Why it is your duty to stop supporting the government → the danger of “feel-good” protests → “symbolic” tax protests? → the “Peace Tax Fund,” legal conscientious objection to military taxation → criticisms of

Tax day has arrived, and with it the various news fluff pieces about lines at the post office. But there are a few bits here and there about tax protests of various sorts, worth reviewing:

• George Bush is continuing the long-standing Republican theme of lowering taxes, or wanting to, anyway. More power to him. Wait — can I take that back? Chances are the Repubs will propose a bunch of tax breaks that’ll mostly benefit the people who share their income brackets, then the Demos will respond with some populist, feel-good, middle-class benefits like higher per-child deductibles and the like, then both parties will remember how much fun it is spending other people’s money and cut their proposals in half. With any luck, though, things’ll drop a bit.
• Some legislator or other had the bright idea of introducing a bill to move tax day from April 15^th to the first Monday in November so that it’d fall right before election day. Clever. Good luck to you.
• Some Libertarian Party chapters protest on tax day by handing out fake million-dollar bills at post offices, explaining that the government spends that much of our money every five seconds.
• There’ve been a few news items about the few folks like me who are purposefully reducing our incomes below the tax line, here’s one: Eleanor Bonney Simons, 83, of St. Johnsbury, hasn’t paid federal income taxes or the federal tax portion of her telephone bills in a decade, and said she always makes sure to give away enough money each year that she doesn’t have any tax liability. “I find I can live very well this way,” Simons said. “It makes me feel good to know I’m not supporting the war effort.”
• Some people are withholding something on the order of half of their income taxes, and then including a letter with their tax forms saying that they will not willingly pay the portion of their tax that goes to the military. The IRS sometimes goes ahead and pulls the remainder from their bank accounts, but these protesters are satisfied with their symbolic protest and with not paying the taxes voluntarily.
• There’s another idea in the form of a bill that gets floated from time to time in the U.S. Congress that would create a sort of “conscientious objector” tax that would be paid into a fund that is only spent on those parts of the federal budget that are non-military in nature. Yeah, right. (link: National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund.) Of course this, like the symbolic withholding above, doesn’t actually have any bottom-line effect. It’s just an accounting shuffle. In fact, I’d wager that it would have an overall negative effect, because it will encourage even more people to pay taxes by enhancing the illusion that it’s a morally neutral or morally acceptable act.
• I’ve seen many news articles about how the IRS has been doing less and less enforcement, with fewer and fewer auditors over the last several years, so that it’s much easier to get away with being a tax cheat. Even the most blatant and wacky phony tax dodges often work simply because the IRS doesn’t have the resources to go after most of ’em. (Last year, the IRS revealed that over the previous two years it had mistakenly paid out thirty million dollars to people who were claiming a “slavery tax credit”.) A lot of these articles have a “but this year things will be tougher” spin, and seem to have been prompted by a preëmptive IRS press release, but the numbers seem to support the suspicion that people who pay their lawful share are either a willingly generous group or are being played for suckers.

“I think people fear the IRS much less,” says [tax analyst Jackie] Perlman. Her suspicion is supported by data.

A 2001 government survey found that 24 percent of taxpayers think it’s OK to cheat on their taxes — up from 13 percent in 1999. And the fiscal consequences are huge: If all Americans had paid their taxes last year, according to IRS estimates, an additional $207 billion would have poured into federal coffers — enough to pay the projected federal deficit for 2003, and have $7 billion to spare…

“I think that people have come to see paying income tax as driving 55 m.p.h: Only a fool would do it,” says Deborah Schenk, a law professor at New York University. “If the attitude spreads, the whole system will collapse.”

Because of a series of recent budget cuts, the IRS’s number of full-time personnel declined by 16 percent between 1992 and 2001. The result: the average taxpayer’s chances of being audited dropped dramatically. Five years ago, the IRS audited 1 of every 78 tax filers. Last year, the fraction shrank to about 1 in 170. That steep decline in audits, experts say, has emboldened brash millions to try to pay less. “It’s not a secret that the IRS is understaffed and it can’t enforce as much as it would like,” says Perlman.

The Peace Tax Seven are a group of people who are making a legal challenge to the tax system in the UK — saying that it “makes all taxpayers complicit in mass killing if they do their civic duty and pay their taxes; or it makes criminals of them if they follow their conscience, and refuse to fund war.”

The compromise they propose, and the one that seems most likely to be granted in the unlikely event that their government decides that their claims have any legal merit, is something like a Peace Tax Fund. Conscientious objectors to war would be able to check off a box on their tax forms or something like that and then all of their tax payments would be designated for non-war purposes.

This is of course just an accounting trick and it would not make any actual difference in terms of what money went where or how much was spent on the military. But apparently some people who have moral qualms about paying taxes today would not have such qualms if there were only such a checkbox.

It is hard for me to understand why anyone would devote their time to convincing the government to make such a meaningless symbolic concession, particularly people who seem to understand the arguments for refusing to pay war taxes and who practice what they preach, as many of the Seven do. But what seems obvious to me apparently doesn’t seem very obvious to the many war tax resisters and war tax resistance organizations who endorse and encourage these sorts of movements.

In yesterday’s Picket Line I had some discouraging things to say about ideas like the “Peace Tax Fund.” In fact, I dismissed them as worthless and wondered why they were so popular in war tax resistance circles.

I decided that I’d better take a closer look and make sure I really understood what I was talking about.

The “Peace Tax Fund” movement is active in something like 17 countries, and bills have been introduced in at least 7 national legislatures to create such funds.

Each bill and campaign is a little different, but they all appear to be essentially the same idea. The U.S. bill “would create a separate fund in the U.S. Treasury that can only be used for any government purpose that is not military in nature. This will allow a CO to check a box on the tax form, like the presidential election fund option, and pay their full tax liability, but have 100% of their tax obligation kept out of any war efforts. The instruction booklet would have an explanatory paragraph about what it means to be a CO. Levels of participation in this fund would be reported to Congress annually, and thus published in the Congressional Record,” says one source. It “will allow legally defined conscientious objectors to pay 100% of their taxes into a separate fund that will be used only for government spending that is not for a military purpose. The level of contribution to this fund will be annually entered into the Congressional Record, and information about the fund will be published in both the tax return form and the instruction booklet. The apportionment powers of Congress will not be restricted while relief of suffering will be granted to tens of thousands otherwise not able to earn above the taxable level of income or otherwise forced to refuse payment of taxes,” says another.

I have tried to identify the benefits of this legislation, as suggested by the campaigns’ promoters:

Sends a Message

• “It will be a watershed event for religious and civil liberties when a major military power acknowledges its citizens have a just claim to freedom of conscience which has been denied.”
• “Each set of federal tax instructions for 160 million U.S. taxpayers would include this information about conscientious objector status.” This would raise public awareness about conscientious objection to war. Also it “would be an educational vehicle that uses the tax form to spread awareness that alternatives to war are sought,” and it “would advertise to the nation and to the world that there is not blanket approval of war and that we have a peaceful minority.” “The level of participation in the Peace Tax Fund would be published in the Congressional Record every year. This information would be the most comprehensive and visible barometer for judging the nation’s conscience in regard to participating in war, and could build momentum toward changing military spending priorities.” “The Peace Tax Fund Bill would be a meaningful step towards raising the national consciousness about misplaced military priorities.”

Signals Government Approval of Conscientiousness

• A “Peace Tax Fund” bill “would restore freedom of religion… to taxpayers whose religious or moral convictions forbid their participation in war” and it “would be another step in the de-criminalization of conscientious objection, broadening the rights of conscience to include objection to military taxation.”

Increases Funds Available to Government

• “There are currently thousands of people of conscience who refuse to pay some or all of their federal income taxes because such money pays for war. The government would receive increased revenue if people of conscience knew their taxes were used only for life-affirming purposes.” The text of the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act introduced into the U.S. Congress includes a section that reads: “the Joint Committee on Taxation has certified that a tax trust fund, providing for conscientious objector taxpayers to pay their full taxes for non-military purposes, would increase Federal revenues.”
• “It is important to recognise that diverted tax would not affect the defence budget, which would be set in the normal way.”

Relieves Suffering of War Tax Resisters

• It would relieve the suffering of current war tax resisters, who would be able to go back to a legal, above-board, taxpaying life or earn a taxable income.

Miscellaneous

• “It would provide standing for any future legislation introduced to promote peace and social justice, and would stand as an argument against increased military spending.”
• “As a legal precedent, this would allow previously lost Court cases to be appealed.”

My most basic objection to this set of points is that I don’t believe that a bill that allows the government to have more money and to spend as much of it as it would like to on war is anything like a step in the right direction or anything war tax resisters ought to waste their time on. My secondary objection is that quite clearly some war tax resisters would indeed be deceived into feeling that they could again pay taxes with a clear conscience if a “peace tax bill” were passed — while in reality nothing in the moral equation would have changed. There’s no virtue in further clouding the moral challenge of taxation in this way.

Many of these other alleged benefits seem either unlikely or not worth these negative results. The symbolic, message-sending benefits are the most plausible, but seem just as attainable without the benefit of an act of Congress.

Only one page of the many I visited when searching for information on these “peace tax funds” even attempted to squarely address the most glaring flaws of the campaign:

“Conscientious objection to military taxation would legally parallel conscientious objection to military service. The work performed by conscientious objectors during the draft did not result in fewer soldiers going to war. Likewise, the tax dollars contributed by conscientious objectors to the Peace Tax Fund would not change budgetary priorities. Yet this does not diminish the power of either moral stand.”

But this is not accurate. When someone declared himself a conscientious objector that person did not take up arms and kill. Perhaps somebody else was drafted to do so instead, this is true, but that person, the conscientious one, did not. A “peace tax fund” payer, on the contrary, pays just as much money as the non-fund payer, but just cherishes the illusion that her dollars were peaceful ones. It would be as if the government told conscientious objectors that they had to take up arms and shoot at the enemy just like everybody else, but that they didn’t have to take credit for their kills if they didn’t want to.

The government can’t solve your moral dilemma for you by making a separate slot above the basket for conscientious people to pass their taxes through. That’s just silly, and makes “conscientious” people look not conscientious at all but naïve and easily bought-off.

So what are the alternatives?

Whether or not a “peace tax fund” is enacted, the basic problem of not wanting to contribute to activities you think are immoral remains the same, and tax resistance continues to be a good response to that problem. If the idea of a “peace tax fund” is attractive to you, I would suggest not waiting for the government to create one for you, but to go ahead and donate money directly to charities that you consider valuable. If merely the illusion of having paid taxes that were only used for peaceful purposes is enough for you, visualize every dollar that you paid going directly into the budget for your favorite government program (you can do this even without a “peace tax fund” bill and it will mean just as much).

In two messages over at The Peace Tax Seven Message Forum Simon Heywood and Robin Brookes (both members of the Peace Tax Seven) take issue with my recent criticism of “Peace Tax Fund” schemes. Simon Heywood writes:

Peace tax isn’t just diverted away from the military, it’s diverted into a fund for non-military security (NMS), including pro-active conflict resolution and transformation and international development. When people tick the box, the war fund goes down by X pounds, and the peace fund goes up by X pounds, accountably, funding more development, more expert work with conflict situations, more research, better understanding of the contexts of crises, more intelligent policy-making, more considered, focused and sparing (and/or no) use of military force, and (finally) fewer ruined lives. Even if a government then compensates by diverting X pounds from (say) the health service to the war fund, the peace fund still benefits by the same amount — and so, consequently, does the world…

Robin Brookes adds:

[T]his would not be an “accounting gimmick” but an action which would make government accountable for some of the money it spends since the amount diverted would be ring fenced. It would then be up to activists, perhaps through a “Commission for Peace” cf. ministryforpeace.org.uk, to keep an eye on how it is spent.

I tend to think of the peace tax issue as the thin end of the wedge and if other peace organisations got behind it, the whole peace/non-violent conflict resolution movement could voice their angle. We could get a more public airing of peace issues and get more people on our side.

I have doubts whether the government would accept a check box on the tax form. They are more likely to want to set up some tribunal system, perhaps within the county court system. This would in fact keep the issues alive with news of hearings and their results.

This seems a more effective and thorough “peace tax” than what I had envisioned in my criticism, although I’m skeptical about how “ring-fenced” this fund will be, knowing what I know about how the government treats its other such funds. However this proposal also seems far less likely to make much headway in the legislature, largely because it requires so much more than a simple checkbox (ministries, watchdogs, etc.) and also because it seems designed to be more effective at doing what its proponents would like it to do.

At this point my criticism changes from “why try to get the government to grant a symbolic victory that won’t mean much” to “if you’re going to ask the government for such an unlikely concession, why not go for something more directly to-the-point (e.g. nuclear disarmament, permanent abolition of the draft, etc.)?”

