As one pastor at the meeting said, “We are calling
my congregation into deep water when they haven’t even gotten their toes wet.”
The mainline Protestant denominations have reacted cautiously or ignored the issue.
There is a growing movement within the Unitarian Universalist Association to take a position in favor of tax resistance.
One of the leaders of this effort is Rev. Philip Zwerling of the First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles.
He says, “Nowhere is military madness more manifest than in the nuclear arms race… and on one day of the year — April 15 — we break down and pay for it all… Is it not moral schizophrenia to blithely pick up the tab for the military mania that we speak out against?
It’s time to put our money where our mouth is.” However, for all the strength of this statement, the denomination as a whole has not adopted this position.
At the General Conference of the United
Methodist Church a resolution was adopted calling for support of those “who
conscientiously object to the payment of taxes for military purposes.” Here,
too, the group stopped short of calling on church agencies themselves to
engage in tax resistance.
Although large numbers of Roman Catholics are engaged in various forms of tax resistance, the church has taken no official position.
According to Father Bryan Hehir, Associate Secretary for International Justice and Peace of the U.S. Catholic Conference, “We have no policy on tax resistance… and I have not adopted a position intellectually on it.” Activist and author Father Daniel Berrigan thinks this position is becoming increasingly untenable, “More and more the question of paying federal taxes is going to become a question of conscience.
The government is stealing money and turning it into blood money.
We’re going to be pushed into a corner on whether we can recognize… our Christianity.”
Freund then recapped the example of (Catholic) Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen.
Excerpts:
Addressing the Pacific Northwest Synod of the Lutheran Church in America… Hunthausen surprised his audience by suggesting what form their action might take, “I would like to share a vision of an action which could be taken: simply this — a sizable number of people in the State of Washington, 5,000, 10,000, a half million people refusing to pay 50 percent of their taxes in nonviolent resistance to nuclear murder and suicide… Form 1040 is the place where the Pentagon enters all of our lives, and asks our unthinking cooperation with the idol of nuclear destruction.
I think the teaching of Jesus tells us to render to a nuclear-armed Caesar what that Caesar deserves — tax resistance.”
Reaction in the community was mixed, but leaders of eight other Christian
denominations in Seattle announced their general support for the stand of the
Archbishop… However, they stopped short of endorsing tax resistance, saying
they would “encourage discussion of tax resistance” and offer support to
“those who refuse to pay taxes in protest of the arms race.”
At the time of his speech the Archbishop openly stated that he himself had not yet refused to pay taxes, but that it was troubling his conscience.
Several months later he acted.
In a pastoral letter published in the Seattle archdiocesan newspaper, Hunthausen declared, “After much prayer, thought, and personal struggle, I have decided to withhold 50 percent of my income taxes as a means of protesting our nation’s continuing involvement in the race for nuclear arms supremacy… I am saying by my action that in conscience I cannot support or acquiesce in a nuclear arms buildup which I consider a grave moral evil.”
…However, Pacific Northwest United Methodist Bishop Melvin Talbert said that “while the city’s ecumenical leadership is supportive of Hunthausen, none has indicated that he or she is prepared to follow suit with similar personal acts of tax resistance.”
Freund ends the chapter with a nod to the World Peace Tax Fund Bill idea, taking it at face value and noting that “[c]hurch support is broad.”
This is the twenty-ninth 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.
Representatives of the General Conference Mennonite Church and the Internal Revenue Service failed to reach an 11th-hour compromise at a meeting in Washington on which would have averted a suit by the 63,000-member denomination against the government agency.
IRS
officials at the meeting denied that there was any administrative solution to the conference’s complaint that it must withhold the income taxes of its employees, thereby acting as a tax collector for the state.
The denomination has argued, and will argue in a forthcoming judicial action, that the IRS requirement violates the concept of separation of church and state as embodied in the First Amendment in the U.S. Constitution.
“The 45-minute meeting was cordial, but unproductive,” said Vern Preheim, general secretary for the conference.
“We outlined our concerns about the withholding issue as a historic peace church and described the problem which the IRS requirement poses for us.”
William Ball, the conference’s attorney in the matter, then formally asked members of the IRS’s special working group on withholding issues whether there was any way to exempt the General Conference from the problematic requirement.
Nancy Schuhmann, who chairs the special group, stated that the IRS must abide by its codes of operation and would not be able to offer an exemption on tax withholding to the conference.
IRS officials Susan Cunningham and Gail Libin were also present.
In light of the results of the meeting, attorney Ball will complete the preparation of the conference’s complaint and submit the brief to a U.S. district court after one last check to make sure all administrative possibilities have been exhausted is complete.
The General Conference’s General Board was authorized to initiate a judicial action on the tax withholding question at an international gathering of the conference membership at Estes Park, Colo., in .
More than a year earlier, on , delegates to a special midtriennium conference session instructed the GB to “use all legal, legislative and administrative avenues for achieving conscientious objector exemption” to the tax withholding requirement.
GB also heard a brief report by its general secretary, Vern Preheim, on the progress of the judicial action on the tax withholding issue.
Progress seems to be slow, as witnesses and a co-plaintiff have to be found.
Employees of the conference who are taking action of their own on the war tax issue were assured of adequate and appropriate conference support.
But by the issue, everything had come to a screeching halt:
In the light of a negative judgment rendered by the U.S. Supreme Court against an Amish employer on , the General Conference’s judicial action committee has recommended to the denomination’s General Board that a planned suit against the IRS on the issue of tax withholding “be put on indefinite hold."
The committee’s decision came at the end of a conference call with William Ball, who has been preparing the case on behalf of the church group over the past year.
During the telephone meeting.
Ball indicated that, considering the Supreme Court ruling in the case U.S. vs. Lee, the General Conference would almost certainly lose its case.
In the Amish case, employer Edwin Lee argued that his withholding of Social Security taxes was against both his own and his employees’ consciences.
In the unanimous decision of the court on the Amish question, Chief Justice Warren Burger wrote, “The tax system could not function if denominations were allowed to challenge tax systems because tax payments were spent in a manner that violates their religious belief."
Rather than pursue a negatively shrouded course of action at this time, the General Conference committee also urged the General Board to make more money available “for additional efforts to promote the World Peace Tax Fund.”
In his letter to General Board members, general secretary Vern Preheim concluded: “With closure of the ‘administrative avenue’ during my meeting with IRS, and now closure of the ‘judicial avenue’ via U.S. vs. Lee, we are left with the ‘legislative avenue’ as our only conceivable legal avenue prior to our triennial sessions.
“If no significant progress is made in terms of additional congressional sponsorship of the WPTF legislation, we will have to report a totally negative outcome to the efforts resolved at Minneapolis in .
This will again bring us to the threshold of divine obedience/civil disobedience.”
In coming to that decision, the group weighed the importance of a number of concerns, including the timing of the GC action, the witness value of the suit if it were pushed forward, the fact that a loss in court might set a negative precedent which would eclipse favorable decisions in related cases, and whether proceeding with the action when defeat seems certain would be good stewardship.
Preheim hopes to gather together preliminary response of the General Board to the committee recommendations in the next few weeks.
A full discussion will take place at a fall meeting of the board.
The decision of the board was covered in the edition:
Realizing they had reached a critical juncture in their church’s ongoing struggle against the payment of taxes used for war, members of the General Conference’s General Board decided on to stall its impending suit against the IRS and let delegates to ’s triennial sessions decide on what course of action to take.
A resolution to proceed with the judicial action, which would have tested the constitutionality of laws forcing the church to collect taxes on behalf of the state, was turned down by a vote of six to two, with seven abstentions.
The move to put the suit on indefinite hold was based on recommendations from the church’s judicial action committee and the denomination’s attorney in the matter, William B. Ball of Harrisburg, Pa.
In a letter to general secretary Vern Preheim dated , Ball had been pessimistic about the chances of the judicial action’s success in the light of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in the case Wisconsin vs. Yoder [sic].
As part of its ruling in that case, the court had stated, “The tax system could not function if denominations were allowed to challenge the tax system because tax payments were spent in a manner that violates their religious belief.”
“We regard that language as most threatening to [the General Conference’s] position, if not foreclosing it completely,” wrote Ball.
Rather than scuttle the proposed litigation completely, GB members agreed at the recent meetings to consider the suit again, “if and when more favorable conditions prevail and depending upon the response at Bethlehem, Pa.” (the location of ’s triennial sessions).
Delegates to the General Conference’s triennial sessions in Estes Park, Colo., empowered the General Board to initiate a judicial action as a follow-up to a special session on the theme of Christian civil responsibility in Minneapolis .
At that meeting, delegates resolved 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.”
Part of the General Board’s discussions focused on interpretation of that resolution; namely, at what point each of those “avenues” would be considered to have been exhausted.
Some members felt that Ball’s advice closed the legal avenue; others said that the judicial route would not be blocked until a court ruled against a suit brought before it by the conference.
Many agreed that a legal test would be an important public witness and is, for that reason alone, worth considering further.
The administrative avenue to a solution was eliminated after a meeting between GC officials and representatives of the IRS on
, when IRS declined to make any exceptions to rules requiring the conference to withhold taxes from the salaries of its employees.
The World Peace Tax Fund legislation, currently in committee in the U.S. Congress, represents the legislative avenue.
Board members will ask the GC delegate body to answer some of these questions at Bethlehem , and to make a decision about whether or not the conference’s business office should simply go ahead and stop withholding taxes from the salaries of those employees who wish it, thereby breaking IRS regulations.
In such a case, the general secretary and business manager would be immediately responsible, Preheim reported.
The conference’s judicial action committee will prepare appropriate background materials and resolutions for presentation at Bethlehem and present these to the General Board at its meeting for review.
Level one — tax protest. Why is it that those who feel uncomfortable with tax resistance spend more time protesting civil disobedience than war taxes?
Persons filing and paying taxes each April 15 should attach a protest letter, outlining one’s opposition to how 50 percent of the tax money will be spent.
Most importantly, copies of this letter should go to your representative, senators, newspaper editor and should be posted in the church.
Openness is critical.
The IRS is fearful of those who publicize their tax protest — even if it is merely a letter — because it encourages others.
For those who feel exceptionally penitent, file back letters of protest and ask that they be attached to your previous returns.
Level two — tax resistance. This is a clear call to civil disobedience — organized tax resistance with acceptance of penalties.
Having a support group to guide you in this decision is important.
Hopefully, congregational affirmation of such a decision would be forthcoming.
One should be prepared for the IRS to use its unchecked power to collect any income or other tax owed.
Level three — tax avoidance. Legal tax avoidance — keeping one’s income below taxable levels — is certainly in line with living more with less.
Perhaps we ought to have our MCC overseas workers explain to us how half the world can live in poverty on $100 a year, when we with abundance and waste all around us cannot seem to live on less than $10,000.
Legal tax avoidance has the additional blessing of insuring that no income tax is used for war.
Minimum U.S. income levels for 1981 are $3,300 for single people and $5,400 for married couples.
Level four — tax counseling. This level incorporates any of the three levels above, but commits one to a study into the IRS, military budget and federal tax policy.
Just as draft counselors sprang up during the draft years, we need more tax counselors to aid us in responding to the draft on our money.
According to Sen. Pryor, D-Ark., the Pentagon spends more on military bands — close to $90 million — than we spend on arms control — about $20 million.
When will we hear the music?
Perhaps there is no single right answer for everyone, but surely silence is not an acceptable response.
The edition reviewed Affirm Life: Pay for Peace, a small handbook put out by the Historic Peace Church Task Force on Taxes, designed in a loose-leaf form so it could be updated, and meant to help classes and discussion groups explore their response to war taxes.
(There was another review of the book in the edition.)
James W. Nikl, in an letter to the editor, encouraged readers to consider cutting their income to cut their taxes.
“What
would happen if we all cut our incomes in half?” he asked.
“How would it affect the military budget?”
He did the math for a dual-income couple in the 49% tax bracket and found that they would significantly lower their taxes and gain a lot of valuable free time in the bargain.
He concluded:
We have a choice.
We can race our motors all our lives, and the government will take most of what we produce.
Or we can take time to smell the flowers along the way.
In response to a critic who thought Nikl’s tax advice was too materialistic and coldly practical, he responded:
I agree with what [the critic] said about our attitude toward material possessions.
We should put a strong emphasis on the gospel of peace which embraces the needs of those in our community who are without.
I believe, however, that Mennonites should and would prefer to use their own wealth as they see fit and would be much better stewards of God’s bounty than the U.S. government.
I doubt that willfully giving of our tax money so that a small portion will go for human resources is really attractive to many Mennonites.
I would also question whether the good effects of the human resources portion of our tax even comes close to offsetting the bad effects of the military part.
A testimony of an “outsider” in attests that Mennonites were still people of conscience at the end of their first century in North America: “It is well known that the Quakers and Mennonists were formerly some of the best farmers in Pennsylvania.
These people, from having their cattle, horses, farming utensils, etc., so often taken from them for taxes, have sensibly declined as farmers.
Many of them have sold their farms and gone to other states, whilst others of them do not raise 20 bushels of grain, where they once raised 100.”
MCC
has spent over $10,000 to purchase and ship about 1,200 shovels to Laos.
$4,000 of that amount was allocated from MCC’s “Taxes for Peace” fund [which] was established in to receive contributions from church members who had voluntarily withheld portions of their taxes as a symbolic protest against the government’s excessive spending for military purposes.
The Lutheran Peace Fellowship recently issued “A Call to Tax Resistance for Lutherans” statement committing members to tax resistance as a moral stand against the nuclear arms race.
According to Dennis Jacobsen, fellowship coordinator, 23 Lutherans from 11 states endorsed the statement, which said, “We will no longer pay for war while praying for peace.”
The St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in Indianapolis made a public decision to withhold payment of the excise tax on its phone bill.
This was done, said the congregation, “in response to the gospel call to be peacemakers and to church teachings that we, as Christians, must devote ourselves to the cause of peace — and, in particular, disarmament.”
In the same edition, James W. Nikl gave some advice on seeking tax shelters and deferrals.
Most of this was fairly dry tax advice, but the article ended with a section that began thusly:
Role of our churches. Recently the Boulder, Colo., Friends Meeting proposed a position of peace secretary for the congregation.
That person would become an authority on taxes and related items and keep the rest of the congregation informed as to how to legally divert their tax dollars from military uses.
We could perhaps create a position on our various church boards and work toward this same goal.
Two members of the Methodist Federation for Social Action have found an innocent way to protest U.S. budget priorities.
John and Pat Schweibert concluded that about 41 percent of their income tax was going for armaments.
So they withheld that amount from what they owed, then handed out a $5 bill to each of 200 unemployed people they found in line at a state employment office.
The distribution, timed for , received coverage in the local paper.
Seattle Catholics gave significantly more to the annual archdiocesan funds appeal after their spiritual leader, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, took a strong stand against nuclear war, reports the lay-edited National Catholic Reporter.
“We thought the archbishop’s stand would have some adverse effect on the appeal,” said Paul LeBlanc, archdiocese assistant director of development.
“We didn’t think (the funds) would be this large… The letters to the diocese are running eight to one in favor of the archbishop.”
Hunthausen has attracted nationwide notice for withholding the portion of his federal income taxes used for the military.
A petition with 14,000 names of Old Order Amish in Lawrence County, Pa., was presented to Rep. Eugene V. Atkinson, a Democrat whose district includes Lawrence County.
The Amish are seeking a legislative remedy to having to deduct Social Security taxes from employees’ salaries.
A bill by Rep. Robert S. Walker (R-Pa.), and cosponsored by Atkinson, would exempt members of religious faiths opposed to the program from paying Social Security taxes.
Hanno Klassen sent the Internal Revenue Service two checks this year — each for half the amount he owed.
One was made out to IRS; the other (to cover the military share of his taxes) was made out to the American Friends Service Committee.
Klassen explained his action in a letter to IRS: “The check made out to AFSC is to show that I want to pay what I owe.
But I cannot let my life or my substance be used for killing.
You see, I was a member of Hitler’s destructive forces in World War Ⅱ.
I was used once; I will not be used again.”
This is the thirty-first in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite.
Today we reach 1984.
The magazine helpfully summed up the current state of war tax resistance, particularly among American Christians, in its edition:
“Were you able in 1983 to find the resources to support religious, charitable and peace efforts equal to the taxes you were required to pay for the military establishment?”
The Friends Committee on National Legislation uses this question to encourage people to examine the consistency of their peace witness while filling out income tax forms.
In current military expenditures consumed 33 percent of federal appropriations, or 46 percent if the cost of past wars (interest on the national debt and veterans programs) is included, reports Delton Franz of Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section Washington Office.
During each Monthly Meeting (similar to an individual congregation) in the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting (similar to a conference body) was asked to examine this question:
Is the voluntary payment of war taxes consistent with the Quaker peace testimony?
When the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting convenes its annual session in , this question will be on the agenda.
Concern about “war taxes” is reaching beyond the traditional peace churches.
The United Church of Christ and the United Methodist Church have adopted statements of support for members who conscientiously oppose payment of taxes for military purposes.
The United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. has initiated a churchwide study on war tax resistance.
While the religious community in the United States has moved toward greater support for conscientious objection to paying taxes for military purposes, the Internal Revenue Service has beefed up its efforts to penalize tax “protests” of all kinds.
An estimated 4,700 taxpayers were fined $500 each during for expressing their religious, moral or political views on their income tax forms.
Congress enacted this automatic $500 fine as a provision of the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of .
The Internal Revenue Service began enforcing the penalty soon after its passage by Congress.
At least 30 people, including those of Mennonite, Quaker, Catholic and other religious backgrounds, are challenging the constitutionality of this regulation in court.
Lawyers believe that the penalty violates freedom of speech and that the expression of religious convictions on income tax forms is not “frivolous.”
Courts are expected to issue summary judgments (decision made by a judge only, no jury) in a number of cases in the coming year.
Internal Revenue Service officials invited Mennonite representatives to meet with them in to discuss the application of the penalty for “frivolous” returns.
IRS officials told U.S. Peace Section staff that the penalty is a processing penalty, designed to protect the efficiency of processing millions of tax returns.
People who have filled their tax forms out correctly and have simply not paid the full amount of taxes owed are not subject to this penalty.
However, taking a “war tax” credit or deduction or writing other comments on the tax form itself can result in a penalty.
The IRS officials agreed that the World Peace Tax Fund bill would be a solution if it were enacted.
Abatement of the penalties already imposed is highly unlikely, but senators who helped formulate the legislation remain concerned about its application against Mennonites and Quakers in particular.
The Fellowship of Reconciliation group in North Manchester, Ind., has organized a Tax Resister’s Penalty Fund to ease the financial burden on conscientious tax resisters.
People can submit a request for financial assistance to cover interest and penalty charges resulting from not paying military tax.
If the request is approved, an appeal letter is sent to all people who have expressed interest in contributing to the fund.
In this way, the cost of a $500 penalty could be distributed among 200 people if each paid only $2.50.
In , 250 people were on the Tax Resister’s Penalty Fund mailing list.
In MCC U.S. Peace Section approved guidelines for a “War Tax Witness Relief Fund.”
This fund was established to provide financial assistance to people within the MCC constituency who face hardship from court cases resulting from a war tax witness.
People in financial straits because they contributed the military portion of their taxes to a charitable organization and then had to face an IRS levy, property seizure, or garnishment of wages would also be eligible for assistance.
To date, no money has been budgeted for the U.S. Peace Section War Tax Witness Relief Fund and the existence of the fund has not been publicized.
U.S. Peace Section, however, will consider aiding those who are unable to acquire assistance from their congregation or conference.
U.S. Peace Section continues to accept contributions of redirected telephone and federal income tax money to its “Taxes for Peace” fund.
Donations to this fund have supported special projects and the ongoing work of U.S. Peace Section.
“The payment of taxes in the service of our common life is a necessary and a good thing.
It is therefore unusual and inappropriate to refuse tax payment,” begins a declaration printed in several national daily newspapers in the Netherlands on and signed by 69 Amsterdam area ministers, including at least seven Mennonites.
The statement, pointing out the Dutch government’s agreement to place nuclear weapons in the Netherlands, goes on to say, “In this critical phase we consider tax objection as a necessary means of protest.
We wish tax monies no longer to be misused to continue along this dead-end road.”
The edition brought readers up to date on the story of John Dyck, a Canadian war tax resister whose story had been introduced :
Like the rest of us, John R. Dyck of Rosthern, Sask., files his tax return.
But unlike most of us, he sends Revenue Canada a check for only 90 percent of his unpaid taxes.
And he includes a letter informing the Canadian government that, for reasons of conscience, a check for the balance has been sent to the Peace Tax Fund in Victoria, B.C.
The second check represents the estimated portion of Canadian taxes designated for the military.
This is in that John and Paula Dyck quietly insisted on not having their taxes spent on bombs and guns.
They believe that Christian non-resistance means more than simply refusing to fight in a war.
It also means not paying others to arm and fight for you.
A small but growing number of Canadians are sending a portion of their taxes to be held in trust by the Peace Tax Fund.
They are hoping that the Canadian government will recognize their conscientious objection to military taxes and provide an alternative.
As a retired pensioner, Dyck must calculate the taxes he owes and forward that amount with his income tax return.
Every year he checks with Ernie Regehr at Project Ploughshares (a peace research group) on the exact percentage of Canada’s budget that goes to the Department of National Defense.
Last year it was 10.5 percent.
He subtracts the military percentage and encloses a letter informing Revenue Canada of his actions, his reasons and the number of his account at the Rosthern Credit Union.
“I tell them, ‘If you want it, take it.’ But I won’t send it myself.”
Consequences.
Last year Dyck found out the hard way what happens when the government wants to collect unpaid taxes.
He says he was prepared to accept the consequences of his actions, but not for the ruthless, impersonal way Revenue Canada operates.
One day the Credit Union manager showed him an official letter that had arrived that morning garnisheeing his account.
His personal notice of the action did not arrive until a week later.
And even though the credit union account held sufficient funds, a second bank account in Saskatoon was also garnisheed.
Then, without notice, his two pension checks stopped coming.
The government ended up with $360 more than was due and Dyck has not heard from them since.
Presumably his “credit” at Revenue Canada will be used to cover the taxes he won’t pay for .
When Dyck visited the Revenue Canada office in Saskatoon to ask why he had not received a notice about the diversion of his pension checks, he was treated rudely.
“The man used some pretty rough language.
He gave me the impression that he would walk over anyone to get the money.”
Although he can recall the money in the Peace Tax Fund trust account if he wishes, he would prefer to have that money used in a hoped-for court challenge, based on the new Canadian Charter of Rights.
“On principle, I don’t mind paying twice,” he says.
The Conscience Canada organization, an outgrowth of the Peace Tax Fund Committee, expects such a challenge to cost at least $50,000.
Dyck himself is not inclined to get involved in a court case.
He has had trouble finding a lawyer who is sympathetic.
Besides, “the court route should be taken by some organization that has enough money and can do it right.”
What is Caesar due?
John R. Dyck is not a man to get up on a soapbox and trumpet his cause.
But the word gets around.
There are Mennonites in his hometown who don’t agree with him and others who ignore him.
His pastor chooses his words carefully when talking about the subject.
“I don’t suppose he has a great deal of support in the church; people feel we should obey the government.”
Dyck is now 70 years old.
When asked why he has taken such a stand when others rest in quiet retirement, he begins to talk about a lifetime spent in church-related service, of the example of his parents, about the books he has read and the years spent overseas with Mennonite Central Committee in Paraguay, India, Korea and Jordan, where he observed the effect of Western militarism.
“They all left their mark on me.”