But everybody’s got their own battles to choose, and I’m sure from many perspectives mine seem no less ridiculous.

SCENE I: Valley Children’s Hospital, where a new “Philanthropic Boss Burn Unit” is being dedicated. Philanthropic Boss and Iris Enchmann walk back to a waiting limo.

IRIS:

What a wonderful thing you’ve done here, Boss. You’re going to go down in history as a great benefactor.

BOSS:

Well, thank you, Iris. But I couldn’t have done it without a lot of fund-raising help from you and from our clients.

IRIS:

I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that, Boss. There’s a couple of our clients who have withdrawn from the agreement. They’ve stopped paying.

BOSS:

How’s that? Have you gone over the agreement with them?

IRIS:

I’ve reiterated the benefits of the protection we supply, and the importance of their funding in making it continue. And I’ve explained the consequences of not paying, including the possible revocation of Kneecap Integrity Guarantees and of the Having Healthy Children benefit.

BOSS:

So what is their complaint?

IRIS:

They tell me they don’t want to fund your murder, rape, pillage and plunder campaigns. Apparently it’s against their religion or provokes moral revulsion or something like that — I don’t quite understand what they’re getting at. What’s more… it seems to be spreading. Every month or two there’s another one who won’t pay.

BOSS:

I see. Is it cutting into revenues much?

IRIS:

Not a whole lot so far, but enough that we’re having to make sacrifices we shouldn’t have to make. And, you know, even if it doesn’t amount to much, it’s the principle that counts. If you let these people get away with it, pretty soon nobody will want to contribute. Shall I call the Goon Squad?

BOSS:

No. We never get contributions from anyone after the Goon Squad’s through with them. Hard to squeeze blood from a vegetable, heh heh. I’ve got a better idea.

IRIS:

What’s that, Boss?

BOSS:

Go back to these malcontents and remind them of all the good things we’re doing — the “we’re saving your money for retirement so you don’t have to” fund, the “Philanthropic Boss Burn Unit and Arthroscopic Knee Surgery Rehab Ward,” the new baseball stadium. Remind ’em that I couldn’t do it without their help and give them my solemn word as a gentleman and a patriot that I will only spend their money on things like that, and I’ll use the contributions from other people for those projects that sensitive, religious types turn their noses up at.

IRIS:

Think they’ll fall for it?

BOSS:

It’s worth a try.

SCENE II: Later that week, at stately Philanthropic Boss Hall, Iris returns from her rounds to report on progress.

IRIS:

Well, they’re not buying it. They don’t believe you when you say you’ll spend their money differently — how do you even know who’s money is whose, they ask. And they don’t trust you to make the fine distinctions their strange religion seems to call for. Can I call the Goon Squad now?

BOSS:

Not yet. I think we can finesse this one. Next time you go on your rounds, carry two envelopes for the contributions instead of one. When you see one of these religious nutcases, bring out the other envelope. We’ll call it the Conscience Envelope. Make sure it’s decorated with pictures from all the good things we’re doing — the ribbon cutting at the burn unit dedication for instance. And here, I’ll write up a Solemn Declaration:

The monies in the Conscience Envelope are for beneficial, peaceful, soothing, and pleasant uses only and shall under no circumstances be used for rape, for murder except execution after due process of law, for pillage outside of Philanthropic Boss’s domain, or for unauthorized plunder, except in the case of bona fide emergencies. Anyone caught using these monies for any such improper purposes will be subject to a fine of not more than $50,000.

IRIS:

And the other envelope will continue to pay for your rape, murder, pillage and plunder campaign?

BOSS:

Exactly. You know, I’m going to go the extra yard on this one — tell everyone who puts money in the Conscience Envelope that I’ll have their names engraved right on the walls of the next hospital ward I have built to show the world just how philanthropic and ethical and sensitive they all are.

IRIS:

But there aren’t enough of them. You’ll never make enough money to pay for your burn units and orphanages by just taking money from a handful of zealots!

BOSS:

Oh, that’s okay. We’ll just take money from the rape, murder, pillage and plunder fund to supplement it. Surely nobody is going to complain about that. And there’ll be more money over all than before, so we’ll be able to hire another accountant to manage the added complexity of the two distinct accounts and we’ll still have enough left over to start on some new projects. You can find us a good accountant, can’t you?

IRIS:

The best.

BOSS:

Good to hear. Let’s give it a shot.

IRIS:

One more thing, Boss: What if this catches on? What if so many people decide to put money in the Conscience Envelope that you don’t have enough money for your rape, murder, pillage and plunder campaign?

BOSS:

Well, I just don’t see that happening, Iris. If enough people had those sorts of strange convictions, we’d have bigger problems than where to get our money. Besides, I think we can find ways to get at the money we need no matter which envelope it’s in. You can find us a good accountant, can’t you?

IRIS:

The best.

BOSS:

Good to hear.

SCENE III. Back at Philanthropic Boss Hall, several days later.

IRIS:

Boss, you’re a genius. They fell for it. Except for a couple of hold-outs, anyway.

BOSS:

Fantastic.

IRIS:

But they want you to outlaw the use of the Conscience Envelope money for all pillage.

BOSS:

Splendid. Tell them to elect a representative and I’ll form a committee charged with drafting stronger and more ethical guidelines and we’ll pay them right out of the Conscience Envelope for all of their hard and ethically demanding work. But enough about these clowns — how are our accounts looking?

IRIS:

Fantastic. The regular fund is zooming along nicely as always, and now we’ve got some extra in the Conscience Envelope to play with.

BOSS:

What to do… I’m thinking of some sort of statue devoted to peace and conscientiousness, maybe a dove or a bust of Gandhi, right in the center of Philanthropic Boss Park. How does that sound to you?

IRIS:

Sounds great, Boss. What do you want me to do about the two hold-outs?

BOSS:

Goon Squad.

IRIS:

I was hoping you were gonna say that.

A contributor to a war tax resistance email list recently urged the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee to throw its weight behind the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act which is currently going nowhere in Congress.

This contributor started by saying that “[o]ur common cause is to resist the payment of war taxes and to encourage others to similarly resist the payment of war taxes,” which I couldn’t much argue with. From there, though, all logic seemed to run backwards.

The argument more or less went like this: The war tax resistance movement is small and politically powerless, so if we want to make political change we have to unify behind a small number of issues. The Peace Tax Fund bill is such an issue, one that (according to the contributor) promotes our common cause, and could at least create a media buzz. If we don’t rally behind the Peace Tax Fund bill, we must either admit that we’ve failed politically or we must produce some better piece of legislation to rally behind. Ergo, each of us should meet with our Congressional representatives and share with them our “struggles of conscience” as a way of convincing them to support the bill.

I went into rebuttal mode pretty rapidly:

I urge NWTRCC to reject the “peace tax fund” idea and to strongly discourage people from promoting it.

Far from being legislation that will help us or further our goals, if it ever passes into law it will undermine the war tax resistance movement and it will tempt resisters to return to funding war under its phony moral cover.

It’s clear that there are many war tax resisters who believe that it is unethical for them to give the government money for its wars and militarism but who would happily pay taxes to the same government that spends just as much or more on the same awful projects if only there was a ridiculous “Peace Tax Fund” shell game in place with which they could pretend that their money only went to good things.

We shouldn’t be humoring this sort of bad-faith reasoning. Our movement — especially our movement — should instead be pointing out how flawed it is!

You can’t get off the hook for the moral complications of taxpaying by passing some law of absolution — just because some politicians have sprinkled pixie dust over your tax dollars and sanctified them as “peaceful-only” doesn’t make it so.

If the war tax resistance movement ever does become a powerful force for social change, you can bet that the government will consider passing such a bill — not as a concession to our movement but as a powerful strike against it. I hope that we will be wiser by then and not assist in sabotaging ourselves.

The “Peace Tax Fund” idea is astonishingly popular in war tax resistance circles, for reasons I have a hard time understanding. How is it that a person can have sufficient qualms about paying taxes that go to a militaristic government that they’d get bent out of shape enough to be a war tax resister or “Peace Tax Fund” promoter, and yet be so unbothered about it that they’d be willing to shrug their shoulders and forget the whole thing if Congress would just wave a magic wand over their tax dollars and promise that they’d only be spent on the good stuff.

If you’re willing to stick your head in the sand like that, why not do it now rather than later? Hmmm… I may be on to something here:

Rather than wait for the enactment of a Peace Tax Fund bill, I would encourage those of you who would feel comfortable paying their taxes if such a bill passes to do so now, without waiting for Congress to pass this legislation.

Simply write on your check to the Treasury “this contribution is only to be used for non-military purposes” and when you seal the envelope, close your eyes and carefully visualize your money going from your bank account into the budget of your favorite government agency — perhaps the Department of Education or the Environmental Protection Agency.

Of course, writing this phrase on your check or doing this visualization will not actually affect how the government spends the money that gets sent to it, but neither would the Peace Tax Fund bill.

This way you get to have the same amount of satisfaction and alleviation of guilt without all of the trouble of lobbying your Congressional representatives.

For more info on “Peace Tax Fund” schemes, see:

• 24 August 2004
• 25 August 2004
• 27 August 2004
• 30 August 2004
• 8 September 2004
• 27 September 2004

In response to my critique of the Peace Tax Fund bill that I posted here yesterday, someone responded:

The Peace Tax Fund would not achieve anything “real” until enough had checked the box to actually make it impossible for Congress to fund the Pentagon to the extent it wished. That is an interesting possibility, however, and would be a direct gauge of a war’s popularity on a year-to-year basis. A so-called just war would see just the true pacifists — and we all know we are a very slender slice of the citizenry — checking the Peace Tax Fund. A highly unpopular war might actually produce millions of such reactions. Would that have an effect? Possibly.

This brings up a couple of issues. One is that the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act does in fact restrict the use of the “Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund” to those taxpayers who are “designated conscientious objectors” — a category that includes only a taxpayer

who is opposed to participation in war in any form based upon the taxpayer’s deeply held moral, ethical, or religious beliefs or training (within the meaning of the Military Selective Service Act (50 U.S.C. App. 450 et seq.), and who has certified these beliefs in writing to the Secretary of the Treasury in such form and manner as the Secretary provides.

I had a heck of a time tracking down this “50 U.S.C. App. 450 et seq.” but I think this is the important part:

Nothing contained in this title [sections 451 to 471a of this Appendix] shall be construed to require any person to be subject to combatant training and service in the armed forces of the United States who, by reason of religious training and belief, is conscientiously opposed to participation in war in any form. As used in this subsection, the term “religious training and belief” does not include essentially political, sociological, or philosophical views, or a merely personal moral code.…

So if the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill becomes law, only those taxpayers who “by reason of religious training and belief” are “opposed to participation in war in any form” will be able to take advantage of its provisions.

The first half of this qualification isn’t as daunting as it may first appear, since the courts, in their reluctance to get their hands dirty in deciding what sorts of religious beliefs are worthy and which are not, have allowed a lot of pretty vague and individualistic spiritual bents to qualify as “religion” for the purposes of such a test. The second half, though, pretty much locks out all but the committed pacifist. Keep that in mind.

Now, just to satisfy curiosity, let’s see how many such pacifists there would have to be in the United States for the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill “to actually make it impossible for Congress to fund the Pentagon to the extent it wished.”

The bill would establish a “Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund” that would receive all taxes paid by these conscientious objectors, and the money in this fund “shall be allocated annually to any appropriation not for a military purpose.”

MILITARY PURPOSE — For purposes of this Act, the term “military purpose” means any activity or program which any agency of the Government conducts, administers, or sponsors and which effects an augmentation of military forces or of defensive and offensive intelligence activities, or enhances the capability of any person or nation to wage war, including the appropriation of funds by the United States for—

1. the Department of Defense;
2. the Central Intelligence Agency;
3. the National Security Council;
4. the Selective Service System;
5. activities of the Department of Energy that have a military purpose;
6. activities of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration that have a military purpose;
7. foreign military aid; and
8. the training, supplying, or maintaining of military personnel, or the manufacture, construction, maintenance, or development of military weapons, installations, or strategies.

A while back, the National Priorities Project conducted a break-down of the federal budget that gives a fairly good idea of what would fall in this “military purpose” category. I use their numbers rather than the numbers gathered by the War Resisters League because the WRL includes veterans benefits and a portion of the interest on the national debt as military expenses, while the National Priorities Project and the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill do not.

The National Priorities Project estimates that “[m]ilitary spending consumes 26 cents out of every individual income tax dollar. It makes up about 20% of total federal spending and over half of the discretionary budget.”

A simple way of looking at the Peace Tax Fund is that the government sets up two sources of money in the treasury. One, the Peace Tax Fund, can only be spent on non-military purposes. The other one, the “general fund,” can be spent on anything.

The only way this would actually have an effect on military spending is if the general fund becomes smaller than the amount spent on the military. If that happens, the government would either have to borrow money to make up the difference (which they certainly could do) or dip into the Peace Tax Fund (which would be illegal) or reduce military spending (which would be grand).

So the question is: How many people would have to become conscientious objectors to military taxation for this to happen?

If, for simplicity’s sake, we assume that likely conscientious objectors to military taxation currently pay on average about the same amount of taxes as everyone else, in order to cut in to that 26% of every tax dollar that is spent for military purposes, more than 74% of these taxpayers would have to declare themselves conscientious objectors, who “by reason of religious training and belief” are “opposed to participation in war in any form.”

Nowhere near three-quarters of Americans feel this way, and so the law will have no effect at all on the military budget. Furthermore, if three-quarters of Americans did feel this way, there would be no need for such a silly law in the first place as we would all already either be living productive and sane lives in a peaceful tomorrow of harmony and understanding, or living in barbed-wire collective labor camps under the control of our foreign overlords, depending on your brand of speculative fiction.

So if you do support the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill, don’t do so because you think it might some day deprive the missile-makers and war profiteers of their turn at the feeding pail. That just isn’t going to happen.

Can you stand another parable about the futility of “Peace Tax Fund” proposals? Recently, Ruth Benn of NWTRCC, accompanied by many supporters, gave some eloquent testimony in favor of the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill before the New York City Council’s Committee on State and Federal Legislation.

It made me sad, because as I’ve mentioned here before, I think that the “Peace Tax” proposals are worse than useless — they’re actually counter-productive and if enacted would do significant harm to the conscientious objection movement. I think that the war tax resistance movement suffers from its support of such legislation — both because this takes time and energy from meaningful pursuits and because this advertises the superficiality of the “conscientious” objection of some of its members.

It astonishes me to see followers of Thoreau behaving as though they really believed that such an empty piece of legislation could actually provide any genuine moral cover. But there are many people in war tax resistance circles who would gladly open their checkbooks and fork over money to the war makers if they could do so under the cover of a “peace tax” bill.

Maybe another parable will help illustrate why I think this is foolish:

Rex has a problem. Like many teenagers, Rex loves fast food, and there’s nothing he’d rather do after a long day of algebra and such than hit Micky Dees on the way home and get a big mac, fries and a coke.

But when his parents split up Rex’s allowance was one of the things that suffered. His mom was always the stingy one, and gives him only five dollars a week, which is almost enough to feed his habit once, since a big mac costs $3, and fries and cokes are $1.50 apiece.

His dad is more generous with the money, typically, and used to give Rex $40 per week in allowance. But shortly after the divorce he got mixed up in some sort of California religion and has sworn off meat eating entirely. He knows that his son spends his allowance money on big macs, so has cut Rex off. “It’s important that the money I earn and spend not go to end the lives of innocent cows, or whatever animals they use to make those big macs. I’m sure you understand, Rex.”

Which Rex doesn’t. But when whining doesn’t work, Rex comes up with a proposal: He’ll promise not to spend any of his father’s allowance money on meat — swearing any oath his father demands — if only he can get that allowance.

His father relents, and Rex now has $45 dollars to spend every month on his fast food cravings: $5 that he can spend on anything he wants, and $40 that he can spend on anything but meat.

Rex troops off to Mickey Dees with $40 in his left pocket and $5 in his right. He orders his big mac, fries and coke, and pulls three dollars from each pocket to pay the bill:

meat money	non-meat money
($2 left over)	($37 left over)
$3 = big mac	$3 = fries & coke

But then he stops. He quickly realizes that this only leaves him with two dollars in his “meat pocket” which isn’t enough to buy a big mac until he gets another five dollars from his mom next week, so he’s not much better off than before, except that he can have all the fries and cokes he wants.

But what he really wants is big macs.

A big mac, as you may know if you remember the commercials, is composed of two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, and onions, on a sesame-seed bun. Which is a 2:6 ratio of meat ingredients to non-meat ingredients, meaning that 25% of the ingredients in a big mac are meat. That suggests, to Rex anyway, that only 25% of the cost of a big mac should have to be paid from his meat pocket.

meat money	non-meat money
($4.25 left over)	($34.75 left over)
$0.75 = 2 all-beef patties	$5.25 = everything else

That’s more like it! By only dipping in to his “meat money” at the rate of $0.75 per big mac, he can have his favorite meal almost every day of the week. It would cost him $0.75 × 7 = $5.25 to do it every day. Rex is only twenty-five cents away from his goal of daily big macs! How can he do it?

As Sunday comes and Rex’s meat money drops down to fifty cents, an idea comes to Rex. He borrows a quarter from one of his classmates, promising to pay it back later in the day with a nickle interest. So at the end of the week, here’s how he’s spent his money on seven of his favorite meals:

meat money	non-meat money	borrowed money
(nothing left)	($2.95 left over)	(paid back with interest)
$5.00 on meat	$36.75 on meals	$0.25 on meat
	.30 on loans

Rex is happy: he gets his favorite fast food every day instead of only once a week. His dad is happy: none of his dad’s allowance money was spent on meat. The only unhappy ones are the cows, which Rex is eating several times as fast as before.

Mennonite tax resister Ray Gingerich has some tough questions for Christians who support the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act:

1. I wonder how many conscientious Christians who subconsciously wish they didn’t need to pay war taxes, are of the mind that they can’t resist payment of these military taxes until a bill is passed to make it legal?
2. I wonder if Congress ever passed a bill of this nature (including the special provisions granted conscientious objectors in WW Ⅱ), that was not in the self-interests of Congress itself?
3. I wonder whether the most effective way to get Congress to pass a bill would be, not to lobby Congress, but to generate a huge movement of conscientious objectors, i.e., military tax resisters — people who resist the payment of military taxes because they are persuaded that it is sinful to pay military taxes and that the faithful way to follow Jesus is to resist payment?
4. I wonder if Jesus ever, ever, had a vision of faithfulness and attempted to implement the vision by lobbying Rome (the Imperial Power) to get permission to do so?
5. I wonder why in all these many years Marian Franz and the people behind the Peace Tax Fund have insisted on doing things so “a**-backward” — so contrary to both efficiency and faithfulness — common sense and the way of Jesus?

Can any Christian (or anyone else) tell me, please, why we work so hard to change the minds of our Congresspeople and Senators, and invest so little of our resources, both human and material, to convert the church to the ways of peace?

Dissident Veteran for Peace engages Chris Fretz of the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund over the merits of the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act.

I’m making another attempt to discourage war tax resisters from supporting the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act and other such “peace tax fund” legislation projects.

It’s delicate business, because the people who promote these projects are ideologically very close to the war tax resistance movement, many are war tax resisters themselves, and they use many of the same arguments that war tax resisters use.

But there are two big problems with their proposals, at least from the perspective of conscientious tax resisters: 1) they aren’t any good, and 2) they’re bad. That is, their supposed beneficial effects do not actually exist, and they have side-effects that are actually harmful.

The Act pretends to create a system that would allow taxpayers to give money to the government without supporting the government’s militarism. The Act’s promoters say that if the Act becomes law, conscientious tax resisters who have been unwilling to pay taxes because they are unwilling to pay for war will be free to pay their taxes again without troubling their consciences. This, however, is an absolute fraud.

Hubert Hoffman, Mime Assassin (a word problem):

Hubert Hoffman is a hunter. By day he goes out with his shotgun to hunt for game with which he feeds his family, and, when hunting’s good, also provides meat to the butcher shops of Blimville, Freedonia.

By night, though, he visits the nearby town of Clemville and murders mimes. He just hates mimes; some childhood trauma, I guess. Any shotgun shells he has left over at the end of his day of hunting he puts to use in his mime hunt.

Ishmael Gradsdovic makes a modest living reloading shotgun shells and selling them to the hunters of Freedonia.

Hubert has a problem. One morning when he goes to Ishmael for some of his daily set of shells, Ishmael refuses to sell him any, saying that he feels for the poor mimes of Clemville and their grieving families.

So Hubert visits Freedonia’s other ammo dealers, but isn’t able to get as many shells as he’s used to hunting with, so at the end of the day he can’t do quite so much mime-killing as he’d like to do.

The next morning he goes to Ishmael and makes him a deal: if Ishmael will mark his shells with a red “X”, Hubert will promise to use those shells only for hunting and not for killing mimes. Ishmael agrees.

Will more or fewer mimes die as a result of Ishmael’s decision to sell non-mime-killing-only shells to Hubert? Please show your work.

This isn’t the first time I’ve tried to weave a parable to explain why paying into a government-run peace tax fund won’t prevent your money from supporting war (see 27 September 2004 and 18 June 2005) and I’ve tried some straightforward number crunching too to demonstrate that the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act will not reduce military spending one bit, and in fact will probably increase it (see 27 April 2005).

And I’ve tried to explain that second flaw as well, that not only is the Act not any good at doing what it claims to do, but that it is bad for war tax resisters. Lobbying for it promotes the view that war tax resisters are naïve and would be easily bought-off by a law that would only provide a phony sense of conscientiousness. And if the Act were to actually become law, it would reduce the number of people who actually conscientiously resist taxation (thereby providing more money for government militarism) and it would give the government propaganda ammunition to use against the remaining tax resisters (“why don’t you just pay your taxes into the Peace Tax Fund like these good, law-abiding, conscientious people do?”).

It seems like more war tax resisters are willing to speak up about the flaws of these proposals, but many others are unwilling to look beyond the good intentions of the promoters. I hope that NWTRCC and the war tax resistance movement in general will eventually come to see peace tax fund promoters in much the same way that they currently see constitutionalist tax protesters — as people who have some overlapping interests, and who travel in similar circles, but who really aren’t fighting the same battle.

François Tremblay at Check Your Premises reacts to my recent post about Daniel Jenkins’s attempt to get U.S. courts to recognize a legal right to conscientious objection to military taxation.

He’s skeptical (as am I) of “Peace Tax Fund”-like plans, whether judicially- or legislatively-enacted, that pretend to give citizens the ability to designate their tax dollars only for the good things that governments fund. “It’s all or nothing. Even if you pay only one cent in taxes, that cent will go to evil purposes.”

Tremblay expands on this argument, in video-blog style.

Dan Evans critiques “Peace Tax Fund” legislation from a Quaker point-of-view at A Thin Place. “If the Peace Testimony means anything, it means that we change our behavior, and not just our accounting methods.” Excerpts:

It’s nothing but a bookkeeping gimmick that divides tax receipts into two piles, and then allocates expenses between the two piles, but (and here’s the important part) the expenses haven’t changed. It is clear from the statutory language quoted above that the “Religious Peace Tax Fund” will only be spent on appropriations already approved by Congress and will not increase any non-military spending. The money that passes through the peace tax fund for non-military spending will simply be offset by an increase in the amounts for military spending from other tax funds. So military spending remains the same, and non-military spending remains the same. The path that the monies might take might change, and things might look different on paper, but the end of the path is the same and nothing has changed in reality.

The only way the proposed statute might have any real-world impact is if so many taxpayers directed money to the peace tax fund that there wasn’t enough tax money to pay for military appropriations, but there are at least two reasons to believe that will never happen:

First, the number of taxpayers who are likely to direct their tax dollars to the peace tax fund, and the number of dollars directed to that fund, is never going to be large enough to impact the federal budget.… Even if a majority of taxpayers directed that a majority of the income, gift, and estate taxes should go to the peace tax fund, there would still be enough of those taxes (half of 41%, or 20% of the budget), together with the corporate income tax (13% of the budget) to pay for military spending (23% of the budget). But if a majority of the taxpayers were that strongly opposed to military spending, that majority could simply elect a new Congress and actually reduce military spending instead of going through the charade of the “peace tax.”

Second, even if enough taxpayers directed money into the peace tax fund to cause some kind of a spending problem for the military, there is nothing in the act that would prevent the Treasury from “borrowing” from the peace tax fund to pay for military spending, just as money is now “borrowed” from the Social Security Trust Fund to pay expenses unrelated to Social Security.

So the peace tax fund will never have any effect whatsoever on military spending, and does no good. And I believe that it will do us moral and spiritual harm.

It harms us because it dulls the pain of war. It would allow us to think that war is no longer our responsibility because we didn’t vote for the politicians who sent us to war and because it’s no longer “our” tax dollars paying for the war. But it is our responsibility. It is our government, and our responsibility, and we can’t wash our hands (as Pontius Pilate did) and absolve ourselves through a bookkeeping gimmick.