He is committed to a vigorous, active faith based on a personal experience of God’s salvation and presence.
John doesn’t mind if people disagree with his stand.
“I don’t have any corner on the truth.
I know what it is for me at this moment.
A person should stay true to one’s convictions.”
About his critics he adds, “People say, ‘What do you think you’re doing?’
I know that.
I have no illusions that anyone in Ottawa is listening — at the moment.
It has to start small, and I want to support this movement.”
But aren’t we supposed to give to Caesar what is Caesar’s?
“Sure. But does Caesar deserve all he asks for?”
A letter to Revenue Canada from Annie Janzen of Victoria, B.C., indicated that she was joining John Dyck in his protest.
“I object on conscientious grounds to my taxes being used for war purposes…
I have sent 12.2 percent (of income tax owed to Revenue Canada) of the net federal tax payable to Conscience Canada.”
“Form 1040 is the place where the Pentagon enters all our lives and asks unthinking cooperation with the idol of nuclear destruction.
I think the teaching of Jesus tells us to render to a nuclear-armed Caesar what that Caesar deserves: tax resistance.”
These are the words of Seattle Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen (right), who two years ago decided to withhold half of his federal income tax and thereby helped launch a religious “war tax” resistance movement that is growing rapidly.
According to the Internal Revenue Service, war tax resistance has increased nearly fivefold in the last three years.
War tax resistance groups say that actual numbers are higher, that IRS tabulations miss many people, including those who simply don’t file or who don’t specify reasons for underpaying.
In the edition, Donald E. Martin wrote about “sponsoring” children from war-torn areas, and noted that doing so “helped to cut down the amount of money we spent on ourselves and the amount of taxes we paid toward paying for war.”
There were also several passing mentions of war tax resistance here and there that I didn’t think were worth excerpting here.
Links have been piling up in my bookmarks as I spent
poring through
back issues of The Mennonite.
International Tax Resistance News
A new law in Samoa requires previously untaxed church
ministers to pay income tax. Many, including those from the country’s
largest church,
are refusing to pay.
The United States government has begun
denying passports to people with large tax debts.
If you’re one of the 362,000 or so Americans who owe more than $51,000 and
you haven’t entered into an installment payment plan (I’m one of those),
you will likely soon find that you cannot successfully apply for or renew
your passport. While the government also has the legal authority to revoke
existing passports from such people, it is not yet exercising that
power.
Guerrilla electricians in Greece continue to
reestablish electric power
to households who have had their power cut off for inability or
unwillingness to pay the state utility monopoly’s bills which have been
inflated to support the state’s austerity budget policies.
Veterans of the successful campaign to abolish the
“écotaxe” in Brittany held
a celebratory picnic
on the anniversary of the destruction of one of the highway portals that
would have enforced the hated tax. In part the picnic was meant to show
solidarity with those who had been convicted of criminal charges for the
parts they played in destroying such portals, and in part it was meant as a
show of strength to let the government know they would not tolerate any
attempts to reestablish the tax.
The increasing use of traffic-ticket-issuing cameras worldwide as a
government revenue booster has led to a rash of direct action by the victim
population. This usually takes the form of destroying, disabling, or
blocking the cameras. Here are several recent examples:
Launched on as another variety of civic struggle against the dictatorship, the proposal to carry the thesis of civil disobedience to the extreme of applying a “tax strike” is still in force, but has not yet switched on, except in the Mercado Oriental.
On that date, the Academy of Sciences, and the Academy of Legal and Political Sciences, called for “civil disobedience as a national imperative to be put into operation immediately,” inviting employers, workers, students, and taxpayers to immediately suspend the payment of taxes to DGI, DGA, and city hall, in particular “withholding of Income Tax from salaries.”
Although the call for tax resistance enters the popular imagination as a civil form — and for that reason a legitimate one — of resisting the regime of Daniel Ortega, neither businesses nor individuals have responded with determination to the proposal, from fear or from caution.
Caution as demonstrated by the sources consulted for this article, who requested anonymity as they explained that people, business-owners and managers in particular, are afraid that the tax administration will fine them or, worse yet, temporarily take over operation of their companies or shutter their business.
Not all of the sanctions are catastrophic.
There are cases in which the fine applied is equivalent to 2.5% of the amount not paid in the case of the monthly advance payment of the business income tax, or 5% in the case of the value-added tax or of income tax withheld from the salaries of employees.
“Technically, it’s an invalid appropriation of withholdings, and can be criminally sanctioned,” in addition to being shut down, fined, or temporarily put under government management, explained a source with extensive experience in tax matters.
That said, this source sees a variety of reasons to doubt that they would decide to take such extreme measures, beginning with “as far as I know, they have never applied them to anyone.”
Another is that to close a business means sending its workers into unemployment, which implies that they will not receive taxes from the business or from those consumers.
But beyond believing in the mercy that any of these reasons implicitly assumes, the source points out fact that is easier to accept:
“If the resolution is massive, the tax administration simply does not have the capacity to audit and penalize everyone at once.”
Larger Companies Have More Fear
If it is decided to penalize only some in order to set a precedent that strikes fear into the others, surely one of the larger ones will be chosen, which not only has more ability to defend itself in the courts, but also to negotiate, precisely because of its size.
Another source asserts that “although it may seem obvious, the businesses that take the least risk are the most powerful ones, for the simple reason that they are not big taxpayers but big tax collectors.
“The DGI, does not want to be bothered with them, because if they weaken them, this affects tax revenues, principally value-added tax withholding.”
When the big companies that could take such measures don’t apply them, despite their intrinsic power, they are demonstrating “the cowardly face of big capital.
If they would decide, the blow to DGI would be immense,” s/he says.
Róger Arteaga, former director general of Revenue, agrees, saying that “big capital has not wanted to go all-in.
It is true that it gave its approval to the strike, but did so with fear and only temporarily.”
There is at least one group that risks more in a tax strike: import and export companies, which require clearances that can only be obtained once they have paid the corresponding taxes.
“If one of these business doesn’t make its monthly statement, or makes it but doesn’t pay, it falls into insolvency, and can neither import nor export.
The only importers who could afford that ‘luxury’ would be those that have sufficient product already on hand, especially at times like these, when there is little movement of inventory,” explained one of our sources.
Small- and medium-sized businesses — both fixed-quota and general regime — can stop paying taxes as long as the situation does not normalize, and while this makes them vulnerable to penalties, it is not likely that this will occur, especially, again, if a critical mass applies this measure of fiscal chastisement.
How long can the government last without taxes?
Our sources note that before making tax payments, the employer must guarantee the salary of its employees, and that the decision not to pay taxes is “protected by the higher legal concept, legally enshrined in the national legislation, as the Act of God and the Force Majeure.
Nobody is obligated to do the impossible, and the reason for this impossibility lies outside the control of the employer or employee.”
Citizens, on their part, could put pressure on big and medium-sized business, offering to act together if the Treasury moves against them.
“In this context, big capital must play a consistent role, acting firmly in the face of a Treasury that has granted them such special privileges.
It would be their most authentic repentance for the eleven years of tax advantages they have taken in the shadow of power.
That stain should be washed out right away,” they say.
As an expert, Arteaga proposes “that the businesses do not charge value-added tax, and the citizens not pay it.
Income tax also.
There are penalties, but the penalties and decisions of this government must be ignored, as they have no legitimacy.
How long can the government last without taxes?” he asked.
“Tax resistance aims to respond to Ortega’s claim that he will stay on through : we must find a solution, and one of these is for the private sector finally to decide on civil disobedience of a monetary and tax nature,” he explained.
Pedro Muñoz Fonseca, president of the executive committee of Costa Rica’s Social Christian Unity Party, urged Nicaraguans to use tax resistance against their government:
Social Media Tax Protest in Uganda
The government of Uganda has imposed a 5¢-per-day tax on using social media and
other services. This was designed as both a revenue measure and a way of
reducing what Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni calls lugambo
(“fake news”). Amnesty International has been among those to see through the
government’s rhetoric and cast the tax as
“a
clear attempt to undermine the right to freedom of expression.”
Robert Kyagulanyi, a Member of Parliament better known by his musician
stage name Bobi Wine, whose election is in part credited to his success on
social media, has been at the forefront of protests against the tax.
He was arrested, along with
three reporters when a march protesting the tax was attacked by police
with tear gas and rubber projectiles, but they managed to escape.
Ugandan protest marchers wearing shirts featuring a smart phone screen that
reads “This Tax Must Go”
War Tax Resistance Around the World
ABC reports on war tax resisters in Valencia — “the new refuseniks”.
War tax resisters there typically refuse to pay some percentage of their taxes, often basing this on the percentage of the federal budget that is spent on the military and similar items, and redirect this money to more worthy charities.
They declare this deduction on their tax forms in such a way that the tax agency typically does not treat it as illegal tax evasion but as an error or mistake.
The Global Day of Action on Military Spending Final Report has been released.
It gives a summary of the various events that took place around the world, including several by war tax resisters and groups promoting war tax resistance.
There’s a new NWTRCC newsletter out, with content including:
Ideas & Actions concerning weapons-free investing, responding to arguments against war tax resistance, a fast for nuclear disarmament, and more
You can now listen to audio excerpts from the upcoming documentary The Pacifist, about war tax resister Larry Bassett, on Spotify.
Erica Leigh pores through back issues of Conscience, the newsletter of the Conscience and Military Tax Campaign, an American war tax redirection group that slightly predates the founding of the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.
Raymond Hunthausen has died.
As Catholic archbishop of Seattle, he took a remarkably strong stand on nuclear weapons — famously calling the Trident nuclear submarine program being developed nearby “the Auschwitz of Puget Sound” — and began practicing war tax resistance in response.
This earned him enemies in Washington and in the Catholic hierarchy. Here are some of the obits and remembrances:
A biography of Hunthausen, A Disarming Spirit, will be released soon.
David McReynolds has died.
He was a long-time War Resisters League and Socialist Party activist and was also on the staff of the Committee for Nonviolent Action which helped to spearhead war tax resistance as a tactic during the campaigns opposing the American war in Vietnam.
He was among the signers of the “Writers and Editors War Tax Protest” in and of a similar public pledge .
David Paul Irish has died.
He was active with the Fellowship of Reconciliation, Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Peace Brigades International, and Witness for Peace.
He was an advocate for war tax resistance in the Society of Friends, drafting a minute in favor of of war tax resistance that the Twin Cities and Minneapolis Meetings approved in .
This is the twenty-second 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.
was marked by heated debate in the pages of
Gospel Herald about war tax resistance, while
Mennonite Church institutions continued to struggle with whether or how to take
a stand.
The issue reported on
Mennonite war tax redirection:
Mennonite Central Committee
U.S. Peace
Section’s Taxes for Peace Fund experienced a substantial increase in
contributions during 1980. The amount of $10,400 was contributed in
, compared to $6,200 in
.
The Taxes for Peace Fund was established in late
. “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.
During , the
U.S. budgeted $138
billion for current military spending. Thirty-two percent of the income tax
paid by every American during contributed to
raising this money. An additional 15 percent went to veterans benefits and the
portion of the national debt related to past wars. Thus, nearly half of the
federal budget, raised almost entirely by individual and corporate income
taxes, is military related.
A recent preliminary census taken by
U.S. Peace Section
found that over 200 Mennonite families and individuals are refusing to pay a
portion of their income taxes and are instead contributing that money to
organizations working for peace.
Withholding a portion of one’s income tax is only one of many ways to witness
against military spending. Some Mennonites are using other methods, such as
reducing income below taxable level, increasing charitable contributions,
refusing to pay the federal telephone tax, and actively supporting the World
Peace Tax Fund.
The Mennonite Board of Congregational Ministries was distributing
a war tax study packet
by this time, according to the issue:
A revised and updated War Tax Packet covering a variety of issues
related to the question of payment of taxes for military purposes is
available. The packet contains articles by Willard Swartley, Marlin Miller,
David Schroeder, Donald Kaufman, John Stoner, and William Durland; the stories
of some persons’ own experiences; several brochures and other reprints; an
issue of God and Caesar newsletter; a list of peace
organizations; and a bibliography. Copies of the War Tax Packet are $2.00 and
may be requested from MBCM… or
MCC…
If the church wants to speak to the peace and justice issues of our day with
credibility, we will need to live out more radically our status as God’s
children. We must really be, in fact, the peacemakers we are called to be.
This goes for the church in all parts of the world, but most importantly, it
is for all of us who are citizens of a nation which insists on being number
one in the world.
After hearing my views on peace, a student leader in Spain asked me what I
intended to do about paying taxes to support the armament race. I personally
do not see how Christians can proclaim the gospel of peace with integrity
while intentionally supporting America’s desire to be the number one military
power. This contradiction is compounded when we realize that, in the eyes of
the rest of the world, the United States is the great bastion of evangelical
Christianity.
Things really began to heat up starting in the issue, which featured this commentary (I corrected the
numbering of items 5–7, where the numbers were missing from the original, but
there was some ambiguity so I might have gotten it wrong):
Editor’s Note: The question of war taxes has been a subject of
discussion among Mennonites for years. It does not appear any nearer solution
than before. Should we then cease discussing it? On the contrary, the issue
is so important that we should listen to all who have insights, especially
those who not only speak, but practice their convictions.
This is a blunt article, but I believe it is written with love. Can we
receive it as such? See also the author’s personal note at the end of his
article.
Introduction For years I have struggled with the knowledge that there
are in our Mennonite Church many pastors, educators, theologians, seminary
professors, and writers who have condoned, justified, and rationalized the
payment of war taxes, even placating those whose tender consciences were
bothering them every April 15.
Many times I have argued with the Spirit when confronted with the request that
I witness against this inconsistency. I had good excuses too! Except for a
year of junior college Bible at Eastern Mennonite College, my academic
training has been in engineering and natural science. I can’t read Greek or
Hebrew! How then could a non-seminary, practically illiterate nobody have
any influence? These little dialogues were nearly weekly experiences
(some more detailed), while driving the car, alone in the field, reading
Scripture in sermon preparation, even in silent prayer.
Finally on , while husking
corn, a terrible dread came over me. I stopped the husker right there in the
middle of the field and shouted: “Okay God, if You want me to make a fool of
myself. I’ll do it, I will, I will.” (No one heard me above the noise of the
John Deere, else they might have questioned my sanity.) What a relief and joy
I felt! I think I sang all the hymns I knew by heart the rest of the day!
It was my day off at the hospital, but that evening I was just “too tired” to
“start anything,” and for two weeks I was just “too busy.” Always when I come
home at 12:30 or 1:00 a.m. I fall asleep
the minute I get to bed. Then one night I was wide awake! After an hour of
tossing I finally got up, picked up my Bible and came down to the kitchen,
dropped it on the table rather disgustedly, got a drink of water, and sat
down. The Bible had fallen open and the first words I read were Ezekiel 3:20,
21. That did it for me! (Don’t bother to tell me that is not the
proper way to read the Bible. I already know that; I’m just telling
you what happened to me.)
I thought I should share these experiences with you so that you may know the
motivation for this communication.
Come then, my brothers and sisters, let us reason together concerning the
payment of war taxes!
The United States Internal Revenue Service has stated: “The
IRS
can only collect income taxes because of the voluntary
cooperation of the citizens.” Let no one say that they voluntarily
pay income taxes, because they have no choice. That is not true!
The payment of war taxes is viewed by the government as voluntary
cooperation; the final endorsement of their policies.
If you choose not to pay voluntarily, and make no
other deduction arrangements, then the
IRS
will eventually try to collect in some other way. We have never paid war
taxes and are now giving our entire farm to the church so that we will pay
no income tax. It is costing us something. The burden of proof is upon you
who approve of war taxes because it costs you nothing.
Now I know that many of our people are not in a position to do as we
are doing, so I have with many others been working for seven or eight
years to get the World Peaee Tax Fund passed. The only reason it
has not passed and will not pass is because of lack of concern. United
States senators and representatives have told us many times that except
for the few of you, “There is no evidence that anyone else has any problem
paying war taxes; so why are you bothering us with this bill?”
A highly educated theologian of our denomination said to me, “You can’t
hang a guilt trip on me about war taxes, because we aren’t in a war.”
Doesn’t everyone understand that this is a “Pay now, go later plan”? I
doubt that we will ever again pay for a war during a war. When the atomic
destruction comes it will be no consolation for the victims to remember
that these atomic bombs were paid for by peace-loving Mennonites, not some
terrible heathen Russians! If I should live to see that total destruction
(may God spare me that) I will know that my own brothers and sisters in
the faith have helped make it possible!
It has been pointed out to me that Menno Simons said “we should pay our
taxes” as justification for paying war taxes today. Based on Menno’s life
and teachings, how can anyone even suggest that he would voluntarily pay
our war taxes? I don’t know how it would be possible to dishonor the man
more than to hang that on him, when he was hunted like a criminal for
things a whole lot less contradictory to Jesus’ life and teaching than
voluntarily paying for killing!
In Luke 13:10–17,
the ruler of the synagogue was correct in calling attention to the laws of
the Sabbath. Sabbath observance was a good rule of conduct to obey, but
when it interfered with meeting human need, Jesus demonstrated that
meeting human need took precedence over Sabbath observance.
Now, suppose for the sake of comparison, I allow you to take
Romans 13:1–7
as universally applicable for today’s world. Now you have the same
difference that existed between Jesus and the Pharisees, namely literal
observance of the law versus human good and well being. You are opting for
the former (as the Pharisees did), but Jesus opted for the latter.
Even verses 8, 9, 10 of the same chapter
make it impossible to obey verse 7 if “their dues” are whatever they ask,
because today the payment of war taxes and loving my neighbor as
myself are mutually exclusive!
Certainly Jesus would not view preparation to kill someone as
the proper way to express God’s love.
Some of you say, “The Bible specifically says, ‘Pay your taxes,’ so
that’s what I do and what the government does with it is not my
responsibility.” That was the position of the church during Hitler’s
extermination of the Jews, a position which some of you have criticized
very severely even though to “be faithful” then was much more disastrous
than to be so now. Personal responsibility is such a consistent principle
throughout the Holy Scriptures that I should not need to belabor the
point. Even the worldly legal system has affirmed personal responsibility
regardless of government demands!
If you really behaved in such a simplistic literalism, then you ought
to advocate hatred of parents, because Jesus Himself said that if you
don’t hate your father and mother you can’t be His disciple. Since this is
completely opposite to all His teachings, we know that He said that for
comparison, for emphasis. In the same way, I wished to pay all my taxes
(and always had) until doing so became completely contrary to the life of
Christ!
Some of you argue, “The government will get the money anyway,” or
“Withholding my war taxes won’t stop the arms race.” The exact same
reasoning should put you into a military uniform! I could have reasoned
(as many did) that if I didn’t go into the military, they would just get
someone else to take my place. The day that I was drafted into Civilian
Public Service, I didn’t really notice any lessening of hostilities! I
didn’t take conscientious objector position because I thought it would be
successful (nor is that why I am writing this). The words I want
to hear from my Lord are: “Thou hast been faithful.”
Our citizens are told that all our “defense” (?) budget is to protect
our life and property. (Even if I were in favor of that, I wouldn’t
approve exceeding that by at least 25 times for the personal profit of
special interests.) Some years ago a Mennonite bishop wrote in the
Gospel Herald, “We shouldn’t criticize our
government because they protect our property.” The logical honest
extension of that is: “There is nothing more important than our property.”
What could be more contrary to the essence of the gospel, or the faith of
the Anabaptist martyrs? Didn’t Jesus specifically teach in
Luke 9:24
that if your overriding concern is to save your life, then you
will lose it? Certainly you can already see the beginning of the
financial destruction of our country because of the irresponsible and
insane spending of the military! How pathetic that the Mennonite Church,
because of our worldview, our concept of discipleship, and our persecution
history, could have been in the strength of the Holy Spirit, a powerful
mover toward peace and sanity, but instead has become a farce
instead of a force! History (if there will be any) will say of us
as Jesus said of the Pharisees: “They say, but they do
not.”
Is it any less a sin to kill someone than to ignore human need? If not,
then it seems very appropriate to paraphrase 1 John 3:17
for today. “If any of you have this world’s goods and voluntarily allow
some of it to be used to prepare to kill your brothers and sisters and to
destroy all that God has made, how is it possible for the love
and spirit of the God and Father of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, to
dwell in a heart like that?”
What a horrifying possibility that any one might some day tell Jesus,
“Haven’t we held many evangelistic meetings, preached many great sermons,
written wonderful books, healed the sick, spoken in tongues, sang your
praises with great fervor?” and Jesus will have to say to you, “Depart
from me, ye workers of destruction!”
Have you ever considered this question: What effect will my being an
accomplice to the American military have on our worldwide witness to God’s
love and His saving power?
If I were an unbeliever in some Third World country and knew that
“Christian America” is the only country that ever dropped an atomic bomb
on a civilian population, and that “Christian America” supports and arms
42 repressive dictatorships in order to maintain the highest standard of
living on earth for themselves, and that they sell six times more weapons
of violence and destruction than any other country, and that the church
justifies all that, I am sure that I would never want to become a
Christian or have anything to do with such a God!
I fully expect that you will be able to put me down with theological
arguments, or discredit me with a self-righteous application of Scripture
taken out of context to justify and rationalize your position; but, at least,
ask yourself this pragmatic question: If everyone did as I do,
regarding war taxes, what difference would it make? If everyone (or
even all so-called pacifists) would respectfully decline to pay for war, what
difference would that make?
Why are Mennonites unable to take an official position against paying for war?
Is it because we really don’t know what the truth is? Is it because we never
had it so good and we don’t want to risk anything? Is it because we have
become so acculturated, so affluent that we don’t want martyrs anymore. Do we
much prefer millionaires now?
It is my firm conviction that, as far as God is concerned, the day that I pay
war taxes I effectively discredit all that I have ever said, written, or given
for the cause of peace!
The forces of evil do not care what you say, or how you pray as
long as you pay!
A personal note, please: None of us is “off limits” to Satan’s deception! I
therefore remind you of your responsibility to tell me if you believe that I
have been misled in my search for the path of obedience!
Daniel Slabaugh is pastor of Ann Arbor
(Mich.) Mennonite Church. He
is a laboratory supervisor at
St. Joseph Mercy Hospital and
has a farm as a hobby.
I have only one point of disagreement with Mr. Slabaugh; that is the matter
of paying our war taxes voluntarily. I pay taxes, but not voluntarily. I
happily pay the portion of my taxes which go for human services and running
the government (even if some is wasted), but I do not happily pay the
portion that goes for military support. We have a Quaker friend who once
“arranged” not to pay his war taxes and the
IRS
showed their “appreciation” by “arranging” for him to spend several months
in prison. Some years ago, we refused to pay our telephone surcharge tax but
later found that our checking account had been debited for that amount,
which they claimed we owed. We then refused to pay that tax by having our
telephone removed.
I would like to “arrange” not to pay war taxes, but the consequences for
exercising that “freedom” would be too harsh for me at this Hme. I,
therefore, pay my war taxes “under protest,” and may God have mercy.
I thought this was a pretty extraordinary example of tying yourself in
knots to justify continuing to pay war taxes:
Does a Christian have to pay all of his taxes? I don’t believe that he can
be taxed on what he does not have; and I don’t see any compelling reason
why a Christian should have to accumulate things just so as to pay
more taxes. In fact, a Christian who in his work gathers a great amount of
money to himself probably is doing more harm in participating in whatever
is bringing him the money than is being done by whatever portion of the
money is going to taxes.
But, what happens if we withhold part of the taxes on our incomes? If we do
not pay all of the taxes, people who are employed by defense contractors
and defense-related industries as well as military personnel may be thrown
out of work. Unemployment will be a hardship to these people; it will be
suffering caused by the actions of nonresistant Christians.