Ruth Benn has followed up on her earlier report on the 12^th International Conference on War Tax Resistance and Peace Tax Campaigns. Excerpts:

Although WTR was never really really strong in other countries, I did sense at this meeting that there were fewer resisters from countries other than the U.S. and Britain than my first meeting way back 20 years ago, which most attendees attributed to the quickness to collect/seize in many countries. (Or are people being drawn into peace tax fund efforts as a safer alternative?) However, although the German groups seem to be all about peace tax fund efforts, they also told about holding a vigil for a resister who was taken to court recently. And I didn’t write about War Resisters’ International in Britain, which is a case of an organization choosing to refuse to send on withheld taxes voluntarily because that is the only way the staff can resist. Their board had to make that decision. They await Inland Revenue’s showing up to sticker their equipment for seizure now, but they are also trying to figure out how to make their resistance more public and convince other orgs that they can do this (even though Inland Revenue usually collects, it is at a point of forced payment).

Still, while I can see these good examples, I do find it discouraging that in the times we are in there are not masses turning to this form of resistance (or even to the peace movement in general for heaven’s sake!) in the U.S., if not elsewhere.…

War tax resisters and peace tax fund advocates have some similarities in the sort of goals they’re aiming for: they think that their governments overspend on the military and they’d like their own money spent in better ways. But tactically, they’re miles apart: peace tax funds are about the polar opposite of conscientious tax resistance, and in fact are most likely to be enacted as a weapon in the government arsenal to fight against war tax resistance should it ever become sufficiently popular to be troublesome.

A lot of peace tax fund promoters don’t see it this way. They think of peace tax fund schemes as being a natural extension of the same impulses that cause people adopt war tax resistance, and they support the former for the same reasons that other people support the latter. So, to that extent there’s some harmony between the groups: peace tax fund promoters typically have their hearts in the right place and just need to appropriately reposition their heads to match.

But, since peace tax fund schemes are really inimical to conscientious war tax resistance, there is necessarily some tension here.

I think it might be useful to rethink the “big tent” that brings war tax resisters and peace tax fund advocates together in conferences like this one. Not that I think there should be a formal divorce, but maybe instead we should consider making the tent even bigger, to include tax resisters who resist from different motives than antimilitarism. The invitation of George Rishmawi was a good example of this (he was one of the organizers of tax resistance during the intifada in Palestine) — too bad he couldn’t make it.

Here’s another example: what appears to have been a sophisticated campaign of tax resistance from Mexico, where the motives of the resisters were to protest that the government simply wasn’t providing the minimum of service in return for the taxes. (From the Saltillo Palabra a couple of years ago; the translation is mine, which is why it’s clunky):

TIJUANA — The executive council of the National Chamber of Commerce [Canaco] in Tijuana decided to hold back taxes from the three levels of Government since they do not provide security to the city, said César Cázares, president of the organization.

“There is a group of tax lawyers who are advising us. We are going to stop paying taxes. Already we have had agreements, meetings, plans. It’s a method of civil disobedience," he said.

So far this month, 24 people have been assassinated in Tijuana, among these was the assistant chief of security who was ambushed Thursday.

Cázares asserted that tax resistance is being tried because the retailers of Tijuana are very worried about the constant crime wave, and they do not see a response from the authorities.

He explained that since Thursday Canaco is consulting with the College of Accountants of Tijuana to find a way to redirect the taxes to some government entity and for the retailers not to be sanctioned as tax delinquents.

“The possibility exists that the taxes will be redirected to an account in the Federal Court for them to hold in escrow so long as the government fails to return security to us,” he emphasized in the press conference.

About 35 presidents of skilled groups from Canaco entreated Cázares to ask the state authorities for the intervention of the Army.

In addition, they will initiate a campaign to urge the rest of the population to stop paying taxes: property, vehicle, and others.

Cázares indicated that there are commercial sales losses of 30–50% due to the insecurity that Tijuana suffers.

Canaco Tijuana includes 2,300 companies in packaging, pharmacy, hardware, used car sales, junkyards, and repair shops, among others.

War tax resisters in many ways have a lot more in common with tax resisters like these shopkeepers in Tijuana — for instance how we organize, what legal complications we have to deal with, what sort of mutual support we provide, and so forth — than we have with peace tax fund promoters. I think we’d probably have a lot more to talk about, too.

Three and a half years ago, I did some back-of-the-envelope calculations and determined that in order for the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act to have any effect at all on government military appropriations, about three quarters of all taxpayers would have to declare themselves conscientious objectors and pay their taxes into the Peace Tax Fund.

On second thought, though, it turns out to be even worse than that. I hadn’t figured in to my calculations those taxes that aren’t covered by the Act at all, such as the corporate income tax.

The Act defines military spending — the sort of spending that taxes deposited into the “Peace Tax Fund” may not be spent on — as spending for “1) the Department of Defense; 2) the Central Intelligence Agency; 3) the National Security Council; 4) the Selective Service System; 5) activities of the Department of Energy that have a military purpose; 6) activities of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration that have a military purpose; 7) foreign military aid; and 8) the training, supplying, or maintaining of military personnel, or the manufacture, construction, maintenance, or development of military weapons, installations, or strategies.” Not included in this are veterans benefits or debt (and interest) payments associated with past military spending.

In 2007, this all would have amounted to nearly $600 billion (according to figures from the National Priorities Project).

In 2007, the federal government brought in over $350 billion from the corporate income tax, which is not affected by the Act (excise taxes, customs duties, and a number of other taxes and fees are also not covered by the Act — if you add these in, this goes up to above $500 billion, but since some of these go into trust funds rather than the general fund, I’ve left them all out of the calculation here). In addition, the government took on over $160 billion in debt (debt, and its repayment, are not covered by the Act, and make for an easy loophole in the unlikely case that Congress will need to get around its restrictions).

So that’s already over $510 billion that Congress could spend on military spending before it has to look at tax revenue potentially covered by the Act. How many people would have to pay into the Peace Tax Fund for Congress to have trouble getting its hands on the remaining $90 billion it wants to spend on the military?

Personal income taxes and estate/gift taxes are covered by the Act. In 2007, the government brought in about $1,180 billion through those taxes. If 93% of taxpayers declared themselves conscientious objectors to military taxation and paid their taxes into the Peace Tax Fund, then less than $90 billion of this $1,180 billion would be remaining in the general fund for Congress to spend on the military and it would be forced to either ignore the law, borrow more money, change the tax code so as to take more money from taxes that aren’t covered by the Act, take some of those excise taxes out of trust funds and put them into the general fund, repeal the Act and raid the Peace Tax Fund, redefine some of the military budget as being outside the military budget (the food in the mess halls, isn’t that really a Department of Agriculture function? shouldn’t the Department of Energy be in charge of security at those Iraq oil fields?), or use any number of other strategies that crafty legislators can think up better than I can. Or maybe they would even cut military spending, assuming that the fact that 93% of their constituents had gone pacifist hadn’t already convinced them to do so. Yep, if 93% of U.S. taxpayers were — in the words of the Act — “opposed to participation in war in any form based upon the taxpayer’s deeply held moral, ethical, or religious beliefs or training” and if all 93% of them paid their taxes into the Peace Tax Fund, Congress would have to take notice and do something about it.

I may be beating a dead horse here, but it does seem to me that sometimes when I talk to “Peace Tax Fund” fans, they’re nourishing a fantasy that if the Act were to pass, some day this might translate into an actual form of pressure taxpayers could bring to bear to force a change in the spending priorities of an unwilling government.

Yesterday I ran the numbers and looked at how the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act — even if it overcomes the many hurdles it has to jump before it could become law — would be powerless to compel the government to spend any less on military spending than it otherwise would.

But perhaps if it does no good in this regard, at least it does no harm, and so it might be a worthwhile gesture if only for symbolic reasons.

Unfortunately, there’s every reason to expect that not only would the Act fail to reduce military spending, it would actually increase military spending. Here’s how:

As even the proponents of the Act admit, the effect of the act on government revenue as a whole would be to increase it:

The Report by the Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation on the Bill states that implementation of the Peace Tax Fund concept would slightly increase the revenue to the government. There will certainly be a savings from increased compliance and a decrease in the current expenses to enforce collections from conscientious objectors who are war tax resisters. Also, those who purposely keep their incomes low to avoid contributing to the military would be able to earn to their potential, thus increasing the amount of income available to the government.

So the question becomes: if the government would expect to increase its revenue in this way, is there any reason to expect that it would not spend any of this increase on the military? As we saw yesterday, the Act would not prohibit or even discourage this.

What is more likely to happen if the Act becomes law and the government revenues increase as expected?

• that the government would pause, reflect that its slightly enlarged coffers are due to formerly conscientious objectors who would disapprove if they spend more money on war, and resist the temptation to throw more money at the Pentagon?
• or, that the government would allocate its next budget in the same haphazard and bloodthirsty way it always does, only with a little more to dole out than before?

Isn’t it only wishful thinking to expect the former and not the latter?

In this way, every dollar paid into the “Peace Tax Fund” would increase taxpayer spending on the military while at the same time it would deceive some of the people who have qualms about this into believing that they are not supporting military spending by paying into it.

But wait just a minute. What about the part of the Act that reads as follows:

Sense of Congress — It is the sense of Congress that any increase in revenue to the Treasury resulting from the creation of the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund shall be allocated in a manner consistent with the purposes of the Fund.

At first glance, that would seem to solve the problem I’ve raised here. Except for one important detail. The “sense of Congress” is legally worthless. It is unenforceable. Like the Act’s preamble, it is just decoration. Bills are frequently studded with noble-sounding but worthless “sense of Congress” sections:

1. It is the sense of Congress that the major greenhouse gas emitting countries join with the United States in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
2. It is the sense of Congress that any acts of violence or discrimination against any Americans be condemned.
3. It is the sense of the Congress that Hmong and other Highland Lao veterans who fought on behalf of the Armed Forces of the United States during the Vietnam conflict and have lawfully been admitted to the United States for permanent residence should be considered veterans for purposes of continuing certain welfare benefits

The courts do not consider “sense of Congress” provisions to be binding, enforceable law (as the Hmong veterans found out when they tried to take the “sense of Congress” to the bank and cash it). At best, such provisions can be seen as guidance as to what Congress’s intentions were if the law itself is ambiguous. But try to imagine how a court would enforce the “sense of Congress” provision in the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act even if it decided that such a provision were enforceable.

Say someone complains to the court that even though the additional money raised through the Act was supposed to be specifically for non-military spending, the year after the Act passed military spending increased at a higher rate than non-military spending, thus violating “the sense of Congress.”

The government would respond that, no, it’s just a coincidence. Spending for various military and non-military government programs goes up and down for all sorts of reasons every year. The government followed the “sense of Congress” to the letter, and would have increased military spending by even more if Congress hadn’t expressed its sense so clearly. Besides, even if this were not the case, it would only reflect the fact that the sense of Congress had changed — and it is the prerogative of Congress, having declared its sense with one law, to change its mind with another.

How would you expect a judge to rule?

But as I pointed out, the judge won’t have to decide this on the merits. Such a case would just get thrown out of court based on the general practice of ignoring “sense of Congress” provisions as extralegal throat clearing.

So not only will the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act be powerless to reduce military spending, but, if the conscientious and peace-loving Americans in the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund are successful in having it enacted into law, it will actually increase the amount of taxpayer money that goes to the military.

On Monday I showed how the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act would not reduce the amount of taxpayer funding for the Pentagon. On Tuesday I noted that it’s even worse: the Act would actually increase taxpayer support for military programs.

But, as the game show host says, “that’s not all.” While the proponents of the Act see it as a way to legalize and protect American conscientious objectors to military taxation, in fact it would be a terrible blow to such objectors.

Here’s how.

Even though the Act would not decrease military spending one bit, and even though every new tax dollar that is paid into its “Peace Tax Fund” would ironically tend to increase taxpayer support for the military, a number of people who are currently war tax resisters would be willing to participate in the Act — under the theory that “their” dollars, at least, would be routed towards less-offensive government programs.

This would have the immediate effect of reducing the number of American war tax resisters. The existing IRS enforcement mechanisms would have fewer resisters to target, and so any individual resister who chose to keep resisting would have a higher chance of becoming a target. In addition, the government would have an additional tool of rhetorical persuasion to use against people who were (or were considering becoming) war tax resisters: “Why don’t you just pay into the ‘Peace Tax Fund’ like those nice conscientious people over there?”

This divide-and-conquer tactic would be so effective that the government would be almost certain to come up with it all by itself if ever the war tax resistance movement in the United States were to become big enough to actually disrupt business-as-usual.^* That elements of the war tax resistance movement are themselves promoting this divide-and-conquer tactic on the government’s behalf (though not consciously so) is terribly sad.

The passage of the Act would also send a terrible message about conscientious objectors to military taxation. That message is:

• They are not particularly conscientious at all, but can be easily bought-off by symbolic concessions and simple sleight-of-hand.
• They are conscientious enough to check a box on a form, but not conscientious enough to follow through on the ramifications of their actions.
• They are willing enough to fund war if you can give them a way to deny that they’re doing it.
• They would rather have a certificate from the government recognizing their officially certified conscientiousness than to actually be conscientious.

I hope that American war tax resisters will come to understand that the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act is not in their interests — that in fact it runs counter to their values.

On Monday I noted that the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act would not reduce military spending one bit. On Tuesday I showed that in fact everyone paying into the “Peace Tax Fund” would be increasing taxpayer support for the Pentagon by doing so. Then, on Wednesday I wrote about the terrible harm the Act would do to the cause of conscientious objectors to military taxation in the United States.

Today I hope to end this series on an up note by looking at some possible alternatives to the Act that might satisfy its supporters without falling victim to the aforementioned flaws.

First, there’s always war tax resistance as it is practiced today in the absence of any explicit legal protection. Such resistance can be practical or symbolic or both, and comes in many flavors and styles — some of which are even legal. But you probably already knew all that.

Second, if a symbolic gesture is enough for you and all you’re really looking for is some sort of magic spell that will make it seem to you as though your tax dollars were only spent on the good stuff, there’s something you can do about this today that will be every bit as effective as the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act but that doesn’t require that Act to become law:

Stop your withholding so that at the end of the year you will owe money on your tax return. Then, when you file your return and write your check to the U.S. Treasury, write in the “Memo” field: “It is the sense of this taxpayer that these funds be used for non-military purposes only.” It’s that simple!

A third option would be to scrap the current Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill, write a new one that addresses its problems, and work to get the new bill enacted into law. As Ruth Benn and Ed Hedemann reported last month after they attended an international conference on war tax resistance and peace tax campaigns, there are other models for “peace tax” laws that address some of the problems I have identified.

Benn wrote that “many Europeans see the effort to actually redirect military taxes to a fund that is only for peace-building efforts or alternative defense [as] primary to their peace tax fund campaigns.” If taxpayers paying into the “Peace Tax Fund” were thereby contributing to a new civilian-based defense program that might eventually increase public confidence in non-military defense (and increase the public’s ability to defend itself against its own government in the process) — well, that might be something worth supporting!

This week I’ve been taking a close look at the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act, and I reached the conclusion that on the whole it’s a bad idea and that conscientious objectors to military taxation ought not to support it — indeed, it’s so flawed that they should oppose it.

But there’s a long history of cooperation between the American war tax resistance movement and the campaign for the peace tax fund. This is partially based, I think, on looking at legislative solutions of the peace tax fund variety through rose-colored glasses — exaggerating their possible benefits, and ignoring their likely downsides. But it may also be partially based on how the proposed peace tax legislation has changed over the years.

One early proposal for peace tax fund legislation in the United States, dating to the 1960s, would have allowed conscientious objectors to military taxation to pay their taxes directly to UNICEF instead of to the U.S. Treasury. Such a plan would not have many of the flaws I identified with the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act.

The version of the bill introduced as late as 2000 would have put the Peace Tax Fund under the jurisdiction of a fund-specific board of trustees, which would have the authority to spend it on things like “(1) retraining workers displaced by conversion from military production or activities; (2) research directed toward developing and evaluating nonmilitary and nonviolent solutions to international conflict; (3) disarmament efforts; (4) special projects of the United States Institute of Peace; (5) international exchanges for peaceful purposes; (6) improvement of international health, education, and welfare; and (7) programs for providing information to and education of the public concerning such activities” but not “to release funds for military expenditures which, were it not for the existence of the Fund, would otherwise have been appropriated for nonmilitary expenditures.”

The following year, this was changed. Now the government could use the Peace Tax Fund money to pay for certain things which would otherwise have been appropriated out of the general fund: specifically “(1) Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC); (2) Head Start; (3) United States Institute of Peace; and (4) Peace Corps.”

At that point, the plan no longer had any defensible practical merit. The following year, the bill became the one we know today (and took on the new Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act name), and these spending restrictions were even further watered-down. The Peace Tax Fund could now be “allocated annually to any appropriation not for a military purpose” which, as we have seen, is no better in practical terms than saying “spend it on whatever you want, we don’t mind.”

In order to make the Peace Tax Fund legislation seem as harmless as possible to legislators who want to keep funding the war machine, the peace tax fund promoters have managed to design a bill that not only is no impediment to the war-funders, but is actually of no help to conscientious objectors.

It’s possible that the reason why the American war tax resistance movement remains closely aligned with the American peace tax fund campaign is that there was once a time when the peace tax fund legislation was not so hostile to and useless for war tax resisters. Over time, the legislation has changed, but many war tax resisters haven’t been paying close enough attention and they still think of it as something that could help them. They still think the legislation they support is the same basic plan that they or their forerunners supported ten, twenty, or thirty years ago.

Why am I bringing all of this up now? Next month, NWTRCC is gathering in Eugene, Oregon. One of the items on our agenda is a proposal that NWTRCC formally “recommit to the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Bill and the efforts NCPTF is doing to get it passed in Congress.” I hope to discourage NWTRCC from endorsing the legislation, and to encourage it instead to find some way of maintaining ties with peace tax fund supporters without supporting their currently-misguided project.

A new issue of NWTRCC’s newsletter, More Than a Paycheck, is out.

Some of what you’ll find inside:

• A preview of Tax Day activities planned for this year across the country.
• A debate about whether or not NWTRCC ought to endorse the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill. This sets the stage for a discussion on the same topic that will take place at the Spring national meeting in Virginia next month.
  • Contributors to the debate include Pam Allee, Larry Dansinger, myself, Carolyn Stevens, Karl Meyer, Joffre Stewart, and Kelly Suttles.
• Some brief notes about IRS policy and tax law changes and about NWTRCC’s new speakers bureau.
• An article by Alan Clemence on the importance of regional gatherings, with lots of good information on how the New England Regional Gathering of War Tax Resisters an Supporters is organized.
• A profile of war tax resister Mimi Copp.

The debate about whether or not NWTRCC should endorse the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill was interesting.

Supporters of the bill tend to project their hopes for what they think such a bill ought to accomplish onto the actual bill that’s being proposed. In doing so, they make claims for what the bill would do that are not supported by the bill’s actual substance.

But there was actually much less of this in the current debate than usual. With one exception, even the supporters of the bill recognized that it is flawed and that it would not accomplish much of substance. More remarkable to me were the number of people in the debate who said that they don’t support the bill or the “peace tax fund” idea in general, but who think that NWTRCC should go ahead and endorse it anyway so as to better preserve our good ties with the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund.

The most contentious item on the agenda at the NWTRCC Spring national gathering was our organization’s relationship with the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act and with the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund, a long-time affiliate of NWTRCC, which promotes the act.

This issue had come up at our last meeting in Eugene because the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund had asked us to formally endorse this legislation. We were unable to reach consensus on the endorsement at that meeting and didn’t allot enough time to really discuss the matter in detail, so we planned to readdress the issue and devote more time to discussion this time around.

One of the arguments in favor of us endorsing the bill was that in the NWTRCC “Statement of Purpose” is a section that many people interpreted as a built-in endorsement of the bill. That section reads:

NWTRCC’s goal is to maintain and build a national movement of conscientious objectors to military taxes by supporting, coordinating and publicizing the WTR actions of groups and individuals. These actions include: war tax resistance, protest, and refusal; the redirection of military taxes to meet human needs; support of the US Peace Tax Fund Bill; and adjustment of lifestyle to avoid tax liability.

I’ve heard many perspectives about whether this section endorses the bill or merely indicates that support for it is one of many war tax resistance related activities that our affiliate groups engage in. But in any case, the “US Peace Tax Fund Bill” doesn’t exist as an active piece of legislation anymore. The currently-proposed legislation is substantially different in content and has a new name. So this time around, in addition to debating the endorsement question, we were also trying to come up with a satisfactory way to remove or replace the anachronistic language from our statement of purpose.

On Saturday, we had a panel presentation on the bill followed by an open discussion. Bethany Criss, the executive director of the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund, presented the case for why we should endorse. Ray Gingerich and I each gave statements opposing the endorsement. Ruth Benn shared some of her insights from being exposed to the variety of international peace tax fund campaigns (some of which are promoting legislation that differs in important ways from the U.S. bill) and also recounted some of the history of the close working relationship of NWTRCC and NCPTF. After these brief remarks from the panel, other attendees addressed the issue.

The following summary is based on notes I was taking at the time, so is only as good as my attention and note-taking were — caveat emptor:

Bethany Criss started out by noting the similarity between legalized conscientious objection to military service and conscientious objection to military taxation. She also tried to assuage concerns that the “Religious Freedom” part of the bill’s title meant that the provisions of the bill would not be available to non-religious objectors. She said that she felt confident that Congress would not raid the peace tax fund to pay for military expenses because the RFPTFA would represent a contract between us and Congress and that we could hold them accountable if they were to violate it. She acknowledged that the bill was imperfect and would not accomplish as much as many people would like, but hoped that we would see it as an initial step in an incremental process.

I went next. Here’s more-or-less the argument I gave against endorsement:

War Tax Resisters and Peace Tax Fund advocates agree that the belligerent militarism of the United States is a grave problem, that individuals must act to oppose it, and that our tax dollars are an important way in which we can move from complicity to opposition. Because of this, we’re natural allies and have much in common.

The RFPTFA currently being pushed by the NCPTF has some significant problems. So much so that although our groups have much in common in our outlook and our interests, I think it would be a mistake for NWTRCC to endorse the RFPTFA. Indeed, the problems with the bill are so significant that if the bill ever looked as though it might pass, we would be wiser to actively oppose the bill than to endorse it.

The main problems with the bill are two: 1) it’s no good, and 2) it’s bad. That is, not only would it not deliver any meaningful benefits, but it would have harmful effects that would be damaging to the war tax resistance movement and dangerous to individual war tax resisters.

The reason why I say the bill is no good is this. If the bill passes, it would give Congress more taxpayer money to spend and would allow Congress to spend as much money as it likes on war and armaments. Every dollar paid into the “Peace Tax Fund” would increase taxpayer spending on the military.

This sounds like exactly the opposite of what the NCPTF intends, which may be true. But sometimes good intentions lead to counterproductive laws and policies. If you read the NCPTF literature, you’ll see that they admit that the bill would increase government revenue without decreasing how much Congress could spend on war:

First, they admit that if the bill were to pass “The government would receive more revenue from increased participation in the payment of income taxes and would spend less on the cost of forced collections.” They also say, of those who pay into the PTF, “nor will their participation in the Peace Tax Fund directly decrease the amount of money spent on war [as] this would violate the Constitutionally given powers of Congress to determine spending priorities.”

So Congress would have more taxpayer money than before and could spend as much as it wants on war. Why on earth would we want this? Well, we’re supposed to want this because at least our money wouldn’t be spent on war. But this is just an illusion.

The basic problem has to do with displacement. If you pay into the Peace Tax Fund and Congress can only spend “your” money on something nice like the National Park Service, Congress can just take some other money that it had been planning to spend on the Park Service and divert it to the Pentagon. So Congress spends just like it always has, with a little more taxpayer money than it would have had otherwise, but the people who pay into the Peace Tax Fund falsely believe that they aren’t responsible for the results of that increased spending.

It would be as though I were to pour a cup of sand into a mug full of hot coffee and then claim that I wasn’t responsible for the spillover since my sand sank to the bottom of the mug and it was only someone else’s coffee that spilled over the top.

So that’s why the RFPTFA isn’t any good. Now here’s why it’s bad.

First: it constructs an illusion through which people can be induced to pay for war and militarism while believing that they are not. The war tax resistance movement should be working hard to tear down illusions like this, not build up new ones.

Second: it would divide the war tax resistance movement between those people who maintain their testimony against paying for war and those who take advantage of the false moral cover of the RFPTFA. This would also give the IRS fewer targets to pursue, and make the remaining war tax resisters more likely to be targeted by enforcement actions. If the war tax resistance movement ever does become a powerful force for social change, you can bet that the government will consider passing such a bill — not as a concession to our movement but as a divide-and-conquer technique against it.

Third: it would give a persuasive rhetorical tool to people who oppose war tax resisters. They would say that war tax resisters should just pay into the Peace Tax Fund like good, law-abiding, conscientious people. Imagine what the IRS would say to resisters: “We gave you the ‘Peace Tax Fund’ you wanted — now you’ve got no more excuses not to pay up.”

Those three things are harmful effects the bill would have if it ever became law. I don’t think this is likely, but there’s a fourth reason not to endorse the bill that doesn’t depend on whether or not it is successful in becoming law: advocacy of such a bill sends the message that the war tax resistance movement is naïve and that our conscientious scruples are superficial. It tells people that war tax resisters:

• are not particularly conscientious at all, but can be easily bought-off by symbolic concessions and simple sleight-of-hand
• are conscientious enough to check a box on a form, but not conscientious enough to follow through on the ramifications of our actions
• are willing enough to fund war if you can give us a way to deny that we’re doing it
• would rather have a certificate from the government recognizing our officially certified conscientiousness than to actually be conscientious

These flaws have been pointed out before, and frequently PTF promoters have responded with an argument along these lines: Sure the RFPTFA won’t reduce military spending and it has at best an ambiguous effect on taxpayer complicity, but it has strong symbolic power: it’s a way to get conscientious objection to military taxation officially recognized, to get a foot in the door, to be able to take a census of conscientious objectors every April 15^th, to propagandize for peace with every 1040 booklet, and so forth.