I should think that the appropriate method to be used by nonresistant
Christians to close the defense plants would be to convert such a large
part of the population to the discipleship of Christ that there would not
be enough people remaining to man the defense plants. The fact that this is
not now the case may very well be the fault of Christians, past and
present, and not the fault of the defense workers.
Of course, the easy answer is to cause suffering to someone we don’t like
so as to alleviate the suffering of someone we do; or to see the problem in
terms of things (money and bombs) rather than people. We
Christians are not to seek vengeance on the defense workers because of
their production of bombs, but it seems easier to overcome evil with evil
than to attempt to overcome evil with good. In this evil world we would
like to keep just a little evil for our own use, just for self-defense.
We in our human fear forget that man has no more power to destroy himself
than he has power, of himself, to draw his next breath. So we abandon the
methods of Jesus Christ and allow Satan to win the decisive battle and so
rob us of our share in the assured victory of Christ.
Took the traditional Render-unto-Caesar / Romans 13 line, asserting that
U.S. currency
belongs to the
U.S.
government, which can reclaim from Christians it at will.
I found myself cheering enthusiastically when the article by Pastor
Slabaugh on the payment of war taxes appeared… I hope there will be more
and more freedom in church papers to deal with this up and coming concern.
Considerations of conscientious war-tax resistance point up some larger
problems that we as the Mennonite Church live with but don’t necessarily
resolve. These problems have to do not with the ample biblical teaching
supportive of noncompliance with war support, but rather, with the lack of
practical models as well as awareness of support resources and groups.
These facilities would greatly enhance our ability to work out responsible
individual witness stances. Several kinds of practical questions seem to
emerge.
In the first place, what ranges of governmental receptiveness (especially
IRS
receptiveness) have been encountered by members of our faith and what
constructive follow-up responses have we Mennonites explored after we are
categorized as tax-evaders? Second, and more specifically, what kinds of
deduction possibilities have been attempted and upon what rationale?
Third, how may we relate the quality of committed Anabaptist peace
perspectives to the degree we withhold tax dollars? Finally, what types of
congregational support models have emerged and what growth has occurred in
each process?
I seem to hear the Apostle Peter speaking across a vast expanse of time
and firmly addressing not only a failing government but a growing church
as well with a burning perspective — “One should obey God more than men”
(Acts 5:29).
Yes. Now how does it happen within the war-tax arena in practical terms?
There is much discussion about the war tax. Maybe we should also give some
thought to the balance of our tax money. We can name the education tax, the
research tax, welfare tax, road tax, regulatory tax, as a few. We can also
identify the abortion tax, tobacco subsidy tax (although maybe this isn’t a
concern since we accept the fact that a lot of grain goes to the liquor
industry), the waste and fraud tax, and of course the congressman salary
tax that pays the people that vote for the war tax. On the local scene we
have others, including the state, county, and city police tax. I wonder if
paying the tax for local law enforcement could be understood to say that we
recognize that the state needs to carry a stick. Is it possible that it’s
the church’s responsibility to decide how big that stick should be? All
this gets somewhat complicated and confusing. It would be much simpler if
taxes were just taxes.
I thought Fretz’s commentary was a good demonstration of how much the
terms of the debate had shifted, even from the point of view of the
pro-taxpaying faction:
Nonresistant Christians pay taxes
Jesus’ kingdom is one of testimony to truth, saving truth, truth that
changes lives, truth that builds character. Caesar’s kingdom was one that
used the sword to restrain evil and even to crucify the innocent.
And yet Jesus had told inquirers to show Him the coin used for paying
taxes to Caesar.
Then He asked them, “Whose portrait is this? and whose inscription?”
“Caesar’s,” they replied. Then Jesus said to them, “Give to Caesar what is
Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”
Jesus did not discuss what percent of the tax money was spent for soldiers
or for war, even though He knew this. There was no implication in His
teaching that taxes paid to Caesar should be called “war taxes” or that
nonresistant Christians should try to avoid payment of such taxes because
they knew they would be used for military purposes.
In reference to payment of specific taxes for support of the military
enterprise such as were imposed by the Continental government in the time
of the Revolution, one can understand that nonresistant Christians found
themselves unable to pay them and especially so since it was
revolutionaries who were asking for them — to subsidize their rebellion.
Then, too, one can understand the attitude of the nonresistant Hutterites
in Moravia who were asked to pay a special war tax to support the war
against the Turks in the 1500s. Peter Riedemann, their leader, said: “For
war, killing, and bloodshed (where it is demanded especially for that) we
give nothing but not out of wickedness or arbitrariness, but out of the
fear of God (1 Tim. 5)
that we may not be partakers in strange sins” (“Taxation,”
The Mennonite Encyclopedia,
p. 688).
I do not agree with Daniel Slabaugh that the federal income tax is a war
tax, per se. His entire article is based on calling it
that… However, it is a good thing to give one’s farm to the church (and so
reduce one’s payment of a tax that is partly used for military purposes).
But should such gifts be given to the church only to reduce payment of
federal income tax? Would not a more scriptural reason be to help the
church in its mission of testifying to the truth?
When I was a young man of 18, I was graciously healed from a critical
attack of pneumonia, and I decided to devote my life to full-time service
to the Lord, wherever and whenever He would want me to serve. For fifty
years I have served in mission work or Christian school teaching on an
income basis that took care of my needs (Phil. 4:19),
but often exempted me from payment of federal income tax, especially if I
was faithful in support of the Lord’s work and diligent to claim other
exemptions and deductions.
But I do not call federal income tax a war tax, nor think I should promote
nonpayment of it on this basis. Should others want to follow my example of
devoting their lives and income to the Lord’s work I would encourage them
to do so, not primarily to avoid payment of federal income tax, but in
order to build Christ’s church on earth.
I think we need to watch that we don’t lose our salvation in going overboard
in some subjects. I do appreciate a country where we have freedom of worship
to our God. The best way to show our appreciation is to pay our taxes. To
hold some back and refuse to pay, saying, “We don’t want to pay for war” is
not the answer. How do you know that the remaining taxes you pay can also be
put in the military? The taxes are for the government to use and it is
theirs. The responsibility of how and where it is used is theirs also.
I have become increasingly aware of the fact that the issue of payment of
war taxes is dividing the Mennonite Church. I have indeed found myself
pulling for both sides at different times and I realize that much study in
the Word of God is required.
As far as Daniel Slabaugh’s article… is concerned, he raised some very good
questions and made us more aware of our need as a church to come together on
this issue. I am not sure that our problems will go away by all of us
turning our properties over to the church but I do believe Daniel made an
honest response.
I’m not convinced that war taxes is the real issue. Right now this is the
issue that is surfacing, but somehow I believe that God is speaking to all
of us about how we use His money. We are living in an age where luxuries are
now necessities, and giving is done when it is convenient. That doesn’t add
up to the teachings in the New Testament at all.
My suggestion would be to try to live a simpler lifestyle. It is very
obvious only those that make increasing amounts of money pay taxes. Could we
lower our standard of living and give more thereby reducing our taxable
income? My suggestion would include taking a look at the Macedonian church
as Paul talks about them in 2 Cor. 8:1–7.
He tells us that they have given as much as they were able and even beyond
their ability. It would be good to learn a lesson from them. Also let’s look
at what Paul says to the Corinthians in 2 Cor. 9:6–7:
“Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows
generously will also reap generously. Each man should give what he has
decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God
loves a cheerful giver”
(NIV).
Farrar saluted Kratz’s letter, and added: “we must first really tithe all
of our incomes… a life of voluntary simplicity… would make all talk or tax
resistance superfluous. Indeed, I believe the only radical response to
war — that which strikes at the root causes — is voluntary poverty.”
Shall we tell our Caesar that he is wrong? Peter and Paul both said that we
should submit to the authorities and that we should show them honor and
respect. Since we live under a democracy instead of a dictatorship I would
like to suggest that we show respect and honor to our president by sending
him a message. No, not just a letter or a phone call, but a money message.
You know, money speaks!
Let all Mennonites and any others that care to join them send their tax
monies to the Mennonite General Board to forward to the
IRS in
one lump payment with the message, "We, the people, request these monies be
used for people programs and none be used for military purposes.” That would
be democratic and respectful, would it not?
The implications of this statement for the Mennonite Church today are
enormous. Most Americans, believing what the popular media and the
government propaganda tells them, are not really aware of the dangerous path
we are walking as we pile up arms and simultaneously arm other nations
involved in active wars — both internal and international. Mennonites have
been well informed for years about these things but have done far too
little, even symbolically, to redress the imbalance. There is no excuse for
this. When will the church recoil from the unavoidable fact that our taxes
and our greed are destroying our brothers and sisters while we read these
lines? When will we give a strong, clear “No” to the government’s growing
demand for funds for war?
There remains but one immediate response that will suffice — that of
voluntary poverty (living below the federal tax line) and personal service
to those we have wronged. The list of places to work is staggering and
growing longer: Somalia, Cambodia, Italy, Lebanon, the Persian Gulf,
Bangladesh, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Brazil, Mississippi, the inner city,
Appalachia…
Mr. Reagan proposes to cut taxes while increasing the war budget
drastically. He knows there is a real economic crisis simmering in the
U.S., yet is
blind to the fact that our military dominated economy is the single greatest
cause of inflation and unemployment. While he officially opposes the draft
he wants more sophisticated instruments of mass slaughter, costing enormous
amounts of money.
I call the Mennonite Church to stop evading responsibility and challenge her
to stand up publicly, and by word and action, witness for peace and justice
and a nation more ready to welcome the kingdom of God.
Helmuth made a long-overdue frontal assault on the traditional
interpretation of Romans 13:
Is one government ordained as much as another?
Taxes and the faithful church
Twenty years ago efforts to introduce ideas of war-tax refusal into the
Mennonite church met with little response. Times have changed and Daniel
Slabaugh’s “Testimony Regarding the Payment of War Taxes”… indicates how
deeply we are now being challenged on this issue.
No one who endeavors to live in the spirit of Christ can feel easy while
helping to finance the machinery of war. We all want to feel our lives are a
consistent witness for the truth of Christ’s love and are, therefore, made
increasingly uneasy as the testimony against war taxes gains currency within
the church.
The standard method of reasoning, to put at ease those whose conscience has
grown tender on this point, is to remind them that the government is
ordained of God and that Christians, therefore, are to obey the government.
(An exception to this reasoning is made in the case of personal military
service. Having allowed this exception we must, it seems to me, allow that
growth in moral sensitivity may well lead to further civil disobedience. )
What exactly does it mean to say “the government is ordained of God”? To
approach this question we need to distinguish two levels of ordination.
First, we hold the church to be ordained of God in a unique way, quite
distinctly different in origin, character, and mission from other social
institutions. Second, because God is the origin and sustainer of all life,
it may be said that, in general, social institutions are ordained of God.
Plainly, the idea of government being ordained of God belongs to the second
level.
Now, it seems to me, that when someone argues that I must pay my taxes
because the government is ordained of God, they are confusing the two
levels. They are talking as if the government was as uniquely and as
specifically ordained of God as the church. This is plainly not true, and a
good many of our ancestors laid down their lives to avoid this confusion.
Government is born out of a human predisposition to organize and control.
Slavery, being derived from the same human predisposition, may also be
regarded as having once been ordained of God. Slavery evidently gave the
apostle Paul no moral pause. He did not foresee that it would become
intolerable to Ghristian morality. Nor did he foresee that governments would
fall and rise through a wide variety of processes, including representative
assemblies, constitutional conventions, force of arms, and subversive
manipulation.
To regard all governments as somehow equally ordained of God is to sever the
concern for social justice from its biblical mandate. A large talent for
political naivety would be required to see the government visited on Uganda
by Idi Amin and the government of Switzerland as equally legitimate.
It is possible to argue that one’s own government is “more ordained” than
others, but such a self-serving view brings with it the whole baggage of
civil religion, and ill befits the world-servant role to which we understand
ourselves called. Governments may be ordained of God in some general
naturalistic sense, but people who care about social justice and human
well-being must judge whether they are legitimate or illegitimate.
Perhaps because Mennonites have a traditional aloofness from politics, the
matter of legitimacy in government often seems poorly understood. I have
seen it argued recently in the Mennonite press, and supported by biblical
proof texts, that opposing the government on the war-tax issue is the same
as opposing God.
It is important to understand that the political framework needed to support
this argument is something very close to the “divine right of kings.” Why
this antique political notion, deriving from ancient and medieval despotisms
and seriously confusing church and state, should be used against the
testimony of tax refusers in the Mennonite Church is, indeed, a curious
matter. Perhaps others, better equipped than I, can delve lovingly into the
motivations of this desperate argument.
Life in North America has been so good to our people that it is difficult to
imagine Mennonites becoming an outlaw church on the issue of war taxes. Yet
the teachings of Jesus and the demands of faithfulness, if taken seriously,
plainly move us in that direction. The conviction that the faithful church
must, at times, become an outlaw church should not be shocking to those
acquainted with Anabaptist origins and history.
If we don’t draw the line at paying for nuclear weapons (or conventional
weapons, for that matter), will we draw it at their use? Military planners
no longer regard nuclear weapons as of deterrent use only. They are openly
talking about a limited use of their offensive first-strike capacity.
What if a nuclear bomb had been dropped on Hanoi in an effort to end the war
in Vietnam? What if the American government uses nuclear weapons to maintain
access to Middle East oil? Would the church then draw the line and move into
a position of active tax refusal? Or will we sit tight, no matter what the
government does?
Is there any threshold of violence or oppression which the government might
cross that would cause the Mennonite Church to advocate tax refusal?
Yoder was having nothing of such scriptural revisionism:
“The teachings of Jesus and the demands of faithfulness, if taken
seriously, plainly move us in that direction [of resisting taxes which may
be used for military purposes],” writes Keith Helmuth…
Whatever teachings he has in mind, however, he neglects to identify. Of
course, that is a common omission among Mennonite writers who advocate tax,
draft, and other forms of “resistance” and “civil” disobedience. Bold
assertions, sharp reasonings, and generalized allusions to Scripture. But,
no direct quotes or citings of passages.
I feel the teachings of Jesus plainly move us in a direction radically
different from tax resistance. I find those teachings in such places as
Mt. 5:41
where Jesus is quoted as instructing those who would seriously seek the
kingdom to, if forced to go a distance, continue on an additional distance.
It is my understanding that this teaching likely referred to the practice
of the Roman army to conscript civilians, literally off the street, and
force them to carry military supplies for perhaps a mile or so. From that
it seems logical for me to conclude that Jesus did not even exclude forced
assistance of the military (such as by taxes) from the compensatory love
response he prescribed for those who are beaten, stolen from, forced to do
things against their will.
Certainly the faithful church will often also face becoming an outlaw
church. The Scripture makes that plain. But, search as I may, I can’t find
any scriptural evidence that resisting taxes is something our Lord would
call us to. Rather, I can only conclude tax resistance to be a symptom of
the philosophy of those seeking a political kingdom and a social salvation
through the exercise of earthly power.
It seems to me that it is only fair that Mennonite editors ask writers
supporting tax resistance to document all supportive references found in
Scripture for their points. I think we readers are by now quite familiar
with their reasonings and rhetoric. If they have a scriptural basis, let’s
hear it.
D.R. Yoder is correct. I cannot cite a specific teaching of Jesus on war tax
refusal.
The case for war tax refusal, however, rests not on proof texts, but on the
fact that Jesus introduced a profound moral vision, with an extraordinary
potential for growth, into the stream of human consciousness. When Jesus was
asked about the “greatest commandment” He replied: “Thou shalt love the Lord
thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it.
Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.”
Starting from this masterly summation of spiritual life, faithfulness, it
seems to me, depends on our growth in moral sensitivity and not on our
ability to correctly analyze all the cultural idiosyncrasies to which Jesus
was necessarily responding. Should we help finance the defoliation of our
neighbor’s rice fields or the massacre of her family just because Jesus
never had the occasion to comment on those situations? I think it entirely
fair to say the “teachings of Jesus” move us away from such behavior.
It was recognized by the early Anabaptists that personal military service
was seriously out of harmony with “the teachings of Jesus.” The refusal of
state ordered military service is not a specific injunction of Jesus, but
the growth in moral sensitivity which accompanied the Anabaptist movement
drew out this inherent aspect of the gospel. The same process, apparently,
kept the Anabaptist settlers in the New World from making use of readily
available slave labor, though Jesus nowhere condemns the institution of
slavery. It is this same growth in moral sensitivity, …which is now focusing
the issue.
As for “seeking a political kingdom and a social salvation through the
exercise of earthly power,” I doubt that very many who support the witness
of war tax refusal have any such aspirations. “Political kingdoms” can only
exist on the conscripted lives and resources of our communities and it is
exactly this that tax refusal opposes. The concept of “social salvation”
has, by now, lost even its nostalgia value. Our dreams are far more modest.
We hope to avoid nuclear holocaust and keep the planet habitable. We want
the resources now being wasted in military budgets to help feed, house, and
clothe the poor of the world. This is not “social salvation.” It is only
good sense and common decency.
One final note: The issue of war tax refusal is one that all persons have to
weigh in the balance against all the other important factors in their lives.
Judge not is the rule here. What makes no sense from the standpoint of a
growing family might come to make good sense after 50.
Our lofty discussion is probably beside the point. If we could see the
anguish that brings people to the point of tax refusal we would be inundated
with images of napalm and herbicides raining down on Vietnam, families
massacred in El Salvador, and the chilling vision of the neutron bomb
grinning over empty cities.
All our rhetoric, all our proof texts stagger and fall in the face of a dead
child and screaming mother with helicopters thundering overhead. The
crucifixion of Christ’s flesh is ever before us. Our sins roll across the
landscape. We do what we must and pray for strength.
In the Mennonite Board of
Congregational Ministries board of directors met.
Among their decisions:
In harmony with the General Board
action to support the General Conference Mennonite Church in their judicial
challenge of the collecting of taxes by church agencies, the board acted to
encourage staff “to publicize among our congregations the issues involved in
the judicial action and the need for funds for this purpose.”
The organizers of the Smoketown Consultation (which was in part a conservative
Eastern Mennonite backlash against war tax resistance and other innovations)
met again in in what was
called the “Berne consultation.” This time, however, according to
Gospel Herald:
“Little attention at Berne was given to war taxes, a dominant theme at Smoketown…”
…neither the Mennonite Church nor the IKV
feels comfortable with individual radical action. Example: 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-taxes portion of his income tax to the Dutch Mennonite
Peace Group via the local income tax office.
This effort was fraudulently aborted 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.
In a Peace Tax Fund-boosting article
in the issue, it was noted that
war tax resisters acted as the “bad cop” to the “good cop” of lobbyists:
“[David] Bassett and others cited the ‘inconvenience factor’ of current war tax
resistance to the IRS as further incentive for change in the tax laws.”
Richerd Lewman, Jr. went back on
the offensive with a forceful rebuttal of Christian war tax resistance for the
issue:
To accept the statements that justify the nonpayment of war taxes is to accept
the statement that Jesus was a hypocrite.
After reading much about the war-tax issue and listening to much discussion,
both pro and con, I wanted to find out more about the issue, so that I could
take a stand consistent with God’s teachings. I read all that I could that
justified not paying taxes. Then I read as much as possible justifying the
payment of taxes. Both of these included much Bible reading and prayer. I then
did a lot more praying and asking God to guide me to what his truth is. He led
me to more reading and research.
After all of this, I was led to only one conclusion. If we believe Jesus
taught that we should not pay taxes to a government in the process of or
planning to slaughter people, then Jesus was a hypocrite because he paid his
taxes. If Jesus was a hypocrite, because he taught one thing and did another,
then Jesus sinned and he was not the unblemished lamb suitable to die for our
sins. So there cannot be salvation through him.
The first point made by those who would condone, even encourage, the
nonpayment of war taxes, is that income tax is voluntary, because it requires
citizen cooperation and to pay it is to agree with the government’s policies.
Using this same line of thinking we could say that all laws are voluntary, and
to obey them is to agree with them. I may not agree that I should not drive
any faster than 55 miles per hour, but if I decide not to obey the law I will
be penalized for it. If I pay my taxes I do not necessarily agree with how my
tax money is spent. But I still must pay.
A second point that is made is that the personal responsibility of loving my
neighbor comes before the law. I agree. But, I ask this question. What were
some of Jesus’ actions and how did they coincide with his teachings? Many
instances of civil disobedience and tax evasion have been justified using
Jesus’ teachings. I feel that his teachings are removed from their context if
they are not in agreement with the example of his perfect life. Do we read in
the Bible that Jesus went to Rome to picket in front of the Senate about the
atrocities committed against Jerusalem. Do we find Jesus lobbying to have the
Roman troops withdrawn from the temple, or for the exemption of the Jews from
paying the many taxes levied on them largely for the support of the
bloodthirsty Roman army? Or do we find Jesus not paying his war taxes? The
answer to each of these questions is a very clear “No!”
But wait, you say it was different back then. Was it?
They say that we must not pay our taxes, in order to make a witness, since we
as Mennonites are not drafted anymore. Well, the Jews in Jesus’ time were not
drafted either. They say they did not have conscription back then. Wrong.
Conscription dates back to the earliest civilization. They say that our
government needs our money more than our bodies. Well, the Roman government
needed money, because many of the soldiers were professionals and they fought
for the money. They say today we have the atom bomb, the most destructive war
machine ever devised by man, up to this time. Back then it was the Roman army,
the most destructive and bloodthirsty war machine ever devised by man, up to
that time.
How do we know that Jesus paid his taxes? The Tribute Coin referred to by
Jesus was a coin used to pay the poll tax which had to be paid by every male
person, ages 14–65, and by females, ages 12–65. If Jesus had not paid his tax,
would not the Pharisees and Sadducees have brought this to the attention of
Pilate when Jesus was before him, since they were looking for something to
convict him of?
If you say that Jesus’ teachings are that we should not pay our war taxes, I
cannot accept this. I believe that Jesus was the perfect example of the
Christian life and that his life was consistent with his teachings and that he
was not a hypocrite. If Jesus paid taxes to the government of his time, then I
can do no less. In fact, I must pay those taxes if I am to be in accordance
with Jesus’ life and teachings.
You say that we must follow the leading of the Holy Spirit. I agree, but how
do we discern the leading of the Holy Spirit? We must go to the Bible. If the
Bible and Jesus’ example contradict what we thought was the leading of the
Holy Spirit, then it can’t be the leading of the Holy Spirit. The leading of
the Holy Spirit, if it is authentic, will always agree with the life and
teachings of Jesus.
You ask. Why doesn’t the Mennonite Church take an official position against
payment of war taxes? I ask you. How can we take an official position
condemning something that Jesus did? I am in no position to question Jesus’
actions!
If we are to be consistent about not paying our war taxes because we disagree
with their purpose, then let’s stop paying that portion of our taxes that goes
for abortion and subsidizes the tobacco industry. But then, why not withhold
our property taxes if the schools teach evolution or sex education? Once the
pattern of nonpayment as protest is begun, there will be no logical place to
stop.
Jesus taught us to pay our taxes and his example showed us we must do the
same. If I am to be a Christian and desire Jesus to say to me someday, “Well
done, good and faithful servant,” then I can do no less than pay my taxes.
A
letter from Elvin Glick
fired just about every arrow from the traditionalist quiver: “there is no such
thing as a war tax” — “The government has a right to its armies and police
forces.” — “Governments have a right to levy taxes.” — Render unto Caesar, two
kingdoms, go the extra mile, Romans 13, Jesus & Paul never resisted their
governments, war taxes are different from military service,
etc.