These benefits are not very convincing to me, for a number of reasons, but even if you were to acknowledge them — are they sufficient to justify putting any more energy into a 38-year-old campaign that has gone nowhere at all, currently in support of a piece of legislation that, even as watered down as it is, hasn’t had as much as a committee hearing in over a decade?

I feel strongly about this, and I have not pulled my punches. Some of you may think I’m being uncharitable and unfair. I’ll end on this note: I think the advocates of the RFPTFA have their hearts in the right place. They are temperamentally our allies and I hope they continue to think of themselves that way. I think that to the extent that we agree, we should continue to work closely and warmly together, and to the extent that we disagree we can agree to disagree.

After me, Ray Gingerich spoke, giving what I interpreted as a Thoreauvian argument against the peace tax fund idea: we shouldn’t wait to act conscientiously until the government gives us its permission to do so. In addition, he feels from his work in trying to reintroduce war tax resistance into the Mennonite churches that the peace tax fund is an obstacle to this — it creates an excuse that people use: they say they’ll resist taxes but only when there’s a peace tax fund that allows them to do it legally.

After these prepared remarks from the panel, and Ruth’s discussion which I mentioned above, we heard from the other attendees.

Before Eugene, I thought of myself as a real outlier in my skepticism about the peace tax fund bill. Most of what I heard about the bill in war tax resistance circles was positive, and the way people spoke about it made it seem like NWTRCC enthusiasm for the peace tax fund was a foregone conclusion if not a tautological one. In Eugene I was pleasantly surprised to see that a few other people shared my misgivings about the bill, though I still felt like we were the minority. In Harrisonburg last Saturday, though, it was clear that the tide had shifted dramatically. Even with the executive director of the NCPTF there to pitch the bill, most people had little praise for it, and even the ones who were peace tax fund supporters in the abstract expressed that we probably shouldn’t endorse this version.

Gary Erb noted that most of those present probably wouldn’t qualify as conscientious objectors under the bill’s restrictive language, and so wouldn’t be able to legally avail themselves of the RFPTFA even if they cared to. He also felt the bill would have a divide-and-conquer effect against the WTR movement, and recommended against endorsement.

Geov Parrish felt that the RFPTFA hadn’t a chance of becoming law, so it should be best seen as an educational vehicle. That being the case, it was a poor idea to have watered it down so much in an attempt to make it palatable enough to pass through Congress. Also, he noted that he feels excluded from the RFPTFA and its promotional materials because he is not a Christian.

Joffre Stewart said that as an anarchist resister, begging the state for exemptions and favors isn’t his style. He thinks that conscientious objection to military service was mostly enacted for the state’s benefit, not for the benefit of the COs, and he thinks the same would be true of legalized conscientious objection to military taxation. From this, he draws the conclusion that the reason we don’t have legal conscientious objection to military taxation is that war tax resisters have not yet become sufficiently inconvenient to the government.

Daniel Woodham thought that though the RFPTFA wasn’t perfect, it might make for a good first step, and once it was enacted we could work to amend it or correct its faults over time.

Bethany Criss said that in her view the “laundry list” of items in the section (§3b) of the bill that defines spending that falls under the “military purpose” category shouldn’t be seen as excluding other spending from that category, but only as examples of spending that fall under that category. In her view, once the bill passes, a next step will be to ensure that the “military purpose” definition is interpreted inclusively so that it covers all the stuff we’re worried about.

Greg Reagle gave us some perspective on the reasoning behind watering down the bill to permit Congress to spend the money in the RFPTF on anything in the budget other than things in the military purpose category (previous incarnations of the bill had specified more precisely where that money would go). He said that potential supporters in Congress had balked at having their spending decisions micromanaged by legislation, and so the changes had been made to mollify them.

Erica Weiland wanted to emphasize the positive working relationship between NWTRCC and NCPTF, though she too was opposed to endorsing the bill. As an anarchist she doesn’t much favor trying to solve problems via legislation, but as an activist she tries to inspire well-intentioned people to be more active in ways that seem most appropriate to them, so she wants to encourage PTF promoters to keep doing their thing.

Robert Randall said he was impressed at the high plane on which the discussion was taking place. He thought that the results of passing the RFPTFA might not be all that important, but that there might be some benefits to be had from the campaign to pass the bill anyway.

Pam Allee felt that the bill would help to emphasize that “we are the government” and so we can take control of the budget and change spending priorities so as to emphasize things like education, seat belt law enforcement, and other liberal priorities. She was concerned that the RFPTFA seemed to lack grassroots support.

Larry Bassett paused to wonder whether it was really appropriate to the mission of a group like NWTRCC to be endorsing legislation or the individual projects of the affiliate groups.

Jim Stockwell felt that there might be a contradiction in that for many WTRs, the fact that tax resistance is illegal civil disobedience is an essential part of their WTR, and so legal conscientious objection would not be helpful to them. He hoped our two groups would continue to work together.

Hiro (whose last name I didn’t catch, and whose first name I may be misspelling) encouraged us to patiently work at incremental approaches and not reject RFPTFA just because it wasn’t everything we wanted. That said, she also worried that the government would spend the “peace” tax fund on things based on its warped definition of peacemaking work. She envisioned Blackwater contractors doing their institution-building mopping-up exercises in Iraq (where she is from) and calling it “peacemaking” activities deserving of RFPTFA funding.

Tim Godshall tried to give us some perspective, noting that WTRs are one of the best arguments for the PTF (that is, the existence of WTRs demonstrates that many citizens have a strong conscientious objection that their government needs to accommodate), and also that although the RFPTFA might not have any effect on the military budget, the same could be said of WTRs. He believes that the RFPTFA is one part of a larger campaign to pressure the government to change its spending priorities.

Peter Smith disagreed with the suggestion that if the RFPTFA were to pass it would divide the WTR movement. He agreed that we should not endorse the legislation, but hoped we would continue to support the PTF campaigners.

Ray Gingerich responded to a comment from Joffre Stewart by insisting that he was not an anarchist and indeed believed that a strong, active government (for example, one capable of implementing single-payer universal health care) was not incompatible with pacifism. He plugged nonviolent conflict resolution strategies of the The Unconquerable World / A Force More Powerful school. He also suggested that Marian Franz (the long-time National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund executive director) had been used by people and institutions who wanted to delay their confrontation with taxpayer complicity by putting it off until some distant future in which conscientious objection to military taxation was a legalized option.

Joffre Stewart noted that the U.S. government had no qualms about raiding the Social Security “trust fund” to pay for its military spending, and that it had stacked its “U.S. Institute of Peace” with CIA folk committed to the government’s violent foreign policy. He therefore sees no reason to trust the government to administer a “peace tax fund.”

Bethany Criss told us that not only is she committed to seeing the RFPTFA enacted into law, but that she is also a war tax resister and has been since 2001. She said that although there is an associated “Peace Tax Foundation” with an educational mission, there should be no doubt that the Campaign’s goal is to get the legislation passed into law. She thinks that the bill will be beneficial to war tax resisters and the war tax resistance movement by making WTR more visible. She says that if the bill were enacted, it would not take away the opportunity to resist or say no; that resisters could continue to resist as before if they wished. The goal is to bring more people in to a war tax resistance mindset. She notes that part of the reason the bill was watered down is that their campaign doesn’t yet have enough supporters to bring enough pressure to bear on the legislators; this is another reason why she’d like our support.

Finally, Bill Ramsey felt that we might be better off not concentrating on the (unlikely) endorsement and instead trying to work on ways the two groups can work better together.

Saturday was an open-ended discussion without any decisions to be made on either the endorsement or the statement of purpose wording; on Sunday, our “business meeting,” we addressed those decisions.

A number of people who could not come to the meeting sent along their opinions about the RFPTFA, and printouts of these were made available to attendees of the business meeting before we took up the issue. These were on the whole much more positive about the Act and more in favor of endorsement than the attendees had been, with one person recommending endorsement, another recommending “NWTRCC continuing its endorsement” of the bill (though we had a hard time determining which if any version of the bill our group had originally endorsed), and another conveying the results of a discussion about the issue held by Sonoma County Taxes for Peace which led to that group deciding to strongly support NWTRCC endorsing the bill.

Predictably, we did not reach consensus at the business meeting on Sunday to endorse the RFPTFA. I counted about a half-dozen people in favor of endorsement, maybe half again as many against it. Unfortunately, although a non-endorsement was pretty clearly the inevitable conclusion, it took a while to get there, and we weren’t able to devote as much time as we needed to the stickier question of the Statement of Purpose and its anachronistic reference to the “US Peace Tax Fund Bill.”

The upshot of that discussion was that there were two replacement phrases with a large amount of support:

• “…support of peace tax fund legislation…”
• “…support of legislation that would legalize conscientious objection to military taxation…”

While there was broad support for both, neither was able to rally a consensus around it. My proposal to simply scrap the old anachronistic wording for now and perhaps come up with a replacement at a later date also failed to attract consensus support — with many people feeling that by rejecting the endorsement and also eliminating mention of the PTF from our Statement of Purpose it would look too much like we’d conducted a wholesale purge of PTF sympathy from the group.

So when it came down to it, the Statement of Purpose ended up the same way it began in this area: it continues to pledge our support for supporters of the long-gone “US Peace Tax Fund Bill.” This is a little ridiculous, but seems mostly harmless.

Dissident Veteran for Peace reacts to news of the NWTRCC debate over the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Act:

I haven’t written about the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund in more than two-and-a-half years now. The proposal is an extremely flawed effort that should be opposed by all people of conscience. As I summed up in August 2006, “…if you want to send more money to the war machine, split the war tax resistance movement, and help set up a feel good shell game then the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill (HR 2631) is for you.” So, I was happy to read in the June 2009 issue of More Than a Paycheck that the Coordinating Committee of the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee did not renew its previous endorsement of the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund.

What follows is my translation of the outline of a 1988 paper that criticizes the efforts to enshrine conscientious objection to military taxation as a human right. The paper is attributed to Juan Carlos Rois, and I have found it on-line in PDF and at Insumissia as a web page.

Juan Carlos Rois

I may try to translate the whole paper, but it is somewhat tough going. I’m not actually bilingual — I just know enough Spanish to get myself in trouble with it, and something like this is good practice. I’m almost certainly missing some nuance, translating many things more awkwardly than necessary, and probably getting a few things wholly wrong. I’d say “caveat emptor” but nobody’s paying for this.

In particular, the Spanish word “derecho” can mean “right” (as in “human rights”) or it can mean “law.” Rois uses the term in both senses, sometimes in the course of a single paragraph, and it isn’t always clear to me which one is the most appropriate translation. Be aware that when Rois talks about “rights” he very deliberately is using a term that implies “legal rights,” and not something like “natural rights” or “god-given rights” or anything that implies that the rights have some sort of existence that precedes the system that enforces them.

Tax Resistance as a Human Right

Contents

1. Initial approach to the topic: Limitations, suspicions, and skepticism concerning war tax resistance and other related topics
   1. Confusion and ambiguity at the outset: A human right to war tax resistance is vague, and stuffed with paradoxes and contradictions.
      1. The lack of specific mention in international legal instruments.
      2. The current definite tendencies of human rights in the context of the new world order:
      3. Is it possible that states would voluntarily admit some type of limitation (in legal form) to military spending?
      4. The controversy in legal doctrine: between radical refusal and partial & nuanced tolerance to a right to war tax resistance.
      5. A look at jurisprudencial positions.
      6. The limits of war tax resistance as a stand-alone, not fundamental, right to redirection or exemption:
      7. The argument of war tax resistance as a human right.
      8. The argument of war tax resistance as disobedience securing the exercise of human rights denied by militarization.
      9. Differences of “character,” “extent,” and “context” between a human right or a disobedience in defense of human rights and a legislative proposal for a “peace tax”: Or, how not to confuse the collar for the dog.
      10. A recap for those lost in the maze.
   2. The aspiration of the law as a liberator and the deception of the law as a golden cage: “Be wise as serpents and harmless as doves.”
   3. An attempt at classification, biased but hopefully also valid.
      1. Proposals with an institutional focus.
      2. Proposals with a reformist focus.
      3. Proposals with an alternative focus.
2. War tax resistance as a human right: What is not and what can be a human right to war tax resistance from the perspective of war resisters.
   1. Diatribe against a reductionist approach to the subject-matter and the justifications for a “human” right to war tax resistance:
      1. (First) criticize the traditional concept of human rights:
      2. Criticize (secondly) the reductionist concept of human rights as individual rights.
      3. Criticize (however vaunted) the fundamentals of conscience based in ethico-religious imperatives.
      4. (And finally) criticize the traditional record of human rights and the claim that all social needs must be called human rights.
      5. A rest stop along the road.
   2. Make a tentative search of the elements of war tax resistance that want to be a human right or guaranteed by a human right.
      1. The realistic and multidisciplinary vision as reasonable discourse, around which to make our “ethical” construct with a normative claim.
      2. The “additive” character of dissent as a constructor of new human rights.
      3. Rights of the “first,” “second,” and “third” generation.
      4. The class of resistance to war as an imperative class (the Russell paradigm).
      5. The choice of peace and the search for a new world order.
      6. Outline of a peace with substance and the role of war tax resistance in this ensemble.
   3. Legal justifications of war tax resistance
      1. The purpose of the law is to build peace.
      2. Human rights are incompatible with the arms race.
      3. War tax resistance forms a part, at least via prevention, in the human right of peace and a just and mutual world order.
      4. The theory of sovereignty and the justification of disobedience.
      5. War tax resistance is supposedly a form of democratic participation in the determination of defense policy.
      6. War tax resistance is supposedly an invocation of personal responsibility in the legal and political process that enriches the law.
      7. There is no duty to contribute to military spending, but only a legal obligation in a weak sense.
   4. Towards a legal characterization of war tax resistance
      1. My preference for accenting “resistance to war” and disobedience to this option.
      2. A human right to war tax resistance.