[One extreme of the feedback:] In 22½ hours of business sessions, 266
delegates who answered the roll call “dragged their feet in giving women equal
leadership opportunities in the church, in speaking with a clear voice on
nuclear armaments and war taxes, and in preparing a relevant and up-to-date
confession of faith.”
In their business sessions delegates… in the longest discussion of the
week — struggled with how to realize reconciliation with a delegate who
denounced them for continuing to pay war taxes.
Most of the floor discussion centered in the letter to President Reagan…
“There’s an unfortunate philosophy behind this letter,” said James Hess,
Bethel, Pa. “It’s that
because I’m a Christian, I’m qualified to advise the government how to go
about its business. That goes against our historic doctrine of the separation
of church and state.”
Said Dan Slabaugh, Whitmore,
Mich.: “The president will
laugh when he reads this letter — if he reads it at all. He’ll laugh because
he knows that every payday we disavow what we say when we continue to pay our
taxes for war.”
A sidebar to that article read:
A prophetic voice?
How does the assembly process minority viewpoints? That became the focus in an
intense discussion engaging assembly delegates for 2½ hours beyond their
scheduled closing time in the final business session.
Impetus for the discussion came when Dan Slabaugh, Whitmore Lake,
Mich., asked permission to
make a four-minute statement on a concern of his. He confronted delegates with
their failure to back up their sentiments about peace, as stated in their
letter to President Reagan, with their actions. “Why do you continue to pay
taxes that go for war purposes?” he asked. “The religious community in America
could stop the arms buildup if it wanted to; I can’t understand why this
doesn’t excite us.”
Slabaugh reported he had wanted to put two motions on the floor but had been
advised by assembly leaders not to. (Later discussion revealed one motion
would have called delegates to acknowledge that paying war taxes was sin but
that they planned to continue doing so anyway; the other would have called for
all Mennonites to stop paying war taxes immediately.) In frustration Slabaugh
concluded: “I joined the Mennonite Church because of its stand on peace and
nonresistance. I will leave it for the same reason.” He then walked off the
assembly floor to participate in a seminar on war taxes.
In subsequent discussion, many delegates voiced concern about the incident and
called for reconciliation to be effected between Slabaugh and assembly
leaders. There was also discussion on how the assembly can hear a prophetic
word and what is the process by which it is determined whether or not a
minority opinion is prophetic.
After long discussion, delegates approved a motion which (1) made Slabaugh’s
concerns about war taxes a part of the official record of the assembly; (2)
asked the Council on Faith, Life, and Strategy to bring proposals to the next
assembly for dealing with the war tax issue and for discerning “prophetic
voices”; (3) called for immediate steps to be taken to bring about
reconciliation between Slabaugh and the assembly.
For Suzanne Polen, a part-time research microbiologist in Pittsburgh,
President Reagan’s recent decisions to increase arms spending mean that she
will no longer pay that portion of her taxes she says would fund national
defense. “The government is buying weapons which will eventually kill me,”
said the 45-year-old tax protester. Instead of paying her full tax bill to the
government, she plans to deposit about 50 percent of the money into the newly
created Pittsburgh Fund for Life, which describes itself as a peace and
justice ministry.
Since the Vietnam War ended, Wildon Fadely of the Internal Revenue Service
said, the number of those who have withheld taxes to protest Pentagon
activities has been “minuscule.” The category is so small that no separate
records are kept, he added. But he admitted his general impression was the
“protests of all kinds are on the rise.”
A conservative Anabaptist conference on “Basic Biblical Beliefs”
was held in . Among its
concerns for the church: “There is a growing alignment with ‘leftist elements’
who advocate civil disobedience, demonstrations, and nonpayment of taxes used
for military purposes.”
We call for acts of tax resistance to be undertaken since our federal income
taxes fuel the arms race. We suggest giving funds denied for use in building
nuclear weapons to groups working for peace and disarmament, and to groups
meeting human needs.
Jim Longacre, Peace Section chairman, brought a statement of concern to the
group for possible adoption. After the document was criticized for not being
specific enough, the group moved to add a paragraph on the war tax issue.
Although there was some dissent regarding the usefulness of a statement (one
person noted: “It’s easier to assent to a piece of paper than to be
accountable”), and the initial voting process was confused and had to be
repeated, the majority of the participants approved the statement.
That section of the statement read:
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.
Episcopal Bishop Robert H. Cochrane of Olympia,
Wash., while denouncing the
worldwide buildup of nuclear arms, stopped short of condoning a tax revolt as
did his Roman Catholic counterpart.
“Please know that I shall continue to pay to my government every penny of my
income tax, but at the same time every penny that I save under our president’s
new tax plan I shall give away to meet the needs of the poor and uncared for,”
Bishop Cochrane said in his annual address to the diocesan convention.
“I invite you to do the same.”
Bishop Cochrane’s diocese covers western Washington, the same area taken in by
the archdiocese of Catholic Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen of Seattle. The
archbishop has become a rallying point for a growing anti-nuclear movement
among leaders of nearly a dozen denominations in the Pacific Northwest.
Archbishop Hunthausen has said that people would be morally justified in
refusing to pay 50 percent of their income taxes in nonviolent resistance to
nuclear “murder and suicide.” He also said he favors unilateral nuclear
disarmament.
Truman H. Brunk, Jr., snuck a
war tax resistance message into his article
“Disarmed by his peace”:
Neither can Christians hide their eyes from the evil insanity of the arms
race. Christ came to signal peace on earth, not preparation for war. Christ’s
peace means that we cannot participate in the crime of preparation for nuclear
war. The obedience of Christians to their government is not absolute and
unconditional. We need the courage to avoid adding even a particle of evil to
our broken creation. How long can good Mennonites pray for peace and pay for
nuclear readiness with our tax dollars?
[T]here are three things God is doing in Ames, Iowa… [including] the
formulation of guidelines for a war tax alternative fund.
[Ames Mennonite Fellowship] is taking the lead in establishing a war tax
alternative fund for persons in the Ames area who are conscientiously opposed
to paying taxes for war. In ,
AMF
took formal action to establish the fund. Since then, some $300 has been
contributed to it. On
seven persons gathered and drew up guidelines for participation in the fund.
In brief, the group determined that contributors to the fund need to pay “an
equivalent to the amount actually withheld from Internal Revenue Service.”
Participants are expected to sign a “statement of purpose and guidelines” at
the time of the first deposit. Keith Schrag, Dan Clark, and other
AMF
participants in the fund welcome questions and counsel from the broader church
in this matter.
This is the twenty-third 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.
Here’s how Larry Cornies of the Gospel Herald
reported on the negotiations between the General Conference Mennonite Church
and the
IRS
(the Mennonite Church, with which Gospel Herald was
associated, was supporting the General Conference action but from a bit of a
distance):
Representatives of the General Conference Mennonite Church and the Internal
Revenue Service failed to reach an 11th-hour
compromise at a meeting in Washington on
which would have averted a suit by the 63,000-member denomination against the
government agency.
IRS
officials at the meeting denied that there was any administrative solution to
the conference’s complaint that it must withhold the income taxes of its
employees, thereby acting as a tax collector for the state. The denomination
has argued, and will argue in a forthcoming judicial action, that the
IRS
requirement violates the concept of separation of church and state as embodied
in the First Amendment in the
U.S. Constitution.
“The 45-minute meeting was cordial, but unproductive,” said Vem Preheim,
general secretary for the conference. “We outlined our concerns about the
withholding issue as a historic peace church and described the problem which
the IRS
requirement poses for us.”
William Ball, the conference’s attorney in the matter, then formally asked
members of the
IRS’s
special working group on withholding issues whether there was any way to
exempt the General Conference from the problematic requirement.
Nancy Schuhmann, who chairs the special group, stated that the
IRS must
abide by its codes of operation and would not be able to offer an exemption on
tax withholding to the conference.
IRS
officials Susan Cunningham and Gail Libin were also present for the
discussions.
In light of the results of the
meeting, attorney Ball will complete the preparation of the conference
complaint and submit the brief to a
U.S. district court
after one last check to make sure all administrative possibilities have been
exhausted.
The General Conference’s General Board was authorized to initiate a judicial
action on the tax withholding question at an international gathering of the
conference membership at Estes Park,
Colo., in
.
More than a year earlier, on ,
delegates to a special midtriennium conference session instructed the General
Board to “use all legal, legislative, and administrative avenues for
achieving[”] conscientious objector exemption to the tax withholding
requirement.
John J. Hostetter, Jr. attacked
the new war tax resistance craze in a commentary titled “Render unto Caesar”:
In the , issue of the
Gospel Herald, the forms of protest on nuclear
weaponry advocated by
MCC,
Peace Section, include the following, “We call for acts of tax resistance to
be undertaken since our federal income taxes fuel the arms race. We suggest
giving funds denied for use in building nuclear weapons to groups working for
peace and disarmament, and to groups meeting human needs.”
Such statements are damaging and completely misleading. It gives the
impression to the uninformed that an option for taxpayers is withholding part
of their tax liability and sending it somewhere of their own choosing. Rather,
the choice is whether one pays his tax or whether he pays his tax plus penalty
and interest. The only other possibility at present is fraud for deliberately
not reporting income, which is even more serious.
Pick and choose from the budget? Most ethical and religious protestors
base their action on the notion that one can pick and choose in the budgetary
items of the government, as a shopper at a department store. It is implied
that taxes are a voluntary contribution to the government by its citizens and
therefore, if they don’t like the way the money is spent, they can withhold
the part of the contribution they don’t like.
The courts have long ago settled this also. There is a classic quotation from
Judge Learned Hand, “Over and over again courts have said that there is
nothing sinister in so arranging one’s affairs as to keep taxes as low as
possible. Everybody does so, rich and poor, and all do right, for nobody owes
any public duty to pay more than the law demands; taxes are enforced
exactions, not voluntary contributions.”
While one can so arrange his affairs to pay as little as possible within the
law, this does not imply the right to pay the part one likes and refuse the
rest any more than one can dictate how the groceryman uses the money paid for
groceries. Once the tax liability is assessed, it is no longer the taxpayer’s
money. Otherwise very few would pay any taxes since we all feel we have better
ways to spend money than the way the government spends it.
Some object to the defense budget, while others feel just as strongly about
the welfare program. Although far less than one tenth of one percent of church
people protest taxes to the point of refusing to voluntarily pay all of their
taxes without confiscation, yet probably a high percentage of Christians as
well as non-Christians would opt to send their tax money to a “Peace Fund”
were that option available. At present it is not. Perhaps in the future the
Congress may grant such an election in much the same way that taxpayers can
direct $1 of their taxes to the presidential election campaign. Even if such
were possible, it wouldn’t change the size of the budget for defense.
In the Waitzkin case of , the court said that
conscientious objectors couldn’t withhold 50 percent of their tax on the basis
of “war crimes” deduction. Neither religious beliefs nor international law
relieve citizens of tax liability. Tax is neutral on religious matters and is
imposed on all citizens, even though each may object to some specific
governmental expenditure on religious grounds.
Likewise in the McDade case, the “war crimes” deduction was disallowed. The
taxpayer’s belief that the government shouldn’t force its citizens to
participate in taking of lives didn’t relieve her of an obligation to pay tax.
In another case, the taxpayer’s deduction for “conscientious objection to
military expenditures” was denied and the negligence penalty imposed. Military
protest deduction wasn’t permitted under the code. Taxpayer lacked standing to
contest military expenditures of the government. (Reimer) In the Van Tol case,
the war tax credit was denied; sincerity of the taxpayer’s objection to war
didn’t excuse the tax liability.
The government gets the money. A few observations could be made. First,
such protestations, as sincere as they are, are not accomplishing what may be
the desire of the protest, in that the government ends up with more, not less,
money for undesirable purposes as a result of the protest. Not only will the
tax be collected, but penalty and interest as well. (The average increase is
$207 for penalty alone.)
Second, in the case of war or defense, not one cent less will be spent for
bullets, bombs, or battleships because of the protest. Tax money which we
might earmark for Cambodian Relief, as good as that might be, only means other
money out of the same treasury is used for what the Congress believes is
necessary for national defense, and if that is not enough, the government will
simply borrow what it needs. One who thinks that such a fund will change the
size of national defense has only a superficial method of salving his
conscience.
Third, Internal Revenue agents, with (against) whom I have worked, openly joke
at such protest tactics. Regardless of the agents’ own personal views on the
use of tax money, which all citizens agree leaves much to be desired, they as
public servants must go and collect the tax whether it is from an impoverished
taxpayer, a religious protestor, or a fraudulent evader. Thus all that is
accomplished is a reduction in efficiency and an increase in the cost of
collection in the tax system. The Revenue Service doesn’t make the laws;
Congress does. A much more valid approach is correspondence with those in
Congress responsible for the present law and who have the power to change it.
Certainly the revenue agents have no jurisdiction over setting up the national
budget.
Internal Revenue agents deserve our respect. They are, with some exceptions,
well trained and conscientious, doing a job necessary to insure compliance and
integrity in the tax system. (After all, Jesus selected one as one of his
disciples. While he wasn’t the star of the show, he certainly wasn’t the
villain either.)
It would be interesting to know what percentage of church people have ever
written to their congressman expressing their concern on militarism. The
percentage would probably increase if names and addresses of congressmen were
available on church bulletin boards with sample letters for those who want
some positive ways to express their concerns.
I cringe when reports come out in the paper of tax protestors who have been
convicted of tax evasion on religious grounds with a byline that they are
Mennonites, with the implied impression that this is a belief of such
churches. Mennonites do not believe that. Editors of newspapers and
periodicals should be corrected when it is implied. The vast majority of
Christians believe such a stance to be unscriptural teaching.
This prompted a series of letters to the editor in response:
Called Hotstetter’s commentary “a breath of fresh air” and said “the newer
viewpoint promoted so much presently is not the historical nor the
majority viewpoint of the Mennonite brotherhood.”
“I differ from his assessment that those in our churches who cannot in
Christian conscience pay war taxes are ‘simply being contrary.’ That seems
to me to be a judgment form the world rather than the Word. I believe
that, increasingly, those who have ears to hear will understand that,
while it may be contrary to the world, to resist payment of war taxes is
being faithful to the Word of God.”
The failure of the General Conference Mennonite Church to reach an agreement
with the Internal Revenue Service… should come as no surprise. Furthermore,
if the case goes to court the winner can be predicted with a considerable
degree of assurance. It will be Attorney Ball in collecting his fee. It is
to be hoped that our church does not emulate the unenviable position in
which that church now finds itself. It can hardly back down without
swallowing its pride and cannot push forward with any hope of success in the
untenable stance it is taking. The constituency should scream at using so
much funds on such a case.
The requirement of the service to withhold taxes and forward them to the
government is nothing new. It has been on the books for more than a
generation. If they had not signed the waiver on Social Security taxes, they
would have more of a leg to stand on. They can’t have it both ways.
Felt that even if Hostetter’s arguments were valid, “there is still the
conviction, scripturally based, that we must witness to Christ’s way of
peace. Our quiet support for the military as we pay our taxes each year is
not consistent with that witness.” Says Flickinger: “Christian war tax
resisters are basing their actions on Scripture, not on a desire to
attract persecution or publicity.”
The issue included an
editorial,
“As for taxes…”,
from Daniel Hertzler. There wasn’t much meat there. It talked around the
subject for the most part, though it did mention Hertzler’s own
dipping-his-toes-in: “For a time I resisted the telephone tax, but then I gave
up. Perhaps I was a little overly impressed by the threatening form letters
which began to come from the Internal Revenue Service. Also, tax refusal seemed
like a form of revolution. As an orderly Mennonite, revolution is not my
style.”
That prompted Art Landis to shoot back in the issue with
a letter to the editor
taking Hertzler to task for romanticizing earlier generations who “had no
compassion for the slave or the prisoner. I believe the state could have
constructed concentration camps and gas ovens next to their meetinghouses and
they would not have protested.”
Good statements can have a reverse and negative effect… The statement can
serve to immunize us and keep us from action. We have resolved our guilt by
preparing another statement. This statement calls for a radical change of
lifestyle. Guilt and inner conflict are not as easily laid aside as this
statement might indicate. Wrestling with the complex issues of peace does not
successfully reduce inner conflict. What would really happen if “the old self
that lives for self dies”? We call into judgment economic systems that keep
millions poor when we ourselves are very deeply rooted in that economic
system. We denounce wars, but no consensus can be reached regarding applying
the same biblical understanding to paying for the hardware of war as we have
for giving of our bodies for war.
[A]t Bowling Green when a brother expressed
his concern over the assembly’s failure to deal with the question of obedience
as it relates to payment of taxes for war. Even though long discussion
followed, business proceeded very much as usual…
The question that comes to my mind is whether we indeed should make statements
such as these when we know well enough that the very structures of our
institutions would be shattered if we attempted to live out the text of the
statement.
Responding to Seattle Catholic Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen’s call for a tax
revolt against the nuclear arms race, Lutheran pacifists have urged
co-religionists to join the protest, redirecting the money to the poor. “We
shall act on Bishop Hunthausen’s encouragement to resist a percentage of our
federal income tax that is symbolic of allocations made to the military,” said
the New York-based Lutheran Peace Fellowship, an independent intra-Lutheran
group which works with the International Fellowship of Reconciliation.
“We will no longer offer our tax dollars for a nuclear military that affronts
the lordship of Jesus. Instead, we choose to redirect resisted tax dollars to
the poor of our country and of our world.”
Conscientious tax resisters who were hoping the courts would find a place for
them in the U.S.
Constitution were disappointed (Levi Miller reporting):
Amish employers and employees cannot invoke their religious beliefs to avoid
paying Social Security and federal unemployment taxes, the Supreme Court ruled
on .
The unanimous decision overturned a western Pennsylvania judge’s ruling that
forcing the Amish to pay such taxes violates their freedom of religion.
Chief Justice Warren E. Burger said, “The design of the [Social Security]
system requires support by mandatory contributions from covered employers and
employees.”
The controversy arose when the internal Revenue Service informed Edwin Lee, an
Old Order Amish carpenter from Lawrence County,
Pa., that he owed some
$27,000 in back taxes. Lee had not paid any Social Security taxes for himself
or his employees since . He also had not
withheld such taxes.
It was noted in the ruling that Congress has already provided for a tax
exemption that covers self-employed Amish, such as farmers. The Amish believe
that the church and the family should take care of the elderly and do not
withdraw the government funds at old age.
John A. Hostetler, a professor at Temple University and member of the Plains
Mennonite Church, commented on the ruling by saying that although “it is a
blow for religious liberty in general, in the long run it is better for the
Amish to pay it. If they were exempt, it would create jealousy.”
Hostetler said he did not know how many of these small shops would be
involved. “It will mean more paperwork for them,” he concluded.
A follow-up by Phil Shenk explained the consequences for war tax resisters:
The U.S. Supreme
Court indirectly referred to the issue of war tax resistance and the World
Peace Tax Fund in its
ruling, denying an Amish employer exemption from paying and collecting Social
Security taxes.
The unanimous decision, plus the arguments employed by the court, may also
have diminished the prospects for success in the General Conference Mennonite
Church’s case asking for an employer’s exemption from collecting
federal-military income taxes for the government.
In the Amish case, Amishman Edwin Lee had refused to withhold Social Security
taxes from his Amish employees’ paychecks and failed to pay the employer’s
share of their Social Security taxes, claiming that doing so would violate his
and his employees’ First Amendment rights to the free exercise of religion.
Lee said the Amish believe it is sinful not to provide for their elderly and
needy themselves and therefore are opposed to the national social security
system.
Unlike the celebrated case, in which the
Supreme Court granted the Amish an exemption from Wisconsin’s compulsory
school-attendance law based on their free exercise of religion rights, the
Supreme Court here held that the government’s interest should overrule the
religious rights of the individual because it would be difficult for the
Social Security system to accommodate the “myriad exceptions flowing from a
wide variety of religious beliefs.”
In ruling that Amishman Lee’s First Amendment religious rights must “yield to
the common good,” the Supreme Court raised the issue of conscientious
objectors’ refusal to pay taxes that go for what the court called “war-related
activities.” The court said it could not see any difference between Lee’s
refusal to pay Social Security taxes and the position of one who refuses to
pay war taxes.
“If, for example, a religious adherent believes war is a sin, and if a certain
percentage of the federal budget can be identified as devoted to war-related
activities, such individuals would have a similarly valid claim to be exempt
from paying that percentage of the income tax.”
The problem with this, the court said, is that “[t]he tax system could not
function if denominations were allowed to challenge the tax system because tax
payments were spent in a manner that violates their religious belief.”
In a very broad statement that implicitly referred to religious conscientious
objection to federal-military income taxes as well as Social Security taxes,
the court revealed its basic rule: “Because the broad public interest in
maintaining a sound tax system is of such a high order, religious belief in
conflict with the payment of taxes affords no basis for resisting the tax.”
The court did recognize that Congress has passed a constitutionally sound law
that exempts Amish who are self-employed from paying Social Security taxes.
But it held that taxes imposed on employers “must be uniformly applicable to
all, except as Congress provides explicitly otherwise.” Because Congress has
not exempted Amish employers or their employees from Social Security taxes,
the court refused to honor their religious rights over the interests of the
nation as a whole.
Before Congress, in the proposed World Peace Tax Fund legislation, is explicit
language that would “exempt” conscientious objectors from paying war taxes and
instead divert their taxes to peaceful governmental activities. If passed,
this might provide the authority the court has implied it needs before it will
honor the rights of war tax objectors.
A Mennonite lawyer, John Yoder, is working as one of several assistants to
Chief Justice Burger, the author of the opinion striking down Amishman Lee’s
free exercise of religion rights. Burger’s Mennonite aide is originally from
Hesston, Kan.
The decision was so gratuitously dismissive of conscientious tax refusal that
the General Conference Mennonite Church decided to
halt its legal action,
on :
In the light of a negative judgment rendered by the
U.S. Supreme Court
against an Amish employer on ,
the General Conference’s judicial action committee has recommended to the
denomination’s General Board that a planned suit against the
IRS on
the issue of tax withholding “be put on indefinite hold.” The committee’s
decision came at the end of a
conference call with William Ball, who has been preparing the case
on behalf of the church group over the past year. During the telephone
meeting, Ball indicated that, considering the Supreme Court ruling in the case
IRS vs. Lee,
the General Conference would almost certainly lose its case.
In a cover story in the issue
Donald B. Kraybill proposed some ideas on
what to do about the threat of nuclear war.
Idea #10 was “Refuse to pay some of your federal income taxes as a witness to
your faith. If you’re scared, try a small amount like $7.77. If that’s too
scary, at least send a letter describing the difficulty of praying for peace
and paying for war. Those who pay taxes without sending such a letter are
quietly condoning and supporting the nuclear arms buildup.”
Raymond Hunthausen’s war tax resistance, which had been alluded to earlier, was
covered in a brief note:
Seattle Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen announced that he will withhold half
of his income tax to protest “our nation’s
continuing involvement in the race for nuclear arms supremacy.”
“As Christians imbued with the spirit of peacemaking expressed by the Lord in
the Sermon on the Mount, we must find ways to make known our objections to the
present concentration on further nuclear arms buildup,” the archbishop told
300 peace activists attending a meeting at Notre Dame University.
In the issue, Ivan H.
Stoltzfus felt compelled to write in to explain
“Why I pay taxes.”
The standard set of bible verses were deployed to explain that worldly goods
are at the disposal of worldly governments; Rome’s government was no better
than ours, so Paul’s advice in Romans 13 still holds; besides, it’s impossible
to determine what percentage of your taxes are objectionable, so you might as
well pay the whole thing. Still, Stoltzfus wrote, if there were a Peace Tax
Fund law, he’d go along with it.
A senate of priests in Iowa has voted to support a Catholic lay minister who
refuses to pay his federal income taxes as a protest against the nuclear arms
race.
The resolution approved by the representative group of priests in the Dubuque
Catholic archdiocese says they commend Tom Cordaro and
St. Thomas Aquinas parish at
Ames for their courageous stand relative to the payment of taxes for military
and nuclear armaments.
Mr. Cordaro, 27, has held back most of his income taxes
because he believes it would be a
sin to contribute money for nuclear weapons. The parish council at
St. Thomas Aquinas has refused
to honor an order by the Internal Revenue Service to turn over Mr. Cordaro’s
wages to satisfy the $828 tax debt.
Dan E. Hoellwarth made another attempt to defang Romans 13 in the
issue. According to him, the
description of government in that chapter should be seen as prescriptive, not
descriptive, and is meant to restrict which sorts of governments Christians owe
allegiance to: “what if the leaders are not acting in accordance with Scripture?”
“Obviously we should pay taxes… However…”
The Catholic war tax resisters were back again in the
issue:
The Catholic peace advocate Daniel Berrigan says he will take the church’s
anti-nuclear arms movement seriously “when we have a few bishops in jail.[”]
Berrigan, who is appealing a 3–10 year prison sentence for breaking into a
Pennsylvania nuclear plant, spoke to some 200 students and faculty members at
Fordham University.
The Jesuit priest said this “unparalleled threat to our survival” has made
civil disobedience — such as demonstrations and withholding federal income
taxes — a necessary component of the anti-nuclear movement.
He said he was encouraged by the fact that the American church hierarchy no
longer engages in “cold-war” rhetoric, and that the peace movement has made
some strides. But he added that the church, like the rest of the anti-nuclear
movement, has only “moved the diameter of a dime” toward serious opposition to
the arms race.
A Methodist pastor and wife in Portland, Oregon, withheld $1500 from their
U.S. income taxes.
They turned $1,000 of the money into $5 bills and gave them to persons they
found in line at the state of Oregon employment service.
According to the United Methodist John and Pat Schwiebert “clipped [a note] to
each $5 bill explaining that the couple was withholding a portion of their tax
‘because we cannot in good conscience do nothing while income we have earned
is used by our government to plan and carry out the killing of human beings…’ ”
After nearly a year in Laos, we feel a bit of fire brewing in our bones.
Surely, we think, the church can offer an alternative and a “no” to the
militarism and violence that is increasingly manifested around the world.
Surely we have a responsibility to end such suffering. Yet, as we turn to our
church papers (which we read avidly even though they arrive 4 to 5 months
late) we find that much of the discussion on peacemaking, including war-tax
resistance, seems to focus on the interpretation of certain biblical passages.
While it is important that these passages shape our thoughts and direct our
lives, it seems that too much time is spent fine-tuning favorite arguments in
comfortable, safe settings, far removed from the cries of those who suffer. We
wonder, for example, how well our arguments would stand up if the bombing
which occurred in many areas of Laos had instead destroyed our own communities
in Kansas, Ohio, or Manitoba.
The oil lamps burned late into the night when we visited the village. The day
before a Lao woman, the mother of 11 children, was killed when her hoe struck
a small anti-personnel bomblet that had buried itself under a root in her
garden. The bomblet, one of hundreds which still litter the soil, had been
dropped 10 to 15 years ago… Looking at the depression left in the soil by the
explosion, the hoe fragment, and the saddened eyes of the 10-year-old
daughter, we wondered who would own this family’s grief… who would answer for
this woman’s death?
The answer, we fear, is no one. Indeed the United States has created a
military system which can kill in such a way that no one need feel guilty.
Certainly no one in America, army general or taxpayer, will be accused of
plotting the death of this peasant woman. No international court will bring
bomb manufacturing companies to trial. Even to know which pilot dropped that
particular bomblet some ten years ago would be impossible. Thus we have
created death without a murderer.
Are we really so clever? Have we finally outwitted God, who would come and
ask, “Where is Abel, your brother?” Indeed, if God should come and ask, would
he not find us all guilty?
Of course, we as historic peace churches have often tried to separate
ourselves from our nation’s militaristic policies, to be a people with a
different identity. To some extent we have succeeded. The very fact that
Mennonite Central Committee is allowed to be in Laos is in large measure due
to the fact that we, as Mennonites, did not fight as
U.S. soldiers in
Indochina.
Nevertheless, how clean are we? Are our self-perceptions of innocence
realistic? Or have we been lured into a giant game of guilt evasion whose
players include Pentagon officials and common folk alike? While we ourselves
have not worn a soldier’s uniform, have not our taxes and our silence helped
to build weapons systems and to pay the salaries of those who fight? Though we
have espoused love and peace, could any of us stand before that peasant
woman’s family and state with assurance that we did not contribute to the
making of the weapon that killed her?
Thus, the presence of the shattered family in Muong Kham or the “cave
dwellers” in Sam Neua is disquieting to our spirits — the links between our
tax money and their suffering are too strong to ignore. The option of war tax
resistance then seems not like a matter for debate, but the next logical step
for all Christians who would work for peace in the world.
Perhaps many of you will disagree with us that withholding taxes is a faithful
part of peacemaking. May we plead however that before final judgments are
made, you listen to the voices of those hurt by our violence? Standing close
to them, we need to respond with compassion. What will we say? What will we
do?
A letter to the editor
from Robin Lowery followed: “They [the Peacheys] seem to base their conclusion
on the experience of those they dialogued with rather than on what God our
Father says to us through the Bible,” Lowery wrote. “It is a dangerous thing to
base our faith on experience and feelings.” We shouldn’t expect governments to
live up to Christian principles. Our worldly life is only temporary; we are
guests here and live under worldly rules temporarily. “War is a horrible thing,
but even more terrible is the judgment waiting for those who would oppose God
and what he has put in place.”
A
letter to the editor
from the Peacheys complained that their original article had been severely
edited:
As edited by Gospel Herald, our article seemed to
imply that all true peacemakers will engage in war-tax resistance. Certainly
we were urging Christians to seriously consider making some type of witness
with their tax return. Our original article acknowledged, however, that this
could take many forms. Some people may choose to live with an income below the
taxable level while others may wish to enclose a letter of concern with their
tax return. Some may withhold a symbolic amount while others withhold all of
their taxes.
Yet, none of these actions can be the whole of peacemaking. Rather, as we
stressed in our original submission, peacemaking is a total way of life which
embraces our troublesome next-door neighbor as well as those whom our country
defines as “enemy.” Further, as we seek to prevent suffering caused by North
American militarism, we must also turn to those in our communities who have
been cut off from help by our nation’s preoccupation with defense “needs.”
Finally, all of our actions must spring from our Christian faith. We cannot
work for peace out of guilt or a desire for personal innocence. Instead, what
we do, we do joyfully as a positive witness to life, to wholeness, and to our
faith in God who loves all people, irrespective of human barriers.
And Titus Peachey also wrote a follow-up article. Here is
an excerpt
that touches on war tax resistance:
The U.S.
asks neither for our consent or direct physical participation to send
weapons around the world such as the cluster bombs which were dropped in
Laos. It requires only our dollars and our silence. Can we continue to
give our government what it needs to make wars, and then serve the victims
of its violence with a clear conscience? Can we still claim to be
nonresistant if that violence was committed in defense of our way of life
in another part of the world?
Some of us felt that the shovels provided to Lao farmers in Xieng
Khouang should be purchased with money which Mennonites withheld from
their taxes, thereby making the connection between our nation’s militarism
and the victims of war. While some of the shovels were indeed purchased
with the Taxes for Peace Fund, many people cited legal, theological, and
practical problems with taking such an action.
From our vantage point in Laos, we admittedly worry more about the
theological, human, and practical problems of inaction. Can we
find common ground for a strong, unified, Mennonite peace witness which
deals more directly with our nation’s defense budget, arms sales, and
military aid?
MCC
has spent over $10,000 to purchase and ship about 1,200 shovels to Laos, and
$4,000 of that amount was allocated from
MCC’s
“Taxes for Peace” fund. This “Taxes for Peace” fund was established in
to receive contributions from church members
who had voluntarily withheld portions of their taxes as a symbolic protest
against the government’s excessive spending for military purposes.
“Since people withheld this money so that it could be used for peace instead
of war, we feel it especially appropriate that these dollars be used to help
clear the land of Laos of bomblets made and dropped by Americans,” explains
John Stoner, executive secretary of
MCC
U.S. Peace Section.
What is the meaning of conscientious objection to war in Canada today, and how
does this relate to the support of Canadian military industries and armed
forces activities? That is the focus of a task force on tax support of
Canadian military activities. A short document spelling out proposed goals and
research tasks of this group was mailed to each of the conferences earlier
this year asking for more guidance or support, perhaps after discussion at
their annual meetings. The initial work of this task force is being
coordinated by the Peace and Social Concerns office of
MCC
(Canada).
War tax resisters continued to have tough luck in
U.S. courts, as
this showed:
A Rhode Island couple who have refused to pay their federal income taxes
as a way of demonstrating their
opposition to military spending have lost their fight with the
U.S. Internal
Revenue Service. The United States Tax Court in Washington has not only
ordered Kevin and Linda Regan to pay $4,138 in back taxes and $206 in interest
for , but it has also slapped
the couple with a $500 fine for having “wasted” the government’s time and
money on “frivolous” actions. Although the decision was reached
, the
IRS
office here only announced it .
Keith Johnson, an
IRS
public affairs officer, said the agency was publicizing the Tax Court decision
because the Regans had been the subject of a long
Providence Journal-Bulletin story
in which the couple attempted to
justify their nonpayment of taxes on religious and moral grounds. In the
interview, the Regans argued that the arms race contradicted the Christian
belief against the taking of human life. “What we were presented with were
taxpayers who were saying they could withhold tax payments on moral grounds,”
Mr. Johnson said. “This is an argument that neither the
IRS,
nor the courts, accept.”
Finally, a
letter to the editor
from Weldon Nisly emphasized the parallel between conscientious objection to
the draft and conscientious objection to military taxation:
May we all have the faith and courage to stand with these young men of
conscience facing draft registration. It is indeed a difficult moment and
decision they and their families face. But it is not just they who face the
demands of the powers in our country and time. We all face a parallel decision
in a direct way with the demand for tax money to finance the Pentagon’s
headlong plunge toward death and destruction of all God’s creation and
creatures. The painful question of faith we ail face is will we contribute to
and cooperate with that demand of the powers or will we choose to place our
trust in God alone?
This is the twenty-fifth 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 war tax resistance continued at a simmer through
, and by the end of the year it was clear that
the Mennonite Church would have to have the same debate about withholding taxes
from its employees’ salaries that had occupied the General Conference Mennonite
Church .
Joel Kauffmann’s “Pontius” comic strip was a regular feature in
Gospel Herald. This example comes from the
issue.
The Center for Discipleship and the Peace Studies Program at Goshen College
will cosponsor a seminar on “Conscientious Objection to Military Taxes” on
Goshen’s campus, .
The program will feature an Internal Revenue Service representative addressing
the legalities of withholding military taxes; discussion of improved
communication between tax withholders, the government, and the church; and a
look at various patriotic and biblical objections raised by nonwithholders.
The purpose of the seminar is not to foster debate on the morality of tax
withholding; rather, persons who are already withholding taxes or who are
seeking additional information on the issue are encouraged to attend. In lieu
of a registration fee, participants will be asked to make a $10 tax-deductible
contribution.
I wonder if you could rope an
IRS
spokesperson into addressing a war tax resistance conference today.
The included an article that
summed up the state of the war tax issue in the Mennonite community. It’s the
same article that appeared in The Mennonite around
the same time and that I reproduced here when I was going through those
archives (see ♇ 4 August 2018 — search
for “Military taxes — continuing agenda in 1984”).
War tax resistance foe D.R. Yoder wrote
a commentary
for the issue in which he
argued that tax resistance was ineffective because the government can just rely
on borrowing or seigniorage if it runs out of tax money, which means ultimately
the costs not paid by war tax resisters just get shifted to other people, which
isn’t very Christian.
One stewardship issue that is seldom brought up, although one of the most
important, is how we use our tax dollars. Becky and I are comfortable in
paying local and state taxes but have come to feel that we cannot pay any of
our federal income taxes, given their use in fueling the arms race. We note
the irony that while the average Mennonite family gives the church $430 a year
for peacemaking it pays the
IRS
$1,500 for its militarism. A 4 percent tithe for the church, and a 10 percent
tithe for the government! Our response is to reduce our taxable income and
refuse to pay anything, choosing instead to use this money for serving the
kingdom. Friends of ours have taken other options such as matching their
giving to the
IRS with
their giving to the church, refusing to pay a percentage of their tax dollars,
enclosing a letter of protest with their payment. We feel that how we use our
money is a crucial test of our loyalties and commitments and must become a
stewardship issue for this generation.
Imagine with us what could happen if we Mennonites were to take the steps outlined in books like Beyond the Rat Race.
Imagine if we were to give as much to the church as we give the IRS, or if we gave our tax dollars to the work of the church, withholding them from military use?
I want to make a few comments… especially on the last part concerning the
average Mennonite family giving “a 4 percent tithe for the church, and a 10
percent tithe for the government.” I cannot understand how he can withhold all
income taxes from Uncle Sam in light of the fact the
U.S. government is
very reasonable in its demands. The government allows us to give 50 percent to
charitable causes without too many restrictions, though there are some.
Thus I ask, until we give 50 percent to charity which the government allows,
who is responsible if it is not spent right? Peters talked about the tithe for
the church. Personally I believe many of us should give much more. Just
because we feel our government does not spend all our tax money right does not
give us the right to withhold all or part of our tax money.
There was a passing mention of war tax resistance at the Bijou Community in
a article:
[Esther (Leatherman)] Kisamore, formerly of Pennsylvania, is a member of a
Christian community, called Bijou House, consisting of 13 persons. There are
four other Mennonites in this house community; the next largest group
represented is Roman Catholic. The group shares economic resources and lives
below the taxable income level as a way of avoiding the payment of war taxes.
The issue contained
a pro-taxpaying op-ed from Harold Hartzler.
Christians should pay taxes gladly, he wrote, citing Romans 13. Taxes help our
terrific government; we shouldn’t try to lower our taxes but should indeed pay
even more than is required; the government should simplify taxes and broaden
the tax base, and should increase taxes even if that makes things “unbearable.”
Alongside that commentary was this one, credited to Call to
Peacemaking:
Praying and paying: a dilemma
The question begins to sound like a cliché, we’ve heard it so often: Can we go
on praying for peace while paying for war?
But the question won’t go away. Every year in the United States we are
reminded of the reality of military preparations when the president presents
the proposed budget to congress. This year the figures reach almost beyond our
imaginations, near a trillion in total spending with more than a third for
war. A military expenditure of that enormity was once associated only with the
waging of all-out war. Now it is only preparation for war, plus minor (?)
interventions here and there.
We only need to reflect for a moment on the consequences of the kind of war
we’re preparing for to know in our hearts that the government is buying us
less security. That’s the purpose of the state? To brandish a nuclear sword
which guarantees that if used it will fulfill the prophecy of Jesus: “They who
take the sword will perish with the sword.”
Between the time the budget is unveiled and when we can no longer delay the
moment of truth with the Internal Revenue Service is usually a little less
than three months. Plenty of time to agonize whether what Caesar is demanding
to support the arms race is really what is due to Caesar.
An increasing number of concerned persons recognize the dilemma of praying and
paying and are seriously trying to decide how to resist. A leaflet, “Stages of
Conscientious Objection to Military Taxes,” by Bill Strong at the Philadelphia
Yearly Meeting of Friends and Linda Schmidt of Mennonite Central Committee
describes what some have done in response to the question of taxes for war.
The leaflet is available from New Call to Peacemaking, Box 1245, Elkhart,
IN…
Milo and Viola Stahl presented bags of groceries to a staff person at the
regional office of the Internal Revenue Service, Staunton,
Va.
Reporter Steve Shenk brought this news in the issue:
As tax season rolls around, taxpayers are faced with many facts and figures
that concern the conscience as well as the wallet. For some Christians payment
of federal income tax — the portion which goes to finance the military — is a
dilemma.
This year a group called Christians for Peace, consisting of largely
Mennonites from the Harrisonburg,
Va., area, gathered at the
regional office of the Internal Revenue Service in Staunton,
Va., on
, 1984. They came to register their concern about the amount of
income tax money which is used for military purposes. Instead of bringing
their normal checks, they came with a truckload of food for the
IRS.
The food was purchased with money that the participants withheld from their
tax payments. “We seek to follow Jesus’ call
to be peacemakers by directing our resources away from the instruments of
death and toward life,” explained Wendell Ressler, one of the organizers of
the event. “We cannot reconcile Jesus’ call to love our enemies with our
government’s call to help pay for their destruction.”
The group began the witness with a short worship service in front of the
IRS
building. There was a short mime skit entitled The Global Garden Deli which
visualized their feelings about paying for military expenditures. The theme
song, “I Am Not Willing to Buy Your Bombs, Sam,” sung to the melody “I Have
Decided to Follow Jesus,” was heard between prayers and testimony of the group
members.
Wendell Ressler then read a short statement of purpose to the small crowd of
onlookers. He explained that this action was really a pledge to reexamine the
effects of the group’s lifestyle on other people. “We do not wish to be
protected if it means others are killed in our names. We gladly pay taxes
which are used to enrich the lives of others, but it is immoral for our
government to play Russian roulette with the future of our planet.”
Christians for Peace members, Milo and Viola Stahl, then entered the
IRS
building to offer their bags of groceries in payment for the military portion
of the income tax. They were cordially received by the representative for the
regional director of the
IRS,
but told that the
IRS
could not accept the bread. When the Milo Stahls asked the representative what
the IRS
would like them to do with the food, the representative replied, “That is your
prerogative, but I cannot accept it.”
The food was then presented to the Blue Ridge Area Food Bank,
Inc., a nonprofit
community organization that distributes 220,000 pounds of food each month to
hungry people in the area. Executive Director Phil Grasty was careful to note
that he did not want to take a political stand on the issue, but he was “happy
to receive the food.” Over 1,000 pounds of canned goods were donated to the
organization.
The group repeatedly tried to explain that their intention was not to harass
the IRS
personnel. Instead their goal was to represent their concern as a Christian
witness. “The reason that I am here,” said Christian for Peace member Nate
Barge, “is that for me it is an act of faith. I am trying to bring evangelism
and social action together.”
The event attracted passersby to stop and watch the demonstration. One of
them, Dave Murphy, a member of the Staunton Christian Fellowship Baptist
Church, said, “I think it is a nice effort on their part to present what they
believe about military spending… after all it is the American way to speak
out. I am particularly pleased that they are giving the food to the Food Bank
where it will do some good.”
Members of the Christians for Peace group tried to donate food to the
IRS,
but it was refused, so they turned the food over to the Blue Ridge Area Food
Bank.
Two years after Seattle Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen’s decision to withhold
half of his federal income taxes, a religious “war tax” movement is growing
rapidly. Its numbers are being swelled both by Hunthausen imitators and by
creative new forms of protest by people who are upset by the nuclear arms race
but reluctant to put themselves outside the law.
According to new Internal Revenue Service figures, the type of protest
popularized by the Seattle archbishop has increased nearly fivefold in the
last three years, while alternative forms of protest, some of them revived
from the Vietnam War era, have also become more frequent. Among the latter
protesters are people who refuse to pay a small, token amount of tax, or
withhold federal excise taxes from their monthly telephone bills. Others file
a return and write “paid under protest” on the check, or file for a refund of
military taxes already paid. Increasing charitable giving to reduce the amount
of income subject to tax, and changing one’s lifestyle to live below a taxable
income level, are also gaining acceptance. Many religious groups, in addition,
are pressing Congress for legislation that would allow “conscientious
objectors” to divert all their taxes to “peaceful” purposes.
The Mennonite Central Committee held its executive committee meeting in
:
Executive Secretary Reg Toews reported that three staff members have requested
that
MCC
no longer withhold the military portion of the federal withholding tax from
their paychecks.
Member Larry Kehler of Winnipeg,
Man., noted that "this is a
very volatile issue in our constituency." It was observed that
MCC
is in a unique position, since it represents a wide coalition of conferences,
who come to this issue with various degrees of intensity. “Just to discuss
this issue is to raise concern in many groups,” Toews said.
The executive committee stated their intention to take seriously the request
from the staff members, as well as constituency concerns. They asked
administrative staff to work on a plan, to be discussed by the committee in
, concerning how this issue should
receive broader testing.
A letter to the editor
from Steven G. Gehman ()
rejected on scriptural grounds the “witnessing” justification of war tax
resistance, but left open the possibility that it was justified on the grounds
of conscientious objection to participation in war:
I have struggled with the war tax issue and have not reached any definite
answer. I cannot feel comfortable knowing that a great portion of my taxes is
devoted to killing or creating the potential to kill, and knowing that Jesus
commands us to have no part in war. But neither am I comfortable with war tax
resistance. There are no records of Jesus opposing taxes to the Roman military
machine. In Romans 13:1–5 Paul states his view that the government bears the
sword as God’s servant. First Peter 2:13 gives us the injunction to submit to
human authority.
I do not think either or both of these passages in themselves yield a final
answer to the war tax issue. They do help to sharpen the questions. If the
government bears the sword as God’s servant, total disarmament cannot be the
goal or the reason for war tax resistance. Neither is the desire for an
effective witness to the government sufficient reason to resist payment since
we are commanded to submit to human authority.
The question of whether or not payment of war taxes is right hinges on whether
or not payment of these taxes constitutes participation in a killing machine
to an extent forbidden by the example and teachings of Jesus. What effect does
current military technology have on our response to this issue?
Michio Ohno, pastor of the Mennonite congregation in Toke outside Tokyo, told
of his pilgrimage which included being a pastor in the United Church before
becoming a Mennonite. He also made an eloquent appeal for a peace stance and
the nonpayment of military taxes.
J. Ward Shank, in a
“Update on the peace movement in the Mennonite Church”,
criticized the modern centrality of anti-war activism among Mennonites,
suggesting that it had displaced more basic Christian themes. “Peace is a fruit
of the gospel, not its basis, or necessarily the heart of it,” he wrote. The
article only mentioned war tax resistance in passing, but of course was
relevant to it. It prompted a great deal of back-and-forth in the letters to
the editor column.
The Mennonite Church’s general board’s
“council on faith, life, and strategy”
met in . It turned out that
the Mennonite Church, like its cousins the General Conference Mennonite Church,
had employees who wanted their church to stop withholding war taxes from their
paychecks. This time around, the Mennonite Church wouldn’t have the luxury
of playing spectator in the debate:
One of the stickier issues arose out of a request from a couple employed by
Mennonite Board of Missions that federal income taxes not be withheld from
their paychecks. They want to stop paying the portion of their taxes that goes
to the military. The council tried to clarify the issue by raising underlying
questions such as “Shall a church perform a function on behalf of the state,
in this instance collecting taxes?” and “Should a church institution place
employees in a position where they do not have the option to follow their
conscience on this issue?” Vigorous discussion led to two recommendations: (1)
That this question might be considered in the forthcoming Conversations on
Faith Ⅱ meeting. (2) That a task force be appointed by the General Board.
I noticed that tax resistance was on the agenda at the General Conference
Dialogue on Faith
in also, but there wasn’t
anything meaty in the article worth reprinting here.