Several days back I posted my translation of the outline of Juan Carlos Rois’s critique of the idea of war tax resistance as a human right. Today I’ll share my translation of the paper itself, and tomorrow, perhaps, some of my thoughts about it.

Juan Carlos Rois

My disclaimers still apply: Some bits of this translation were tougher than others, and I’m not actually bilingual — I just know enough Spanish to get myself in trouble with it (something like this is good practice). I almost certainly missed some nuance, translated many things more awkwardly than necessary, and probably got a few things wholly wrong. I’d say “caveat emptor” but nobody’s paying for this (and I don’t know Latin either).

One thing to keep in mind is that the Spanish word “derecho” can mean “right” (as in “human rights”) or it can mean “law.” Rois uses the term in both senses, sometimes in the course of a single paragraph, and it wasn’t always clear to me which one would be the most appropriate translation. Be aware that when Rois talks about “rights” he very deliberately is using a term that implies “legal rights,” and not something like “natural rights” or “god-given rights” or anything that implies that the rights have some sort of existence that precedes the system that enforces them.

Rois’s paper is plagued with repetition. Its core arguments are few and could be summarized in as many paragraphs, but he adds a trellis of rhetoric on which he hangs these same points again and again, decorated with occasional examples and zoologies of arguments he is responding to. So before I give you my translation of his paper, I’ll give you my summary of it:

Efforts to enshrine a form of conscientious objection to military spending as a fundamental “human right” are largely confused and misguided. Attempts to find a justification for this right in existing international law (say as an outgrowth of freedom of conscience or religion) require incredible stretches (and why should we expect that the military governments who were the impetus behind these international treaties would have inadvertently legalized the mechanism of their own elimination?). Attempts to find such a justification in some sort of preexisting, Platonic natural law suffer from an ethnocentric reliance on the European liberal individualist tradition that prevent such a justification from having the universality that a fundamental human right requires.

In any case, either way, such efforts concede too much. They are willing to allow for the right of governments to spend society’s resources on war and preparation for war, to maintain armies, to go on military adventures, and so forth — they just want these governments to recognize certain conscientious peoples’ right to be personally aloof from such things. In effect, they countenance militarism in exchange for permitting some people to have the feeling of a clear conscience. Any measure that would legalize the right to personally conscientiously object to military spending would also enshrine as the default that everybody else would collaborate in military spending as their way of participating in this freedom of choice.

This has the effect of keeping militarism safely intact and converting the war tax resistance movement from being a group dissenting from government militarism into being one more interest group lobbying the government for special privileges. Instead, we should forthrightly assert that the whole militaristic leviathan is illegitimate and that it simply does not have the right to mine the world’s riches to inflict the sufferings of war on people.

War tax resistance is not a human right, but it may be one method of defending a human right — the fundamental human right to real, substantial peace and to be free of the malevolent parasite of militarism. But war tax resistance is a means to that end, and not an end in itself. Our primary goal should be the dismantling of militarism, and not personal aloofness from it (and certainly not the legalization of such aloofness).

This fundamental human right has plenty of precedent in international law and seems more likely to garner an international and multicultural consensus.

If people have a right to a peaceful world, it follows that people have a duty to make a peaceful world a reality — people themselves in an exercise of direct democracy, not states, since states (at least as they are currently constructed) cannot be trusted to advance peace. War tax resistance in this sense becomes something more like part of a universal duty to defend human rights against the threat of militarism than a particular privilege of the conscientious to turn their backs on it — part of a process of reimagining defense as something other than the maintenance (or expansion) of national borders by the military but instead as the defense of fundamental human rights (in some cases defense against the military) by people.

There is much that I find agreeable in this point of view, though I found the paper exasperating for a number of reasons. But anyway, now for my translation of the paper itself:

War Tax Resistance as a Human Right

Initial approach to the topic: Limitations, suspicions, and skepticism concerning war tax resistance and other related topics

Confusion and ambiguity at the outset: A human right to war tax resistance is vague and stuffed with paradoxes and contradictions.

The theoretical consideration of war tax resistance as a human right presents great difficulties. The very ambiguity and conceptual confusion of the various proposals made public by the groups and campaigns of various countries (“human right of war tax resistance”, “peace tax campaigns,” “taxes of conscience,” “legislation for peace,” and other terms by no means identical, but which are used interchangeably in some quarters) serve us as an example of the slippery terrain in which we work.

For example:

The lack of specific mention in international legal instruments

Certainly there exists no explicit mention of a human right to war tax resistance — nor of its substantial essence — in any international declaration or instrument in force today.

It does not even seem that one can derive the possibility from existing texts, for the simple reason that a supposed right of this nature never entered the minds of the “international lawmakers” of yesteryear

The current tendencies of human rights in the context of the new world order

Nor does the tendency of human rights run along this path, as nations continue to maintain a conception of the international legal order that privileges the role of armies, military research, and military spending in the ideology and tools of international security or — even more so — because now the decisions (universally) about self defense comport with the states and their military experts, and not with the will of the citizens, who are converted in these matters into mere “spectators” or “public servants,” long-trodden under by certain complex interests beyond the reach of a “citizen’s” hand.

It does not appear, from this, that nations have any intention to assert a generous right to war tax resistance that is directly enforceable by citizens: Such a possibility exceeds the limits of the practical prerogatives of power and implies a threat of dissolution, or at least of crisis, in the policies of military defense, which are tightly consolidated in our societies at the end of the century.

To put it another way, the conflict between disputable rights of nations and the (even more disputable) rights of citizens, is resolved in matters of security in favor of the first and to the detriment of the latter without any kind of excuses.

We also ought not to forget that today it is states (and the lobbies of what is euphemistically known as the military-industrial complex), and not communities, that are truly and uniquely the “defining legislators” of human rights in the new world order.

Is it possible that nations would voluntarily admit some type of limitation (in legal form) to military spending?

The most that one could strive for, in view of the current trend, is to accept proposals for control of military spending, of military technology and its dissemination, or of the war industry in general, by means of international legal instruments of limitation or the like, or by means of adding specific budget items for the promotion of peace or development, similar to the famous recommendation of applying 0.7% of GDP from rich nations to international development, or to the kind of right of certain citizens to “hypothecate” one’s taxes to ends of a civilian or military nature.

A common argument of possible efficacy would permit the more dynamic movement of our societies forward along the line of a “peace tax,” compatible with these institutional tendencies, allied to the political forces most interested in an opportunity for more control of military spending and the intelligent rationalization of the danger of military investment.

This presumed alliance may feel inviting, for obvious reasons, to other social groups and collectives of a rather fundamentalist or even nostalgic bent, found in a supposed moral golden era of mankind, sheltered by a very questionable moral revival; and even no insignificant part of liberal groups, in search of an agreement to maintain control of the technological-military “status quo” in force, or, simply, from affinity to the great ideals of rational modernity and its humanist proposals.

The controversy in legal doctrine: between radical refusal and partial & nuanced tolerance in a right to war tax resistance

In another sense, the doctrinal affirmation of a right to war tax resistance is a minority position, and is confused in its justifications, extent, and character.

You can count on the fingers of one hand those who take a position in favor of this perspective, and, of course, this position is not received sedately at all by the legal community in general.

Perhaps an effort of doctrinal development will permit me to characterize it as a form of conscientious objection in a wider sense, tacitly positioned as a form of exercise called freedom of conscience (whether in its ideological or religious dimension), or in any of the rights of individual autonomy known as liberal.

In my opinion both possibilities “of conventional bent” significantly reduce the extent of the characterization to individualistic terms or to a moral rigor today outdated and happily locked away in the trunk of mementos.

This right of a liberal-religious nature runs the risk of emphasizing, ultimately, its compatibility (as an exception) with its opposite (as a rule) or, what amounts to the same, to change continents in order not to change contents [un cambio de continente para que nada varíe en el contenido].

For that trip, perhaps, such luggage will not be needed.

It is naïve, one can see, to nurture high hopes of social transformation by claiming or supporting a supposed imperative of exemplary individual conscience.

A commitment of true resistance to wars must have some view of a political long-term goal far beyond this, which inevitably lies in understanding clearly where the limits of such objection may be found (its essential shortfalls in transforming into a world without armies, its simplistic view of a right reduced to a mere appeal to private conscience, its ethnocentric nature as a consequence of its consideration as an individual right, its unwillingness to confront the generalization or invitation to all of society to be incorporated in this action, the possibility of a shift in current policy so that what the law incorporates is compatible with a global system of military spending, its conversion of the peace movement into a group specializing in political/legislative lobbying, etc.), such as we are sketching out now.

A look at jurisprudential positions

The history of the defense of war tax resistance before the courts proves exemplary:

For example, in the U.S.A. several rulings have been made that discussed the legitimacy of war tax resistance as the exercise of an individual right (see: “Saying ‘No’ to War in the Technological Age: Conscientious Objection and the World Peace Tax Fund Act” De Paul Law Review. Vol 31, n° 3, 1982, pp 498–507 or the ruling U.S. v. Lee, etc.) and the law has always responded negatively. In every case, the American campaigns have settled on a very particular form of advancing individual conscience as a weighty argument, not exclusively but with an almost complete silence about political demands and about erga omnes demilitarization proposals as war resisters.

For its part, in Italy the Court of Cassation, in its ruling of 23 November 1985, has come to consider not only the non-legality of war tax resistance but also its prosecutability in criminal proceedings. And this despite small, partial victories that have authorized a certain permissiveness or tolerance.

Equally, in Germany or in Spain (T.A.S. Bilbao on 29 September 1987, Zaragoza on 9 January 1988, or Madrid on 14 November 1990, S.T.S. in 1991) the praise of the moral position by the judges has not prevented them from, in turn, declaring the illegality of war tax resistance that goes against the general purpose of tax contributions to common expenses, no equivalence of receipts/expenses, and injury to a greater legal good.

The reality is that in general, war tax resistance enjoys no legal or judicial protection anywhere, and, more interestingly, that the defenses that all the same are made in halls of justice are neither of one voice nor are they appropriate, because there is no clear characterization of the form of tax resistance beyond the same deeply moralizing and even doctrinaire “ethical” discourse.

The limits of war tax resistance as a stand-alone, not fundamental, right to redirection or exemption

One might consider that we are dealing with a mere autonomous right, not a fundamental one, characterized more-or-less as a right of tax redirection (the right to decide what parts to contribute to personally), or better as a right of exemption (the right to be excluded from certain parts of the budget that are incompatible with our personal ideas).

This possibility also is theoretically problematical and, of course, very much reduced to the ideological field of war resisters and not accompanied by other types of commitments in parallel.

Any such right of redirection would have serious technical difficulties, since the extension of such a right would entail significant collisions and conflicts of legal benefits as well as important considerations (as much or more than the legalizers of war tax resistance are willing to admit) in national systems, including consequences contrary to the promotion of the values of justice.

On the other hand if you allow an enduring compatibility between taxes for peace and taxes for war, this takes from war tax resistance its claims of social legitimacy through transformation and adds the institutionalization of a situation of “legal tables.”

As regards a possible right of exemption, rather than serving to protect some particular private conscience, it could be quite convenient also as an excuse to wash the good conscience of citizens who are unwilling to cooperate with the personal payment of military taxes but are well-disposed to allow that there be others in the same society who suffer in their place.

Do we need a right to self-righteous moral scruples like this claim of war resisters to tax resistance?