Some recent links of interest:
In recent years, something in the neighborhood of 40–45% of American households have not owed any federal income tax.
This is due to a combination of factors including progressive tax rates and tax deductions & credits that shield a certain amount of income from tax.
Although fabulously wealthy people who do not pay income tax are certainly a thing, most of this group of “lucky duckies” come from the bottom half of the income scale.
In , with its pandemic-related economic disruption and the stimulus payments that took the form of refundable tax credits, the numbers jumped: the Tax Policy Center estimates that 61% of U.S. households paid no federal income tax .
Under a newish law the U.S. government will be issuing advance “Child Tax Credits” to qualifying families with children as checks periodically throughout the year.
These checks take the place of the refundable tax credit that such families would have used to offset their federal taxes at annual tax filing time in past years.
Interestingly, the IRS has directed its enforcement personnel to avoid seizing money from bank accounts in which these Child Tax Credits have been direct-deposited and to refund any inadvertently seized Child Tax Credits.
“Council Tax Strike” is a subproject of the Extinction Rebellion movement in the U.K. They claim: “There are people all over the U.K. withholding their council tax and demanding action on the things that matter to them.”
The National Catholic Reporter looks back on the nuclear disarmament activism of Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen:
“ ‘I think the teaching of Jesus tells us to render to a nuclear-armed Caesar what that Caesar deserves — tax resistance.
And to begin to render to God alone that complete trust which we now give, through our tax dollars, to a demonic form of power,’ he said in his ‘Faith and Disarmament’ speech.
‘Some would call what I am urging “civil disobedience.”
I prefer to see it as obedience to God.’ ”
The Catholic Worker reprinted an article on war tax resistance by Ed Hedemann of the War Resisters League in its issue:
Tax Resistance
by Ed Hedemann
Direct action, as conventionally defined, means those who are adversely affected by a situation are the ones who try to change that situation, rather than appeal to third parties (such as the courts, the government, or the general public).
Direct action is often resorted to when other methods seem inadequate, or fail, or need to be supplemented.
When to use direct action is often a controversial question within the movement.
Some feel that as long as we have a roughly responsive system, the need to resort to direct action is minimal.
I would like to ask those who question the use of direct action “at what point would you be willing to use such methods? Ever?”
Most people might say, "When a problem reaches a state of critical or dangerous proportions, that to wait for or rely on a third party is irresponsible.”
The arms race, the dangers of nuclear power, the poverty and injustices around the world are at such critical stages that we need, individually and collectively, to resist these problems ourselves, in addition to any appeals to third parties.
We cannot rely solely on elected or appointed officials and military personnel to be adequate guardians of our safety and well being.
As A.J. Muste once pointed out, “The two decisive powers of government with respect to war are the power to tax and the power to conscript.”
For arms race opponents, one of the most direct personal ways to oppose armaments — even with a draft — is tax resistance.
A third of the money we pay to the Federal government each year goes to current military.
And, if we include past wars, that means half of our Federal income tax goes to wars and the military.
The basic logic and rationale for war tax resistance would be to
personally reduce our complicity with the war-making machinery,
redirect money to programs which suffer because of the arms race or those organizations actively working against the arms race,
make a dramatic statement to the government in opposition to the arms race,
offer resistance to the smoothly operating military machine,
motivate and inspire others into escalating their opposition to the nuclear arms race.
A Resurgence
Tax resistance isn’t new.
Its origins in this country began over 200 years ago with the Quaker and Mennonite opposition to the French and Indian war.
Today there are probably several thousand people who are refusing some portion of their income taxes in opposition to the military and perhaps three times as many refusing to pay the Federal tax on telephone service.
There has been a resurgence of tax resistance among elements of the historic peace churches as well as more conventional religious groups.
Among the newer efforts to expand tax resistance have been a “Conscience and Military Tax Resolution,” put out by Suffolk County Committee for a World Peace Tax Fund (44 Bellhaven Road, Bellport, NY 11713) which commits signers to withhold the military tax portion of their income taxes when 100,000 have signed up.
Also, the Disarmament Program at Riverside Church (122 St. and Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10027) is seeking to collect 25,000 signers to a tax resistance pledge.
The Government response to a person who resists varies greatly.
Most people can expect to get a series of notices from the IRS.
Often the IRS will attempt to levy a bank account or salary, if they can find either.
Occasionally, the IRS has seized property (bicycle, car, even a house) and sold it at a public auction, returning the money less the tax, interest, and penalties.
If the money “owed” is small (less than $100), the IRS may not proceed beyond a few forms.
In fact some people have been refusing for over thirty years and have never been collected from.
If the IRS is successful in a collection, they will add 12% interest per year and possibly a penalty, which might be a few percent and up.
In any case, it usually costs the IRS more money than it collects when dealing with resisters.
A few resisters have been taken to court and jailed from a few days to a few months for claiming too many dependents on their W-4 form, refusing to reveal sources of assets, etc.
At any point in this process, the resisters can “bail out” and pay the taxes.
I am not suggesting that tax resistance should be used as a means simply to save money, but as a means to offer resistance and a dramatic protest to World War Ⅲ, U.S. imperialism, and the deterioration of our society.
Tax resisters are encouraged to reroute their money to appropriate groups and projects, or at least put it into an alternative fund.
How can we convince the general public and government officials to take more moderate steps, if we—who are so concerned and committed to ending the arms race — aren’t willing to take more daring steps?
Ed Hedemann is on the national staff of the War Resisters League, from whose newsletter this article was taken.
Those interested in exploring tax resistance further can write to WRL, 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 for a free copy of a “Call to War Tax Resistance, or the Tax Resistance Kit, for which they ask $3.
A brief note in the edition of that paper read:
The edition of the Handbook on the Nonpayment of War Taxes, produced by Peacemakers, is now available.
It contains information on reasons for not paying war taxes, ways of nonpayment, regulations on filing, listings of war tax resistance counselors and centers, and alternative funds.
The price is $1.50 for a single copy.
(A discount is available on bulk orders.) To order, or for more information, write to the Peacemakers, Box 627, Garberville, CA 95440, or to Rod Nippert, Route 1, Box 90-B, Amesville, OH 45711.
A National Catholic News Service dispatch from covered the war tax resistance endorsement of Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen:
Archbishop Hunthausen Urges Withholding Taxes to Protest Nuclear Arms
By Greg Manuel
Seattle (NC)—
Denouncing the nuclear arms race, Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen of Seattle called for unilateral disarmament and suggested that Christians refuse to pay 50 percent of their federal income taxes as non-violent resistance “to nuclear murder and suicide.”
Archbishop Hunthausen told about 600 delegates to the Pacific Northwest Synod Convention of the Lutheran Church in America, “to render to a nuclear arms Caesar what that Caesar deserves — tax resistance.”
“I am told by some that unilateral disarmament in the face of atheistic communism is insane.
I find myself observing that nuclear armament by anyone is itself atheistic and anything but sane.,” he said in his call to war-tax resistance and a “return to the Gospel with open hearts to learn once again what it is to have faith.”
Archbishop Hunthausen also intensified his opposition to the Trident nuclear submarine base in Puget Sound, saying that people of the Puget Sound area must take special responsibility for what is in their own backyard and speak plainly when crimes are being prepared in their name.
“I say with a deep consciousness of these words that Trident is the Auschwitz of Puget Sound,” he said to the crowd who followed his speech with sustained applause.
“Some would call what I am urging civil disobedience,” the archbishop said.
“I prefer to see it as obedience to God.”
“We have to refuse to give incense — in our day, tax dollars — to our nuclear idol,” he said in his call to Christians to become peacemakers.
The archbishop told the crowd that he was grateful for the opportunity to speak on the topic of disarmament because it forced him to a “personal disarmament.”
Archbishop Hunthausen acknowledged that he himself had never refused to pay war taxes.
“I must say in all honesty that my vision of a sizeable number of tax resisters is not yet one which I have tried to realize in the most obvious way — by becoming one of the number… And I recognize there will never such a number unless there are first a few to give the example,” he said.
He did not say definitely whether he will withhold his own taxes in the future.
The archbishop said to realize the implications of the gospel of peace given by Christ, “it is not the way of the cross which is in question in the nuclear age but our willingness to follow it.”
In his statement, delivered as a homily during the opening worship service at the Lutheran convention, Archbishop Hunthausen referred to the beatitude which calls Christians to become peacemakers.
He added that the following beatitude in Matthew’s Gospel, “blessed are those who are persecuted in the cause of right, theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” may imply that the consequence of peacemaking — persecution — is a further way into the kingdom.
A follow-up:
Archbishop’s Stand on Nuclear Arms Draws Support
Seattle (NC)—
A majority of the Catholic clergy in the Seattle Archdiocese and many Protestant clergymen have indicated support for the stand in favor of unilateral disarmament taken by Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen of Seattle.
Letters to the archdiocesan chancery have been running four to one in favor of the archbishop’s position, officials reported.
And church leaders in Washington state are planning to meet on to draft a joint statement to send to their national denominational offices in support of the archbishop’s call for unilateral disarmament and his suggestion that Christians refuse to pay 50 percent of their federal income tax to protest government spending on nuclear arms.
“We hope it will spark a national dialogue,” said the Rev. Loren Arnett, executive director of the Washington Association of Churches.
Some military personnel however visited the archbishop “to express consternation” over his stand, said Father Jeffrey L. Sarkies, executive editor of Catholic Northwest Progress, the archdiocesan newspaper.
And retired Adm. Joseph Jaap wrote an article for the daily Seattle Post-Intelligencer to oppose the archbishop’s position.
In a speech on to the Pacific Northwest Synod Convention of the Lutheran Church in America, Archbishop Hunthausen urged the delegates “to render to a nuclear arms Caesar what that Caesar deserves — tax resistance.”
“I am told by some that unilateral disarmament in the face of atheistic communism is insane,” he said.
“I find myself observing that nuclear armament by anyone is itself atheistic and anything but sane.”
In a letter published after the archbishop’s speech, Seattle leaders of the Lutheran, United Methodist and United Presbyterian Churches and of the United Church of Christ vowed to “stand publicly with him” and called on clergymen elsewhere in the nation “to give a similar call to action.”
In an article published in the issue of the Catholic Northwest Progres, Archbishop Hunthausen said his suggestion of withholding taxes “is a tactic that may or may not be used by persons who agree with the main points I made on disarmament.
I have no intention of urging it strongly on anyone.”
Located in the area covered by the Seattle Archdiocese are the headquarters of the Boeing Company, a military supplier; the Bangor nuclear submarine base, which will soon be home port for 10 Trident submarines; Fort Lewis, an Army base; and McCord Air Force Base
The Catholic Worker reproduced the text of Hunthausen’s speech in its issue (I’ve already reproduced that text in an Picket Line post, so I won’t here).
An editorial note accompanying the transcript read in part:
It deserves careful study and much reflection.
While it focuses on the nuclear arms stockpile, it can help us reflect on the various manifestations of violence in our world.
And in response to the evil around us, Archbishop Hunthausen reminds us that we can take concrete steps to build a better society, if we are willing to take risks.
Further, by presenting unilateral disarmament and tax refusal in a moral, rather than a tactical, perspective, he has opened much needed discussion.
We welcome this reminder that to build a society based on love rather than fear, we are called by the Gospel to seek a guide for action and a measure for success other than those the world offers.
A brief introduction to tax refusal, contributed by Peggy Scherer, also accompanied the speech transcript:
Tax Refusal
Tax refusal can be approached in many ways.
A person thinking of taking this step should consider their motivation, and their willingness and ability to accept the consequences of their action.
Yet, while the negative results may range from inconvenience to fines to time in jail, and these realities merit consideration, there are many positive implications as well.
Taking one’s money out of a budget which puts a priority on arms rather than services and putting that money into an alternative fund is a positive action.
Many see tax refusal as an opportunity to engage in discussion with those working in the Internal Revenue System, and view it as a means for educating those who know of no other alternatives.
Methods of refusal vary.
Some people refuse to pay the Federal phone tax, historically connected with military spending.
This tax was to have been reduced to 1% this year, but was kept at 2% for the remainder of .
Others choose to live on a non-taxable income.
Still others refuse to pay all, or part of, their income tax, continuing that witness until possible seizure of property or prosecution by the IRS (which may take months or years, though no one should count on that).
Some pay at different points during this process, having taken their stand, and in fact causing the IRS to spend some part of what is being collected.
Various resources offer concrete information on how to refuse, reasons why this path is chosen, and personal accounts of some who have refused taxes:
War Resisters League, 339 Lafayette St., NY, NY 10012 has a Tax Resistance Kit.
It contains, among other things, a good handbook called People Pay for Peace, by William Durland, which includes information on the why and how of tax refusal, information on IRS’ collection process, a bibliography of reading material, and a list of counselors and alternative tax funds around the country.
The Peacemaker, P.O. Box 827, Garberville, CA 95440, a movement with a newspaper of the same name, has both a leaflet, called “Saying No to War Taxes,” and a regular column on tax refusal in its paper.
Many people connected with the Peacemaker movement have refused taxes for years, and can be very helpful in providing information and personal accounts of their experiences.
The Tax Dilemma: Praying for Peace, Paying for War, by Donald Kaufman, Herald Press, Scottdale, PA 15653, $3.95, discloses the long tradition of Chriatians refusing to pay for war.
It is a helpful resource to those considering tax refusal in the light of the teaching of Jesus.
National Catholic News Service continued covering the response to Archbishop Hunthausen’s speech.
This comes from a dispatch:
Religious Leaders Back Archbishop’s Disarmament Plea
Olympia, Wash. (NC)—
Sixteen leaders of nine denominations in Washington state strongly backed a recent call for unilateral U.S. nuclear disarmament by Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle.
In a separate action the Catholic Biblical Association at its annual meeting in Seattle passed a resolution praising the archbishop’s “courageous witness to the urgent need for nuclear disarmament.”
Archbishop Hunthausen issued the call in a speech in Tacoma, Wash., to the Pacific Northwest Synod Conference of the Lutheran Church in America.
He urged Americans to “render to a nuclear Caesar what that Caesar deserves — tax resistance.”
The 16 church leaders — bishops or executive heads of denominations affiliated with the Washington Association of Churches — said at a press conference following a private meeting that they planned to issue a joint statement on nuclear disarmament soon and take several other steps to begin discussion, prayer and action on the issue within their churches.
“The response of the other leaders of the churches in our state (to Archbishop Hunthausen’s talk) could be summarized in the word ‘bravo!’ ” the Rev. Loren Arnett, executive minister of the Washington Association of Churches, told reporters after the meeting.
“We’ve been waiting for someone in our group to have the courage to forthrightly state the commitment that the archbishop declared that day in Tacoma,” he added.
“We’ve termed it prophetic, we regard it as preaching God’s word in the best sense.”
United Methodist Bishop Melvin G. Talbert commented, “We do endorse his stance and in addition we intend to take further steps.”
The group said it had decided to
Draft a joint statement on nuclear disarmament and the arms race in the near future, based on Archbishop Hunthausen’s talk;
Work with their constituencies to heighten awareness of the moral issues involved in nuclear arms proliferation;
Encourage prayer and discussion over the archbishop’s recommendation of tax resistance as a possible strategy specifying that tax funds withheld should be channeled to peace efforts;
Urge their people to fast and pray each Monday to increase awareness of the enormity of the nuclear arms race;
Advance education for peace in the state and organize a statewide peace conference in the near future.
The group also agreed to start a dialogue with congressional delegations on the nuclear arms issue and to use prayer and non-violent means to express concern over the Trident nuclear submarine and its role in nuclear arms proliferation.
In his address to the Lutheran Synod Conference Archbishop Hunthausen had referred to the Trident base in Puget Sound as a “back yard” issue which people in the Pacific Northwest “must take special responsibility for.”
He said the Trident submarine with its ability to fire 408 nuclear warheads at separate targets, represents a first-strike nuclear doctrine by the U.S. government.
“First strike nuclear weapons are immoral and criminal,” he said, and “Trident is the Auschwitz of Puget Sound.”
The church leaders who attended the special meeting and backed Archbishop Hunthausen’s disarmament plea represented nine of the 10 churches affiliated with the Washington Association of Churches.
No representative of the Church of the Brethren was present.
Catholics besides Archbishop Hunthausen included three other bishops in the state and officials from the Washington State Catholic Conference.
Non-Catholic churches or church agencies represented were the American Baptist Churches of the Northwest, the Episcopal Diocese of Olympia, the American Lutheran Church, the Lutheran Church in America, the United Methodists, the United Church of Christ, the United Presbyterians, and the United Church-Disciples of Christ.
The Catholic Biblical Associations resolution supporting Archbishop Hunthausen passed without a negative vote and with only three abstentions among the more than 150 Scripture scholars attending the meeting, said Benedictine Father Joseph Jensen, executive secretary of the CBA.
The resolution said that “the nuclear arms race is a moral issue of the greatest magnitude” and “the biblical tradition emphasized that our trust must be placed in God rather than in armaments.”
The CBA commended Archbishop Hunthausen “for his courageous witness to the urgent need for nuclear disarmament and for creative constructive efforts to foster peace.”
There were also a few mentions-in-passing of Hunthausen’s call for tax resistance in other dispatches about increasing church activism on the nuclear weapons issue.
A Catholic institution began resisting its phone tax, according to this National Catholic News Service dispatch:
Reaction to Parish Tax Resistance Decision Varies
Indianapolis (NC)—
The decision by the St. Thomas Aquinas Parish Council to withhold the federal tax portion of its phone bill to protest the U.S. arms buildup has met with a varied but basically favorable reaction, said Philip Schervish, parish council president.
“Many people agreed wholeheartedly and support what we’re doing,” said Schervish, who spoke at all Masses on .
“Through the resolution some people have learned for the first time about the church’s position on armaments and escalation and are now considering what their own personal response should be.
“And some other people agree in principle but disagree with the specific action that was chosen.”
Schervish acknowledged that “a small but vocal minority” said the action was against the law or asked “How dare you criticize the government?”
He said the parish will mount a month-long educational effort in , which will include printed materials, films and discussion opportunities after Sunday Masses and at other times.
St. Thomas’s federal taxes on its phone bill probably will amount to no more than about $50, Schervish said.
There is a penalty of 12 percent going up to 20 percent in , on any unpaid taxes, if the Internal Revenue Service chooses to collect it.
Schervish said he doubts that will happen.
He said he and his wife have withheld these taxes for 12 years and the IRS has collected the money only twice.
“For individuals or the parish, the amount isn’t that much,” he said.
“The witness value is what’s important, the decision that we can’t voluntarily participate in the system.”
Frank Savage, Indianapolis archdiocesan superintendent of education, said his office has sent out a statement outlining church teaching on disarmament with its regular mailing to all pastors, school principals and directors of religious education.
The statement was drafted out of concern for the apparent military buildup and proliferation of military arms, Savage said.
He added that “as educators we need to be aware of our responsibility and the church’s teachings on the issue.”
He said archdiocesan high schools are considering offering a short course in war and peace issues.
The Catholic Worker devoted a page to tax resistance:
Conscience and Tax Resistance
Letter to the IRS
314-4th St. Brooklyn, NY 11215
Chief Collection Branch
Department of the Treasury
Internal Revenue Service 4901
Friend(s),
It’s taken me a while to respond because it’s been a very busy month at the house and it takes me time to express truth.
You asked for a tax return.
I wish to give what I have of life in serving others; and, since Federal taxes go primarily for war, I cannot help you in any way with data gathering and collection.
Rather, I wish to have back the $635.17 income tax and $373.95 FICA you took in , to use for building peace and living with the poor.
, I have been a pacifist and member of the Catholic Worker movement.
I quit the Navy Reserve and, rather than report for induction into the Army, briefly went to jail.
During this time I have lived and worked with the poor, actively promoting peace and running city and country “houses of hospitality” for homeless and helpless people.
I’ve done agricultural labor and all sorts of poor and subsistence work that poor people must bear — the basic labor that rich, comfortable, and professional people depend upon to live — though they little realize it.
For three and a half years, I lived with a Quaker family and have many Quaker friends who have strongly influenced me.
Currently, I help run the Arthur Sheehan House of Hospitality and the Christian Help In Park Slope (CHIPS) Shelter in Brooklyn.
I also am a poet and go to library school.
Since I refused to take part in killing or coercion, the only thing that makes sense is to refuse cooperation with the process of paying for it.
Cooperation builds a public spirit of deference and legitimacy that facilitates the process.
The process of taxation supports developments more far-reaching, serious, and monstrously perverse than even simply killing.
This country is spending more of the budget for war than ever before in peacetime.
We make, use, and export weapons which kill indiscriminately (even babies in womb or at breast) and en masse; and weapons which mutilate, pollute air, ground, and water, and corrupt forever the genetic heritage of future generations.
The government plans first strikes and preemptive war, destabilizes governments, foments discord and treachery, and brokers arms races.
Further, it actually has placed and planned to use weapons which can destroy every living thing.
Fear, greed, grasping to get one-up on others, and war, have distorted perspectives and led the Federal Government in every area and at every level (including health, education, welfare, agriculture, commerce, etc.) to adopt what amounts to an anti-life mentality.
I look long and hard to find anything the Federal Government does which is not in its own interest and is in a right spirit.
Support for abortion, though a relatively small part of the budget — an extreme case in point — is a sign that the spirit is anti-life.
Although for civic peace and good neighborliness, I file and go along with state and city taxes, despite whatever foolishness local government gets into, I draw a line.
All of these anti-life actions have been condemned by the Catholic Church. I am Catholic.
The American bishops, Vatican Council, Popes — I think by now most responsible religious bodies — have condemned especially weapons of indiscriminate destruction — even possession of such weapons.
Several American bishops have called for war tax refusal.
I believe the only way to peace is peace. Only winning hearts is effective.
Violence originates in human hearts; peace begins in self with faith, poverty of spirit, and fundamental change of heart.
Then, to make peace with each other, it is necessary to make peace with the earth.
Experience convinces me war is incompatible with any true problem-solving, dialogue, reconciliation, or ministry — war is futile for achieving peace.
It lacks room for forgiveness.
State resort to violence makes violence seem legitimate and helps create a climate of contradictions and violence.
All other violence pales in comparison to preparation of instruments for world destruction.
The government which prepares such things lacks qualifications to resolve conflicts, within or without.
I believe the only way to resolve social conflicts is to resolve and eliminate causes — works of mercy versus works of war.
I believe I must one day face Jesus as judge (Who said: “If you deny Me before men, I shall deny you before My Father in Heaven”).
He commanded “Love your enemy,” “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is, Who lets His rain fall on the just and unjust.”
He warned: “He who lives by the sword will die by the sword” and “What you’ve done to the least of these you’ve done to Me.”
He took judgment and killing out of our hands, because it is sacrilegious to kill within God’s family and killing leads to destruction of the killers — body, soul, mind, heart.
He left us the right to use, in constant prayer, only whatever truth and love God abundantly grants us.
We each face, in a way, the choice that humans have faced since the beginning, as in the story of Adam and Eve: to choose good only and thus find paradise or to choose the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and thus bring on ourselves pain, death, and destruction of everything most beautiful and precious to us in the world we know.
I want to give allegiance only to hope — to say “Yes!” to life, and to say “No!” to mad fear and scapegoating — while it still may possibly not be too late.
The Federal Government may go one way.
I go another — trying to build a spirit in the world, such that some day I may even be happy to contribute to what the government does; and the government may even be willing to allow me to contribute freely or not.
Can you imagine? That is world peace!
I care for your salvation. I pray you may have peace and freedom from the madness of arms.
Will you gather a harvest in spirit for Truth and Love rather than money for war and worse?
If you want to pursue this further may we meet and talk?
Daniel Marshall
Conscience & Military Tax Campaign
One of several groups promoting various ways to refuse taxes is the Conscience and Military Tax Campaign.
It is seeking people who will resolve to start withholding the full military portion of their Federal income taxes when notified that 100,000 people are ready to join in this action.
The Campaign encourages people to start at least symbolic withholding now, and offers support as well as advice on how to do it.
CMTC was organized by supporters of the World Peace Tax Fund.
Some may feel they cannot take such a risk because they are encumbered with assets and family obligations.
CMTC can furnish material that will explain how certain steps towards tax refusal can be taken with minimum risk.
One can withhold taxes in such a way as to not expose oneself to a jail sentence.
For further information, contact: Conscience & Military Tax Campaign, 44 Bellhaven Road, Bellport, NY 11713.
People Pay for Peace
An updated and enlarged edition of People Pay for Peace: A Military Tax Refusal Guide for Radical Religious Pacifists and People of Conscience, by Bill Durland, will be available by .
People Pay for Peace has been used for several years by people of religious and moral conscience who are contemplating or actually resisting participation in military expenditures for war, planning for war or weapons research.
Over 50% of U.S. income tax dollars goes to the military (for past, present and future uses), while social services expenditures continue to be cut by the current administration.
The new edition (published by The Center on Law and Pacifism, P.O. Box 1584 Colorado Springs, CO 80901 and available on order from them) is enlarged to include the following subjects: Part Ⅰ is entitled “Introduction to Military Tax Refusal” and contains four chapters.
Chapter One discusses the background of the movement including motivations and a history of war tax resistance.
Chapter Two outlines theological responses to paying taxes for war — both Christian and Jewish, including the relationship of civil disobedience to the Gospel and Torah.
Chapter Three deals with several philosophical questions on the “why’s” and “why not’s” of doing war tax resistance.
Chapter Four discusses the military budget, alternative funds and community organization.
Part Ⅱ is entitled “How to Refuse to Pay the Military Tax.”
This part also has four chapters.
Chapter One deals with the employee as tax refuser, with special emphasis on the problem of withholding and adjusting one’s W-4 form in order to have sufficient allowances so that by income tax time one may have some control of one’s tax payment, thereby allowing a war tax deduction.
Chapter Two is concerned with the problems encountered by employers, self-employed and community organizations as war tax resisters.
Such questions as the loss of tax exempt status are addressed in this chapter.
Chapter Three provides an historical background of the income tax and information on current trends in military spending.
War tax credits, deductions and refunds and, finally, an analysis of telephone tax refusal are also covered in this chapter.
Chapter Four reprints a number of examples of letters of conscience of people who explain to the IRS their reasons for war tax refusal.
Part Ⅲ is entitled “What the IRS Will Do To You” and treats the administrative process (the audit) in Chapter One; the collection process (the lien, levy, seizure) in Chapter Two.
Attention is given to specific questions such as: Can you be fired?
What are the specific problems of husbands and wives or other people with joint accounts?
What are the IRS penalties and interest?
What can you do about collection?
Part Ⅳ explains the court process.
Chapter One discusses both civil and criminal courts, especially the Tax Court, and the process involved in electing to go there.
Is it true you can be fined $500 for exercising your constitutional right to use the Tax Court?
What are the statutes of limitations for the IRS in prosecuting your case?
Chapter Two deals with current criminal and civil cases with a discussion of winning and witnessing and conscience and the courts.
Part Ⅴ reviews the major constitutional cases on war tax resistance brought before the courts by the Center on Law and Pacifism over the past several years.
Each chapter includes reprints of major sections of legal briefs and writs used at the Appellate Court and Supreme Court level.
These reprints are offered because they can be modified for use at all court levels by war tax resisters handling their own cases.
Chapter Seven of this section concludes with some observations about the future for war tax resistance.
War Resisters League Tax Refusal Guide
People at the War Resisters League, many of whom themselves have refused taxes, have put together a comprehensive Guide to War Tax Resistance.
Drawing on their own experiences and the kinds of questions many people have asked them through the years, they have compiled information on types of tax refusal and their consequences, a history of tax refusal, accounts of resisters, a list of local tax refusal centers or contacts, and an historical analysis of military spending.
Another section is on ways to resist collection.
The Guide is a very useful resource and easy to understand.
It is 120 pgs. long, with 8½×11 inch pages, and can be gotten for $6 plus $1 postage from: War Resisters League, 339 Lafayette St., NY, NY 10012.
―Peggy Scherer
When we last left Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, he had issued a rousing cry for resistance to nuclear arms, and had suggested war tax resistance as one way to go about it, but had been a little coy about how he himself was going to respond come tax time.
In , he cleared that up.
From the National Catholic News Service:
1-1-27-82 ARCHBISHOP HUNTHAUSEN HOLDING BACK HALF OF TAXES IN NUCLEAR PROTEST (600 — EMBARGOED until .
Not to be published or broadcast before that date.)
Seattle (NC)—
Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen of Seattle has announced that he will withhold 50 percent of his federal income taxes as “a means of protesting our nation’s continuing involvement in the race for nuclear arms supremacy.”
The archbishop’s announcement, in the form of a pastoral letter, came seven months after he suggested to delegates to the Pacific Northwest Synod Convocation of the Lutheran Church in America that one possible non-violent form of Christian resistance to “nuclear murder and suicide” would be to refuse to pay 50 percent of one’s federal income taxes.
In his letter dated and released in the issue of his archdiocesan newspaper, the Catholic Northwest Progress, the archbishop stated that he is “aware that this action will provoke a variety of responses,” but urged all persons to “continue to discuss this nuclear arms issue in a spirit of mutual openness and charity.”
He also said that he was not suggesting that all who agree with his peace and disarmament views should imitate his action of income tax withholding.
“I recognize,” he said, “that some who agree with me in their hearts find it practically impossible to run the risk of withholding taxes because of their obligations to those personally dependent upon them.
Moreover, I see little value in imitating what I am doing simply because I am doing it.
I prefer that each individual come to his or her own decision on what should be done to meet the nuclear arms challenge.”
Citing a previous pastoral letter he wrote on the subject.
Archbishop Hunthausen stated that certain laws may be peacefully disobeyed under serious conditions, and that there may be times “when disobedience may be an obligation of conscience.”
“I believe,” he said “that the present issue is as serious as any the world has faced. The very existence of humanity is at stake.”
What he hopes his words and actions will do, the archbishop continued, is “to awaken those who have come to accept without thinking the continuation of the arms race, to stir even those who disagree with me to find a better path than the one we now follow, to encourage all to put in first place not the production of arms but the production of peace.”
The federal income tax which he withholds, the archbishop said, will be deposited in a fund to be used for charitable purposes.
When Archbishop Hunthausen called for unilateral nuclear disarmament by the United States in an address to the Lutheran synod meeting and suggested nuclear tax resistance as one possible response to nuclear arms spending, his comments received national news coverage.
His speech led Catholic and non-Catholic church leaders in the state of Washington to begin programs of prayer, study and discussion on war and peace issues in their churches.
Archbishop Hunthausen, 60, did not reveal the amount of federal taxes he usually pays or how much one half of his taxes would be.
His chancellor, Father Michael Ryan, said he did not think the archbishop would publicize the amount because it was the symbol of the action that was important rather than the amount of money involved.
Father Ryan also said the archbishop “realizes he’s responsible for facing the consequences” of civil disobedience, but “I don’t think he’d want to speculate on” the penalties he may face.
Deliberate refusal to pay taxes can be punished by fines or imprisonment or both.
3-1-27-82 NC DOCUMENTARY: ARCHBISHOP HUNTHAUSEN ON TAX RESISTANCE (1,080 — EMBARGOED until .
Not to be published or broadcast before that date.)
Seattle (NC)—
This is the text of a pastoral letter by Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen of Seattle announcing his decision to withhold half his federal income tax in protest over U.S. nuclear weapons policy.
The letter, dated , was released in the Seattle archdiocesan newspaper, the Catholic Northwest Progress.
My dear people of God:
As you Know, I have spoken out against the participation of our country in the nuclear arms race because I believe that such participation leads to incalculable harm.
Not only does it take us along the path toward nuclear destruction, but it also diverts immense resources from helping the needy.
As Vatican Ⅱ put it, “The arms race is one of the greatest curses on the human race and the harm that it inflicts on the poor is more than can be endured.” (“The Church in the Modern World,” n. 81)
I believe that as Christians imbued with the spirit of peacemaking expressed by the Lord in the Sermon on the Mount, we must find ways to make known our objections to the present concentration on further nuclear arms buildup.
Accordingly, after much prayer, thought, and personal struggle, I have decided to withhold 50 percent of my income taxes as a means of protesting our nation’s continuing involvement in the race for nuclear arms supremacy.
I am aware that this action will provoke a variety of responses.
Many will agree with me and support me as they have done in the past.
Other conscientious people will be puzzled, uncomprehending, resentful, and even angry.
For the sake of all, I shall clarify what I am attempting and not attempting to do by my tax-withholding action.
I do so in the prayerful hope that all continue to discuss this nuclear arms issue in a spirit of mutual openness and charity.
How ironic if we as Christians were to discuss the issue of disarmament for peace in a warlike fashion!
I am not attempting to say that there is but one way of dealing with the problem of the arms race and the nuclear holocaust toward which it leads.
I recognize the need for a number of different strategies for the promotion of arms reduction.
Accordingly, I welcome the diverse efforts of many individuals and groups, including the efforts of some of my fellow bishops to call attention to the seriousness of this matter and to suggest practical ways of acting with regard to it.
I am not attempting to divide the Christian community.
I pray that because of our openness and respect for one another we can grow together by our concentration on the goal of world peace and the eventual elimination of nuclear arms despite our disagreements over the best way to achieve such goals.
I am not suggesting that all who agree with my peace and disarmament views should imitate my action of income tax withholding.
I recognize that some who agree with me in their hearts find it practically impossible to run the risk of withholding taxes because of their obligations to those personally dependent upon them.
Moreover, I see little value in imitating what I am doing simply because I am doing it.
I prefer that each individual come to his or her own decision on what should be done to meet the nuclear arms challenge.
I am not pointing a finger of accusation at those who disagree with what I plan to do.
I would hope, however, that such persons will respect those whose views differ from theirs.
No one has answers that are absolutely certain in such complex matters.
I am suggesting that we must maintain a continuing and open dialogue.
I am not attacking my country.
I love my country.
As I said in a previous pastoral letter on this subject (): “It is true that as a general rule the laws of the state must be obeyed.
However, we may peacefully disobey certain laws under serious conditions.
There may even be times when disobedience may be an obligation of conscience.
Most adults have lived through times and situations where this would apply.
“Thus Christians of the first three centuries disobeyed the laws of the Roman Empire and often went to their death because of their stands.
They were within their rights.
Similarly, in order to call attention to certain injustices, persons like Martin Luther King engaged in demonstrations that broke the laws of the state.
The point is that civil law is not an absolute, it is not a god that must be obeyed under any and all conditions.
In certain cases where issues of great moral import are at stake, disobedience to a law in a peaceful manner and accompanied by certain safeguards that help preserve respect for the institution of law is not only allowed but may be, as I have said, an obligation of conscience.”
I believe that the present issue is as serious as any the world has faced.
The very existence of humanity is at stake.
I am not encouraging those who wish to avoid paying taxes to use my action as an excuse for their not paying.
I plan to deposit what I withhold in a fund to be used for charitable peaceful purposes.
I am saying by my action that in conscience I cannot support or acquiesce in a nuclear arms buildup which I consider a grave moral evil.
I am saying that I see no possible justification for the willingness to employ nuclear weapons capable of destroying humanity as we know it.
I am saying that everyone should think profoundly and pray deeply over the issue of nuclear armaments.
My words and my action of tax withholding are meant to awaken those who have come to accept without thinking the continuation of the arms race, to stir even those who disagree with me to find a better path than the one we now follow, to encourage all to put in first place not the production of arms but the production of peace.
I urge all of you to pray and to fast, to study and to discuss, and then to decide what you shall do to combat the evil of the nuclear arms race.
I cannot make your decision for you.
I can and do challenge you to make a decision.
May God be with you, His joy, His peace, His love.
Raymond G. Hunthausen, Archbishop of Seattle
IRS Could Prosecute Tax Resisting Archbishop
By Jerry Filteau
Washington (NC)—
If Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle holds back half of his federal income tax in protest over U.S. nuclear arms policy, as he has said he will, the Internal Revenue Service could prosecute him.
In addition to having his assets attached to pay the taxes and interest or penalties on them, the archbishop could face up to five years in prison and $10,000 in fines for each year that he refuses to pay.
“We’ve got to administer the law regardless of the political or philosophical persuasion of the taxpayer,” said Larry Batdorf, an official of IRS’s national media relations office in Washington.
Archbishop Hunthausen said in a TV interview in Seattle that he planned to withhold 50 percent of his federal income taxes to protest U.S. involvement in the nuclear arms race.
In a pastoral letter to his archdiocese a few days later he stated his position more fully and explained it.
Batdorf, following IRS policy, declined to comment specifically on Archbishop Hunthausen’s action or how the IRS would respond, but he outlined the general IRS position and policy regarding those who try to resist or evade their taxes.
He cited the court case of Autenreith v. Cullan, in which a tax resister was trying to withhold part of his taxes in protest over the Vietnam War, as a key legal precedent for IRS policy in such cases.
Batdorf quoted the pertinent part of the judge’s ruling: “The fact that some persons may object on religious grounds to some of the things that the government does is not a basis upon which they can claim a constitutional right not to pay a part of the tax.”
“We feel that the court has ruled very clearly” on that type of protest of conscience, said Batdorf.
He said that during the Vietnam War one popular form of tax protest was to refuse to pay the excise tax on one’s telephone bill.
The IRS assessed and collected the taxes from “about 700 to 800 a year” who engaged in that protest, he said.
He said he did not have any specific figures distinguishing IRS cases involving protests of conscience from those involving mistakes on one’s tax return or fraudulent tax evasion.
But in general, he said, the IRS audits some 2 million tax returns a year, settles most of those cases civilly, and gets about 1,600 criminal convictions a year for tax evasion.
He said in most cases the procedure is to try for a civil settlement first.
If the person refuses to file a return or files a low return, the IRS computes the tax, informs the person of its findings, and notifies the person that he has 90 days to make corrections or petition the findings in court.
If the person does not petition, said Batdorf, the tax is presumed correct.
After the court decides in favor of the IRS or the person fails to go to court, the IRS is free to collect the money and can use various means to do so, including attachment of wages or assets.
If the case goes to criminal prosecution, he said, the maximum penalty upon conviction for tax evasion, which is a felony, is five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
The actual penalties in each case are determined by the courts, not by the IRS, he said.
Another dispatch, from , read:
Church Refuses IRS Demand
Ames, Iowa (NC)—
A Catholic church in Ames has refused to cooperate with demands by the Internal Revenue Service to garnishee the wages of an employee who is a tax protester against the nuclear arms race.
Thomas Cordaro, employed by St. Thomas Aquinas Church as a lay campus minister for the parish’s Catholic Student Center at Iowa State University, owes the government $828.23 in federal income taxes.
He has refused to pay the taxes because of his religious beliefs.
He used the money instead to help found and run Loaves and Fishes Hospitality House, a shelter and meal center for the poor.
Father Thomas Geary, administrator of the parish, said an IRS representative from Des Moines, Iowa, served levies four times to the parish secretary, each time declining to wait to meet with the pastor.
He said he was frustrated at the lack of personal contact and called the IRS office, but the personnel there were unwilling to discuss the matter.
The parish council unanimously resolved “that St. Thomas Parish refuse to pay the IRS levy because we are not a tax collecting agency and because we see underlying moral implications that we have not had time to sufficiently explicate.”
Father Geary sent the IRS a letter communicating the parish council’s resolution and his decision to refuse to garnishee Cordaro’s wages for the government.
The decision means that the government could take the church to court to force it to pay the money.
According to an IRS spokesman, under Section 6332 of the IRS code an employer that refuses to honor a levy for garnishment of wages becomes “liable in his own estate to the extent of the levy not honored.”
If the IRS must take the employer to court to enforce the payment of that liability, the spokesman said, the court can force the employer to pay a penalty of 50 percent of the levy in addition to the levy itself.
Archbishop James Byrne of Dubuque, Iowa, the archdiocese in which Ames is located, has privately supported the parish’s decision to refuse to honor the levy in support of Cordaro’s conscience.
Father Geary said that the parish council’s decision was not based on the taxes and their use, but on concern for “respecting the conscience of Cordaro.”
“Also this council decision does not necessarily reflect the thinking of the parish members, who are now struggling with the issue before deciding what path to follow,” he said.
Cordaro agreed that the parish council is still struggling with the issue of his tax protest and said its action should not be interpreted as a condemnation of the arms race.
He said his decision to withhold his taxes as a witness against the nuclear arms race “is intricately linked to my concern for the poor,” and all his financial resources are used to rent and maintain the hospitality house for the poor.
Saying his action “is well within Catholic orthodoxy,” Cordaro cited the statement by the Vatican to the United Nations on disarmament in , which said that the arms race itself “is an act of aggression which amounts to a crime, for even when they are not used, by their cost alone armaments kill the poor by causing them to starve.”
Following a similar rationale, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle recently announced that he was refusing to pay half of his federal income tax as a protest against U.S. involvement in the global arms race.
He said the tax money would go into a fund for charitable activities.
In rejecting the right of citizens to withhold taxes because of conscientious objection to a government policy or program, the IRS cites the decision of the U.S. District Court in San Francisco, which was upheld by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.
That court ruling said in part, “The fact that some persons may object on religious grounds to some of the things that the government does is not a basis upon which they can claim a constitutional right not to pay a part of the tax.”
An article in the Catholic Commentator said that Archbishop Hunthausen had addressed “300 peace activists attending a meeting at Notre Dame University” in South Bend, Indiana and had again announced his tax resistance there.
Aside from that, the article just recycled already-familiar quotes and background.
However, the Catholic Worker printed a few excerpts from the talk:
“…Render to Caesar without question, and without question we will get nuclear war.
“As Christians, we once had a commitment of refusing incense to Caesar.
The Church resisted that idolatry, at the cost of martyrdom.
What has happened to the Christian belief in the Cross and rejection of idolatry?
“Now, on a more blasphemous scale than any homage paid to a first-century Caesar, we engage in nuclear idolatry.
It is not God in Whom we place our trust, but nuclear weapons…
“I believe deeply that God’s love is infinitely more powerful than any nuclear weapon, and that, in seeking to rediscover the Cross, we are on the edge of a discovery more momentous to the world than that of nuclear energy.
Nonviolence. Jesus’ divine way of the Cross, is, in its own way, the most explosive force of history.
Its kind of force, however, is a force of life — a divine force of compassion which can raise the people of this earth from death to life.
I invite you to join me in finding our way back to that nonviolent force of life and love at the heart of the Gospels, which offers a way out of our nuclear tomb.”
An editorial by Father Michael J. Savelesky, printed in the issue of the Inland Register (newspaper of the Diocese of Spokane, Washington), went out over the wire on .
It compared Hunthausen to the biblical prophet Jeremiah, and concluded:
Already people are calling Archbishop Hunthausen a prophet in our own time.
There is a subtle abdication of personal responsibility here.
If the archbishop is indeed a prophet, then we individually and collectively are obliged to face the truth he speaks.
His tax refusal will hardly affect the Gross National Product, but it does shock us into confronting in our own lives the moral issue of nuclear arms.
No one of us escapes that responsibility.
Even to do nothing is a moral stance whose consequences we bear.
A dispatch:
Tax Protester Gets Support in Iowa, Criticism in Florida
By NC News Service
Tax protester Tom Cordaro, who refused to pay $828 in taxes because of the nuclear arms race, has drawn support from the Dubuque Iowa, archdiocesan priests’ senate and criticism from a writer, a lawyer and a priest in Florida.
In an unanimous vote the Dubuque priests’ senate backed Cordaro and his parish, St. Thomas Aquinas, in Ames, Iowa, which has refused Internal Revenue Service (IRS) demands to withhold money from his wages.
Individual members of the priests’ senate also pledged $2,500 for a defense fund to be used if litigation with the IRS over the tax protest ensues.
Meanwhile, in Florida, writer and Scripture scholar Dick Biow and an attorney, Aldo Icardi, both of Winter Park in the Diocese of Orlando, and an unidentified priest, who all disagree with Cordaro, have sent the IRS $145 to cover some of the taxes Cordaro owes.
They said they acted out of concern for armed forces personnel and a “deep sense of shame that one of our co-religionists" would withhold taxes.
Cordaro is a lay pastoral minister for his parish’s Catholic Student Center at Iowa State University.
Because of his religious beliefs he withheld his federal income tax payment and used it to set up Loaves and Fishes Hospitality House, a shelter and meal center for the poor.
The IRS has served levies on St. Thomas Parish four times but according to Father Patrick Geary, parish administrator, has declined to discuss the matter with the pastor.
The parish council passed a resolution stating St. Thomas will “refuse to pay the IRS levy because we are not a tax collecting agency and because we see underlying moral implications that we have not had time to sufficiently explicate.”
Father Geary informed the IRS of the parish decision and the government could take the church to court over the issue.
Biow, a writer whose articles have appeared in the Florida Catholic, newspaper of the dioceses of Orlando and St. Petersburg, the priest and the lawyer listed three reasons for opposing Cordaro and for extending partial payment of his taxes.
They stated that they “would not like to see even one member of our armed forces deprived of the weapons needed to save his own life while he is protecting that of Mr. Cardaro” and that they “pay these reparations out of a deep sense of shame that one of our co-religionists would select such a callous and brutal way of articulating his anti-defense posture.”
“We hope to deny him the opportunity of playing the public martyr,” they added.
A convert to Catholicism, Biow served as a fighter pilot in World War Ⅱ and his son is now a student at the U.S. Naval Academy.
He has studied Scripture for the last 20 years and served as a Scripture consultant to Bishop William D. Borders of Orlando, now an archbishop who heads the Baltimore See.
Biow said he thinks the Reagan administration’s military budget is too big.
But he also said that seeking a strong national defense is good sense.
And, he said, those who believe a cut in military spending will mean more money for the poor are mistaken.
Reagan “is running the military on credit and he could do the same for the poor,” Biow said.
“People who want to help the poor could do a better job if they stopped tying in their arguments with military spending.
Reagan has to be convinced — or politically forced — to help the poor.”
A National Catholic News Service dispatch gave some more details about Hunthausen’s tax resistance (excerpt):
On his tax resistance the archbishop commented that the amount of money involved “will not be great” since “my total income for will be only about $9,000–$10,000.”
He said he will engage in the resistance by withholding half the amount due when he makes his quarterly estimated tax declaration.
He will divide the unpaid tax money “among a peace group — probably the Peace Academy — a pro-life group and perhaps a direct-service charity like our Society of St. Vincent de Paul,” he said.
“Increasingly I see the linkage between peace, life and charity issues, especially as I see the impact on people’s lives of the worsening economy,” he commented.
Asked if he would continue to withhold taxes until the arms race stopped, the 60-year-old Seattle prelate said, “I have not thought that through completely, but what has recently come home to me is the thought that I should be more closely living the poverty of the Gospel and should be giving away more of what I earn.
“In that case I would have no tax to pay.
However, I want to be sure that I am putting myself in that position for the sake of the Gospel and not because I want to avoid the difficulties of tax resistance.”
A dispatch from gives the appearance of a rapidly-developing story:
Priests Hold Back Taxes to Protest Nuclear Arms
By Jerry Filteau NC News Service
At least 10 U.S. priests refused to pay part of their federal income tax to protest American military expenditures and the nuclear arms race.
There was no way to tell how many others may have done so without saying anything about it publicly.
In Oakland, Calif., Father James A. Schexnayder said he “will not be part of a plot to incinerate humanity” and withheld half his taxes “as a conscious resistance to our nation’s nuclear arms race and our selfish and oppressive military interference in Central America.”
Father Schexnayder, 44, is director of the Oakland diocesan permanent diaconate program.
He said he had been considering tax resistance for some time but was “in a sense stimulated” by the similar decision of Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle, which received national publicity .
In Pittsburgh eight priests held a press conference on , to explain their decisions to withhold part of their taxes to protest “the militaristic priorities of the federal budget and to resist our country’s obsessive participation in the arms race.”
“We are fully aware of the illegality of our action according to the U.S. Tax Code laws,” they said in a prepared press statement.
“We pray that the tension caused by our ‘peace gestures’ may turn people’s minds and hearts to the illegality and immorality of the arms race.”
The priests, all from the Pittsburgh metropolitan area, were Fathers Donald McIlvane, John Brennan, Patrick Fenton, Jack O’Malley, Robert Schweitzer, Donald Fischer, Mark Glasgow and John Oesterle.
After a brief press conference and prayer service at the Pittsburgh Diocesan Building, the eight were joined by other opponents of nuclear weapons in a march to the Pittsburgh Federal Building for a protest demonstration there.
Hearing of the tax protests in Pittsburgh and Oakland, the Indianapolis archdiocesan newspaper, The Criterion, called an associate pastor at a local socially active parish to see if he knew of any priests in the Indianapolis area who were doing the same thing.
The priest, Father Cosmas Raimondi, said yes, he knew of one — “me.”
He had made no public announcement of his decision, but he said that a few days earlier he had filed his federal tax return with a covering letter notifying the IRS that he was paying only half the tax due.
“In my own conscience I don’t feel that I can support a strong militarist spirit in government,” Father Raimondi explained.
“I respect civil law but I also feel that God’s law of love is superior to that civil law.”
He said he preferred to not to call his action of conscience “civil disobedience,” but rather “divine obedience.”
Father Raimondi said he objected to not only the nuclear arms race, which he said must be ended by “mutually monitored steps of disarmament, but also U.S. military aid to “repressive regimes” in Central America and the current program of draft registration in the United States, which he said will lead to a mandatory draft.
The fact that Father Raimondi said nothing of his tax protest until he was called by a newspaper indicated that there may be other priests in the country, influenced by Archbishop Hunthausen’s decision and by the numerous denunciations of the arms race by other American bishops in the past year, who have also engaged in tax resistance without publicity.
In virtually all cases the amount of money involved is slight, since the taxable income of diocesan priests is normally very low.
For religious order priests and nuns, tax resistance is not an option because of the vow of poverty they take.
Under federal law salaries received by members of religious orders are considered income of the religious order itself, not personal income.
Father Schexnayder said his protest was “largely symbolic” because half his taxes only came to about $60.
His tax resistance drew mixed reactions from other Oakland clergymen.
Three local military chaplains contacted by the Oakland diocesan newspaper, The Catholic Voice, expressed different views.
A retired National Guard chaplain, Father Paul J. Engberg, called it “anarchism” and said it was contrary to American principles of respect for law and working within the system if changes are needed.
Father Robert Ríen, chaplain of the 349th Military Airlift Wing, said, “If he feels in conscience that he has to do this, then I support him 100 percent.
At the same time, I hope brother priests will support me in bringing the ministry we share to the people in the military sector.”
Another National Guard chaplain, Father Ronald Lagasse, called Father Schexnayder’s protest “laudable” but “ineffective.”
It might “prick people’s consciences, but won’t go any further than that.
There’s no basis on which to build,” he said.
He and Father Ríen emphasized that military personnel do not want war.
Those in the military, said Father Lagasse, are going through the same qualms of conscience as everyone else on nuclear weapons.
Father Brian Joyce, president of the diocesan priests senate, praised Father Schexnayder for drawing attention to the nuclear arms race as “an issue of conscience, a major one that every Christian has to seriously address.”
But he said he would not take the same action for several reasons, including questions he had about its effectiveness and whether it was the right approach.
“For instance, while I oppose nuclear arms, I don’t necessarily oppose defense, and at the same time I have a lot of respect and admiration for what Jim (Father Schexnayder) is doing,” he said.
(Contributing to this story were Stephen Karlinchak in Pittsburgh, Dan Morris in Oakland and Jim Jachimiak in Indianapolis.)
Archbishop Hunthausen, whose announcement of tax resistance drew national attention, said in that the federal taxes he was refusing to pay were being placed in an escrow account for the World Peace Tax Fund.
Bills to establish that fund are pending in Congress.
If enacted, the legislation would change the U.S. tax code to let conscientious military tax objectors direct the military portion of their tax money to non-military peace-related purposes such as peace research, disarmament efforts, international health, education and welfare programs, and the retraining of workers displaced by conversion from military to non-military production.
A citizens’ organization, Conscience and Military Campaign-U.S., has established the World Peace Tax Fund escrow account to accept payments in anticipation of the legislation.
Correction and Insert
At least 11 (NOT 10) U.S. priests…
After 16th paragraph beginning, The fact that… INSERT the following:
Another priest who said nothing until a newspaper called him and asked was Father Joseph O’Hara, a sociologist at Loras College in Dubuque, Iowa.
When he was contacted by The Witness, Dubuque archdiocesan paper, Father O’Hara said he had refused to pay any taxes and had informed the IRS that this was a protest over the nuclear arms race.
Last year Father O’Hara refused to pay his taxes as a protest against the administration’s military support of El Salvador despite the Salvadoran government’s record of human rights violations.
Another tax protester in the Dubuque Archdiocese is Thomas Cordero, a lay minister employed by St. Thomas Aquinas Church in Ames, Iowa.
In the parish council voted unanimously to refuse IRS orders to the parish to garnishee his wages for payment of the taxes owed.
Members of the archdiocesan priests senate agreed to contribute $1,200 out of their pockets to reimburse the parish if the IRS succeeds in legally forcing the parish to pay the taxes plus applicable penalties for its refusal to comply with the garnishment orders.
Father O’Hara said that the money involved in his tax protest was not much, and he had not yet heard a word from the IRS about his refusal to pay taxes last year
PICK UP original 17th paragraph beginning.
In virtually all…
ADD to list of contributors at end of story: …and Father Thomas Ralph in Dubuque.
The Cordero case got more attention in a dispatch:
Tax Protester, Archbishop Clash Over IRS
By Father Thomas Ralph
Dubuque, Iowa (NC)—
Archbishop James J. Byrne of Dubuque and tax protester Tom Cordaro, a lay minister at St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in Ames have clashed over whether the parish should pay the Internal Revenue Service Cordaro’s unpaid back income taxes.
After a meeting between the two foundered, Cordaro held a five-day prayer vigil next to the archbishop’s house and other protesters picketed the archbishop.
In a statement released Archbishop Byrne stated his position.
St. Thomas Parish, the archbishop said, owes Cordaro a month’s salary for his services as a lay minister during .
Under the law of the Internal Revenue Service code, these unpaid funds are subject to taxation and the parish is obliged to honor the levy.
The archbishop further stated that he had been advised by legal counsel that the parish church is not “the proper or appropriate party to litigate the merits” of Cordaro’s refusal to pay federal income taxes as a protest against the nuclear arms race.
The archbishop’s response came two days after Cordaro ended a five-day prayer vigil at the Chapel of Perpetual Adoration adjoining the archbishop’s residence in Dubuque and returned to Ames.
Cordaro had been in Dubuque when he and Father Patrick Geary, pastor at the Ames parish, met with Archbishop Byrne at Cordaro’s request to discuss the archbishop’s decision that the parish must honor the IRS order to garnishee his wages for $1,300 in back taxes.
The archbishop requested confidentiality regarding the discussion, and when Cordaro said he could not honor the request the meeting ended.
Cordaro began his prayer vigil to protest the archbishop’s refusal to state publicly his reasons for his decision.
At a press conference at the Catholic Worker House before leaving Dubuque , Cordaro said the real tragedy of the past week had not been the archbishop’s demand for payment of his back taxes but “that those in the church with power and influence, who knew an injustice was done, have remained silent.”
He named moral theologians, religious communities, other bishops, teachers and presidents of the universities as examples of those he expected to speak out.
“The archbishop’s silence has made it impossible for me to obey his wishes,” Cordaro said, “and I will continue to withhold my taxes.
Blind obedience to authority is in itself immoral.”
Many groups and individuals in the Dubuque Archdiocese support Cordaro’s position of having the courts decide whether he can withhold payment of his taxes on religious grounds.
On the archdiocesan priests’ senate voted 23-1 for a resolution calling for the archbishop to clarify his decision for halting the tax protest.
The parish council at St. Thomas Aquinas voted unanimously the previous week to support Cordaro’s fight and refuse the IRS demand to garnishee his wages.
Cordaro had been refusing to pay his federal income taxes , giving all but $50 of his $874-a-month parish salary to Loaves and Fishes Hospitality House in Ames which furnishes food and shelter to the needy.
Father Richard P. Funke, vice chancellor of the archdiocese, said that neither he nor the archbishop had seen the priests’ senate resolution and questioned why the resolution was made public before the archbishop had seen it.
“The archbishop is equally concerned about the nuclear build-up,” Father Funke said, “but we are talking about two completely different issues.
“The church has the obligation to support the right of conscience and in this has been supportive of Mr. Cordaro and others in their protests of the nuclear arms race.
“The church also has an obligation to support obedience to duly authorized authority such as the government in its right of taxation for purposes of providing protection, order, freedom and services to its citizenry.”
Portions of taxes go to support “the elderly, the needy, the kind of people Cordaro seems to be concerned about,” Father Funke said.
“How he can withhold 100 percent of his taxes is a real problem to me.”
A legal battle over the right of the government to force a church to garnishee tax moneys in violation of a person’s conscience is being considered by Cordaro and the parish council, of which he is a member.
Approximately $9,000 in pledges has been received to support his legal defense, he said.
Gordon Allen of Des Moines, a constitutional lawyer and the chief counsel for the Iowa Civil Liberties Union, has offered to handle the case without cost.
Archbishop Hunthausen spoke about his tax resistance and the reasoning behind it — and took some questions from a skeptical audience — at a talk in Brooklyn ( dispatch):
New York (NC)—
The possibility of the human family’s destroying itself in a nuclear holocaust presents the greatest spiritual crisis in history, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle said in an address in New York .
Declaring that he saw no political solution to the crisis, he said that “conversion” was needed “at a depth in our lives we’d rather not know.”
Archbishop Hunthausen spoke at St. James Cathedral in Brooklyn, N.Y. following Sunday Vespers, one of several bishops appearing in a “Shepherds Speak” series sponsored by the Brooklyn Diocese.
The archbishop from Washington state was a focus of national news when he suggested that refusing to pay part of ones income tax could be an appropriate way of protesting the nuclear arms race, and again when he announced that he was refusing to pay half his own tax.
Instead, he said, he would put the money in a fund for such purposes as helping the poor, fighting abortion and promoting disarmament.
In his address Archbishop Hunthausen offered no analysis of how his approach would resolve the military issues involved in national defense but kept his argument on a religious level.
Faith in Christ he said, will liberate Americans from “fear of the Russians” and other fears motivating production of nuclear weapons.
These include the “fear of losing our wealth,” he said.
Archbishop Hunthausen reported that others had tried to convince him that the “realistic way of preserving peace was to build nuclear weapons and plan for the possibility of a first strike.
“I do not understand any of this as realistic,” he said.
Americans, he added, must get a new understanding of reality “or we shall be destroyed.”
As an alternative he advocated the “reality” of the kingdom of God as taught by Jesus.
Archbishop Hunthausen described the way of Jesus as “faithful non-violent action” and said he was seeking to follow that way in his tax protest.
As a result of taking this action, he said he has “begun to experience conversion myself.” Carrying the action a step further Archbishop Hunthausen said he would participate in a “non-violent peace blockade” trying to stop the U.S.S. Ohio, America’s first Trident nuclear missile submarine, when it is taken to its Puget Sound base .
Archbishop Hunthausen was enthusiastically applauded by nearly all of the audience, which numbered about 200–300.
He received standing ovations when he was introduced, at the conclusion of his brief talk, and again at the end of a question period.
However a few individuals had come to express opposition.
One of them, James Crockett, a retired layman from a Brooklyn parish, had prepared a large sign that he held up outside as people departed.
It read: “Archbishop Hunthausen: Would you have us abandon the defense of our homeland and our loved ones?”
During the question period, the archbishop was challenged by S.Z.F. Rutar, a layman of another Brooklyn parish who is the area chapter president of the National Alliance of Czech Catholics.
He told of leaving Czechoslovakia after seeing many friends killed by communists and went on to question Archbishop Hunthausen’s commitment to preserving American freedom.
“I love my country and it is because I love my country that I say what I do,” the archbishop responded.
“I would like for my country to put its confidence in the God we profess to believe in.”
Finally, Bill Samuel summed up the history and current state-of-the-art of American war tax resistance in an article for New Catholic World (reprinted in the Catholic Worker):
Refusing War Taxes
By Bill Samuel
Tax refusal is such an obvious and fundamental means of protest and resistance that it has been used for centuries for a variety of purposes.
Movements of tax refusers are reported as far back as in Egypt.
Tax refusal movements focusing on opposition to war date back at least as far as , when Danish peasants refused to pay taxes to support King Christian Ⅱ’s war against Sweden.
In the United States, war tax refusal is older than the country.
The Quaker-controlled Assembly of the Pennsylvania Colony in refused a royal demand to appropriate money for an expedition into Canada.
In , when the Assembly voted large amounts for the French and Indian War, many Quakers and Mennonites refused to pay taxes. , this was true throughout the colonies, and a number were imprisoned as a result.
The Quaker testimony became so strong that a number of Quakers were disowned by their Monthly Meetings (parishes) during the Revolutionary War for paying war taxes.
But it was not only Quakers and those of other traditionally pacifist religious groups who are engaged in war tax refusal.
The most famous early American war tax refuser was Henry David Thoreau, who was jailed for refusing to pay taxes for the Mexican War.
He eloquently defended his action in his landmark essay “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience”:
“If a thousand (people) were not to pay their tax bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the state to commit violence and shed innocent blood.”
Over , there continued to be persons refusing taxes on grounds of objection to war, but war tax refusal was not a major part of peace efforts.
It took the dropping of atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the growth of the Cold War, to make tax refusal again an important issue in the peace movement.
A number of peace activists, including A.J. Muste, began war tax refusal in .
In , about 250 people seeking a more radical approach to peace met in Chicago.
War tax refusal was one of the major issues at the conference, which spawned the radical pacifist Peacemaker movement.
Nonpayment of taxes for war has been a central tenet of this movement since its founding.
A handful of people associated with the Peacemakers were imprisoned on various charges connected with tax refusal during .
Until , little was published on war tax refusal except leaflets and magazine articles.
Two important books were issued that year.
The Peacemakers issued the first edition of their Handbook on Nonpayment of Taxes for War, which reported the experiences of a number of individuals and endeavored to explain both the whys and the hows of war tax refusal.
The other publication, Edmund Wilson’s The Cold War and the Income Tax, was written by a prominent literary figure who received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in the same year.
This blistering attack on militarism and the income tax system was greeted with critical acclaim and received mass distribution as a Signet paperback.
Although war tax refusal grew in the two decades following Hiroshima, it remained largely an act of deeply committed pacifists, a tiny minority on the fringes of American society.
It only became a mass movement when large numbers of Americans were killing and being killed in a war that was difficult to justify.
President Johnson aided the growth of tax resistance by identifying specific taxes as needed to finance the war.
The telephone tax, scheduled to expire in , was reimposed explicitly to finance the Vietnam operation and was extended twice during the Vietnam War.
For there was also an income tax surcharge to raise revenue for the war.
People who strongly opposed the Vietnam War, but who were not necessarily pacifists, were moved to resist those taxes.
Because it was both clearly associated with Vietnam and easy to refuse, the telephone tax was at one time refused by hundreds of thousands of Americans.
The War Resisters League (WRL) was the principal group promoting war tax refusal during the early Vietnam war years.
By it seemed to merit its own organization.
With considerable help from the WRL, War Tax Resistance was launched at a New York press conference on .
Aiming at the masses of Vietnam War protesters, WTR defined as a war tax resister anyone who refused at least $5 of some federal tax.
WTR struck a real chord.
Its initial hope was to encourage the formation of WTR branches in at least 25 cities.
Within a year, it had 160 WTR Centers in all parts of the country.
Tax resistance demonstrations were held, especially at filing deadline, in cities and towns all over the U.S.
Most national peace groups participated in the campaign.
Local churches of many denominations refused the phone tax.
Two editions () of a book, Ain’t Gonna Pay for War No More by Robert Calvert, on the reasons for and the methods of war tax refusal were published.
During , the movement attempted to conquer a major obstacle to income tax resistance, the withholding system.
Resisters began to claim additional exemptions on the withholding forms (Form W-4) they filed with their employers to reduce or eliminate withholding.
A number of resisters were indicted on withholding fraud charges.
A handful went to prison, but others won court decisions that an open aboveboard act could not be considered fraud.
Withholding resistance became more sophisticated as Form W-4 was made more complex.
Resisters began claiming allowances justified by large itemized deductions rather than additional dependents.
Large amounts were claimed as “war tax deductions” on tax returns.
This tax refusal method forced the IRS to allow the taxpayer appeals through the civil courts.
The movement also developed a concrete positive component, inspired by Karl Meyer’s article “A Fund for Mankind” in the issue of The Catholic Worker.
Alternative funds pooling refused taxes began to spring up in cities all across the country.
These funds would grant or loan money for a wide variety of social service and social change purposes.
Sometimes the money was dispersed in public and dramatic ways, such as handing people subway tokens with a leaflet at subway stations in poor areas.
Decisions about use of the funds have usually been made collectively by donors.
Most of the funds will return deposited tax money in the event of IRS seizure.
For this reason, many funds have retained all income tax deposits, spending only the interest earned on them.
There were about 55 funds in existence by .
In , a group of war tax refusers and others concerned in the Ann Arbor, Michigan area began meeting together to find a legal alternative to paying taxes for military purposes.
Under the able leadership of Quaker physician Dr. David Bassett, this group developed the World Peace Tax Fund Bill using the legal resources of volunteers from the University of Michigan Law School.
This proposed legislation would allow persons to declare themselves conscientious objectors to military taxation on their tax returns.
Their taxes would be diverted to a new government trust fund, the World Peace Tax Fund.
The military portion of the taxes paid by conscientious objectors would perform alternative service through support of a national peace academy, disarmament efforts, international exchanges and other peace-related programs.
The non-military portion would be returned to the Treasury for use in civilian government programs.
In , a related committee composed largely of church and peace group lobbyists was formed in Washington.
They persuaded Rep. Ronald Dellums (D.-Calif.) and nine other U.S. Representatives to introduce the bill that year.
The Ann Arbor and Washington committees, working from their own homes and offices on a volunteer basis, developed support for the bill from around the country from thousands of individuals and many Church, peace and political groups.
In , the two committees consolidated their efforts into the National Council for a World Peace Tax Fund, operating from a staffed office in Washington.
In , the bill was introduced in the Senate for the first time by Sen. Mark Hatfield (R-Oregon).
The World Peace Tax Fund Bill (H.R. 4897, S. 880) was introduced again in by Rep. Dellums and 29 co-sponsors (as of ) in the House and Sen. Hatfield in the Senate.
In the first years after the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Vietnam, the war tax refusal movement lost a lot of its energy.
Although there continued to be many more tax resisters than before the Vietnam era, the organized movement faltered.
National WTR published the last issue of its Tax Talk publication in and formally dissolved .
Many local WTR groups lapsed into inactivity.
Most of the national peace groups lost interest.
Individual resisters often had difficulty finding needed information and support.
As the much-heralded “Vietnam dividend” releasing resources for domestic needs failed to appear and military spending continued to rise, interest in war tax resistance began to grow, particularly within the religious community.
In , the Center on Law and Pacifism was formed.
The brainchild of Catholic attorney and lay theologian William Durland, it was conceived as a radical religious pacifist group focusing on the relationship of pacifism to law and legal institutions.
The Center has provided legal counsel to a number of war tax refusers.
It has not won any major legal victories, but its existence as an expert resource for support encouraged many to become war tax resisters.
A Center workshop in called for a People Pay for Peace campaign involving the refusal of at least $2.40 (U.S. military budget per day per capita) in federal taxes.
During the tax filing season, local groups formed in a number of cities, resulting in many new war tax resisters and a number of public witness actions.
The Center issued the first edition of People Pay for Peace: A Military Tax Refusal Guide in , and has issued a revised edition or a supplement to the book each year since.
At the same time, interest was increasing in historically pacifist churches.
The General Conference Mennonlte Church had been considering the issue for years, beginning its forum newsletter God and Caesar in .
The issue became a major one for the New Call to Peacemaking (NCP), a joint effort by Mennonites, Quakers and Brethren to revitalize their peace witness.
At the first NCP national conference in , the gathering called upon individual church members “seriously to consider refusal to pay the military portion of their federal taxes as a response to Christ’s call to radical discipleship.”
It further called “on our denominations, congregations, and meetings to give high priority to the study and promotion of war tax resistance in our own circles and beyond.”
This strong stand received considerable publicity in the mass media.
Particularly among Mennonites and Quakers, greatly increased consideration of the issue has resulted and many more individual members are engaging in war tax resistance.
A second NCP conference in reaffirmed the position.
In , Long Island peace activist Ed Pearson and others active in the World Peace Tax Fund movement launched a new national campaign to focus mass war tax resistance on passage of the bill.
The Conscience and Military Tax Campaign seeks 100,000 people to sign a Resolution stating that they are either now resisting the payment of war taxes or will do so by the time 100,000 have signed.
An Escrow Account of refused military taxes is maintained, to be turned over to IRS after enactment of the World Peace Tax Fund bill.
On , Catholic Archbishop Raymond G. Hunthausen of Seattle spoke to a regional Lutheran gathering, sharing “a vision of… a sizable number of people… refusing to pay 50 percent of their taxes in nonviolent resistance to nuclear murder and suicide.”
Although he later stated in a pastoral letter that this was a secondary aspect of the speech, his vision received considerable national publicity and sparked many Catholics and other mainstream Christians to consider seriously war tax refusal for the first time.
There is now a growing war tax resistance movement which has begun to reach Americans in the mainstream.
This movement has the potential of becoming a major component of a large and influential campaign to halt the arms race.
(Bill Samuel is a Quaker who has worked on tax refusal for years.
This article first appeared in New Catholic World.)
Resources
Conscience and Military Tax Campaign, 44 Bellhaven Road, Bellport, NY 11713; (516) 286‒8825. Newsletter, literature, escrow account.
National Council for a World Peace Tax Fund, 2111 Florida Ave., N.W., Washington, DC 20008: (202) 483‒3751. Newsletter, literature, slideshow.
Center on Law and Pacifism. P.O. Box 1584, Colorado Springs, CO 80901; (303) 635‒0041. Publishes People Pay for Peace: A Military Tax Refusal Guide ( edition).
Peacemakers, P.O. Box 627, Garberville, CA 95440. Handbook on Nonpayment of Taxes for War ( edition — $1.50) and The Peacemaker (monthly — $10 year).
War Resisters League, 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012; (212) 228‒0450. Guide to War Tax Resistance, , $6 plus postage.