And finally, despite the different solutions that could be devised to solve these conflicts, they will remain possible, precisely because of its regulation as an autonomous right, not a fundamental one (whose essential substance cannot be limited or suspended at the whim of power), which makes it a variety of “gracious concession by power” of arbitrary limitations of its exercise or extent, because, ultimately, it would be the legislature that granted this kind of legal recognition.

The argument of war tax resistance as a human right

Another possibility of great reach would be to try to argue for the consideration of war tax resistance as a more fundamental human right (autonomous or as a form of exercise of an already-established human right).

However this possibility is not without its problems, which concern the nature of this autonomous right (right of conscience, individual liberty, gracious concession of political power, etc.), the determination of its essence, and the sphere that delimits it.

The justification at this level presents us with the same problems, paradoxes, and ambiguities with which human rights in general is confronted today (because the reality is that neither are rights in the strict sense, but ethical proposals with pretensions of validity that are not universal but Western).

1. Because a human right to war tax resistance understood “Westernly” has the danger of reducing to the above individualist and liberal terms, which impedes its political demilitarizing potential.
2. Because it can induce us to approaches that do not dialog with cultures (including legal ones) distinct from the West, where the concept of individual and subjective rights are not prevalent but those of solidarity, of respect or acknowledgment of the disadvantaged, of life above all, etc.
3. A human right to conscientious objection in political subjects (a supposition, for example, included in the right of substantial peace, right of the future generations against the threat of the present, of solidarity etc.) or a development of this as the right to a new world order, etc., also implies positive difficulties and necessitates a theoretical structure that supports and properly argues its justifications, as the fact is that the positivization of a right of resistance as a historically realizable human right and the appeal to direct exercise of power by men and women does not enjoy a good reputation in the political cultures that be.

However such a characterization seems ultimately of greater depth and value to the war resisters who do not propose a right that is “compatible” with its opposite (a right of war) but the amelioration of the condition of militarization.

The argument of war tax resistance as disobedience securing the exercise of human rights denied by militarization.

I move on, finally, to abandon the argument of war tax resistance as a human right and to move on to consider it as merely an appeal to a means of constructing a more just international order and to defend the use (of war tax resistance of course) as a tool for securing the possibility of exercising a right of peace more ethereal (but just as achievable and not holistic).

In this case, I will relate (as a sign of continuity and a break with positive human rights) the proclamation in the preamble of the declaration of human rights, which suggests the necessity of their survival and that of its paradigm in the political order, so as to keep men from resorting to the supreme (and possibly penultimate) recourse of rebellion against tyranny.

War tax resistance then appears not as a right, but as a guarantee of the exercise of the right, based on various reasons, in order to achieve a global coexistence based on respect for others (and not only on the Western dignity of the person), and able to speak to overcoming the paradigm of rights based on coercion, on violence, and on legally dogmatic criteria, as seen in our societies, that in reality negate all that they promise.

Differences of “character,” “extent,” and “context” between a human right or a disobedience in defense of human rights and a legislative proposal for a “peace tax”: Or, how not to confuse the collar for the dog

Finally, I want to make a further clarification that will help us to better orient ourselves with the aim of this paper, which should make clear that “war tax resistance” as a right or as a guarantor of rights is not the same as “taxes for peace” or some other similar proposition.

The distance between the one and the others is, as it were, similar to the distance between the objective that we set ourselves and the diverse tools (and we must ask ourselves whether they are the right tools for the job) with which we want to efficiently reach this objective.

A recap for those lost in the maze

In summary, it appears that as we announced at the beginning, the consideration of war tax resistance as a human right requires at least two tasks:

1. to clarify and to discover the existing differences between the diverse proposals, which is to say, instruments with which the social movements and diverse groups have come to articulate their campaigns in favor of demilitarization; differentiating between the global long-term goals (“war tax resistance” as a human right or as a guarantor) of the different proposals in order to arrive at said goal.
2. to justify, once that supposed global long-term goal is found, its relevance, scope, context, and alternatives.

The aspiration of the law as a liberator and the deception of the law as a golden cage: “Be wise as serpents and harmless as doves”

The struggle for peace, like almost all searches for emancipation that we know of, is not without its simplifications and mythologies of success and of failure, its anecdotes, and its significant and necessary moments of renewal and evocation.

What I am interested in analyzing is a continuation, of which we can say that there have existed four great myths with which men and women have tried to arrive at world peace:

1. peace can come by means of war (logically to such reasoning I will not comment at all for the obviousness of its falsehood)
2. peace will come by means of law
3. peace will come by the conversion of individuals
4. peace comes through education

I will not try to depreciate the substance that diverse cultural traditions have incorporated in these perspectives, nor ignore the portion of truth and its inestimable wealth.

I want, however, to raise an alert about the necessity of applying a suspicious skepticism unilaterally about how we can “believe” that “the law” (or “conversion” or “education”) is capable of arriving at the desired peace (and not at a mere simulacrum of peace), either alone or in combination.

And in particular, to point out that, effectively — and without losing sight of the healthy potential that the law might contribute to the struggle for peace — it does not stop being an instrument that, on countless occasions, has demonstrated its efficiency as an element of domination.

We are still far from considering war and preparation for war as the antithesis of the law (as demonstrated, for example, by the current positive tendency in the international sphere, or the infinity of legal norms that we call “jus in bellum” today more than ever in force) and yet, jurists of all stripes do not stop alerting us of the ease with which power utilizes the tools of the law to refuse recognizing the heralded rights, trivializing their scope and immunizing them against their liberatory aims (for example, the “westernizing” freedoms of expression and or choice have become propaganda and manipulation in the service of power, choice or participation in consumption or submission, the civil liberties in policing and surveillance, etc.).

And with all that I want to move forward — because I consider the best interest of the case — to argue that if, effectively, we want to make the law a strategic instrument of demilitarization, we must sever all claim of relying too much on these last possibilities. Our long-term goal is not a human right that we justify, but a process of demilitarization, where legal achievements also open new paths.

We may consider our role as mere political operators in competition with others of different designations (with aims not always pure). This supposes a struggle to change the structures and the law, in place of confidence in human nature, in its magical ability, or in the possibilities of a royal decree or of a change in the conduct of human beings.

With all this I want to stop, precisely, at the consideration of law as an instrument, certainly not a weak one, that our strategic reason must learn to employ (without turning it against us) to actively introduce greater limits on militarism today.

Now from there it is said to be an intelligent, strategic reason for us, “wise as serpents and harmless as doves,” to be more able to influence demilitarization in the political context than in the formal legal landscape, determined not to drop our guard and to maintain a nonconformist tension before the eternal claims of the law.

Or, more directly, to propose as an aim of law proposals to the limit of legal tolerance, not in the form of “we consecrate” any unalterable and eternal “right,” but rather, of our proposals “for right” we make educational bridges and roads with which to go forward “without pause” towards higher levels of gradual demilitarization.

In regard to this I want to show distrust for all consecration of these supposed human rights as limits on our action. And this for a variety of reasons:

1. For behind human rights (today in the global imagination) hides a crude ideology that we must make explicit in order that it does not become the “petitio principii” that justifies anything “according to taste.”
2. Because I still cannot respond in a convincing way to the following question: If after the efforts and energies expended by us in order to get a proclamation of some type of human right to war tax resistance They respond with a “no,” does this detract from the reasons for our commitment to demilitarization? Are you not interested in continuing working without the cobble of human rights stuck to your shoe?
3. Because, at this level of fascination for human rights, we can fall victim to a paradox that will not escape us, as those who justify armies as instruments of defense of nations may consider it necessary to introduce some “human right” of their own to arm militarily to avoid being attacked by others (si vis pacem para bellum is a maxim that enjoys health and recognition in the cultural and scientific fields).

These types of reasons must realistically qualify the phantom of human rights and the importance of obtaining recognition of a human right to war tax resistance. It is something that may have an interesting tactical and educational value, but in no case is it “the long-term goal” of the war resisters: the fact of achieving such recognition does not guarantee social demilitarization because there is no immediate or automatic mechanism that moves from “right” to “demilitarization.”

An attempt at classification, biased but hopefully also valid

Having made this foray into cautiousness of which I think we should not lose sight, we now take a further step in the direction of the healthy skepticism which we must wisely practice in order not to get fooled (or to fool ourselves).

The various proposals that I know about concerning military spending are represented in our eyes as a kind of jumble where sometimes we entangle ourselves with the best intentions.

It would be interesting then to find some criteria for classifying some of these that would serve to discern what we are speaking of when we speak of certain things.

Thus, in an absolutely debatable form (as with any typology of this sort) we can classify the different, hypothetically predictable proposals with respect to objection to military taxation as: Proposals with an institutional focus, proposals with a reformist focus, and proposals with an “alternative” focus.

Proposals with an institutional focus

First, “institutional” (national, supranational, international) proposals assume certain features in relation to control of military spending. They will form various supranational accords (and some may already exist) concerning arms control, military spending, transfers of technology and dual-use material, cooperation for the development, control, and registration of military exports, arms embargoes, etc..

We will also find some policies and guidelines given by national institutions (renouncing the manufacture of certain types of armaments, declaring a non-offensive military posture, controlling the sale of arms or of dual-use technology to certain countries, etc.).

This hypothesis also covers other types of institutional assumptions of laws and policies that allocate certain budget items for the purpose of peace (where “peace” is understood almost always as the maintenance of the status quo) or for the development of supportive relationships, either by allocating certain percentages of the budget to these purposes, assuming a certain right of redirection or exemption for those citizens who avail themselves of it, and so forth.

The condition under which these types of proposal can be admitted, even in their most innovative aspects, is the possibility that they can be adopted and legislated by the relevant institutional bodies without creating too many problems for the existing defense policies in military terms, as all of these proposals are characterized by the institutional acceptance of commitments of control within a general framework of choosing armed defense and the status quo insomuch as security and defense are part of these institutions.

These favor, therefore, the maintenance of a general policy of security and defense based on armies and on the military spending necessary for their maintenance.

And such things aim to integrate, unproblematically, a certain weak dissent joined with strong obedience, permitting an option of personal redirection as the exception to the general rule.

The institutional proposals, by themselves, can hardly be offered as an alternative to the actual panorama of forces arrayed worldwide.

We will not make an easy or superficial criticism of such proposals, since our aim is nothing but to differentiate the tax resistance of war resisters, whose general long-term goal is, precisely, and with great effectiveness, gradual and irreversible demilitarization, from this institutional option, noting simply the difference between the first and the second: one thing is a tax resistance with long-term goals and the other consists of the institutional proposals (even when these may be a type of “peace tax”).

At certain moments there may exist certain similarities between the two, but also differences, as the first aims to surpass the second.

From the perspective of war resisters, a certain precaution is warranted with respect to institutional proposals, which makes us wonder sometimes about the consistency of the support, in a proactive and naïve form, that we provide to promote laws that could well be used for purposes comparatively distinct from our own, since they could be like tools that increase our practical support for global systems of military security.

Might it not be the case that our war tax resistance is devalued in its long-term goals to being a mere form of personal exemption to economic contributions to a military system that, however, we fully provide for by means of the rest of the taxpayers? Might it be considered as a certain self-righteousness, more-or-less considered as a path for evading the payment of those periodic military taxes for all (except us)?

Proposals with a reformist focus

We classify as such those proposals that seek significant reforms in order to construct a gradual and peaceful path toward a goal of demilitarization.

These “reformist” aims are considered in the classic sense of the term, since beyond the compatibility with the existing status quo, they aim to introduce small “wedges” that modify some structures in a deep way.

As such, in principle, they are not expressly assimilated by the institutions without introducing a certain change (reform) in their logic, so that it is to be supposed that “reformist” proposals necessitate certain political alliances in order to overcome the inertia and resistance of vested interests and to bring about change.

The attraction of reformist proposals is based on the belief in transformation by means of reform as a sort of historical law that hypothetically guarantees the march of progress towards greater achievements.

However, history does not permit us a blind optimism with respect to reform, since, as has often been exposed, history itself is discontinuous and there are many examples in which nothing changes but there is constant superficial change — what in the common refrain of my grandmother was known as “the same dogs with different collars.”

Nothing guarantees that some “reformist” measures are more disposed to global and continual change than to a superficial change that essentially strengthens the interests of the military-industrial complex (but now with a certain additional badge of legitimacy).

And with this we do not want to deprecate the reformist proposals of various stripes that may occur to us, but simply to encourage that in the strategy of the social movements we will hone our wisdom in order to achieve our goals rather than playing the game in the interests of others.

In my opinion, as they are specified today, social and religious groups’ proposals concerning “peace taxes” or “peace laws,” as well as other types of figures who claim some variety of tax determination (redirection or exemption) based on motives of conscience or some such, are “reformist” proposals in the sense of seeking a partial reform of the general defense framework, which at least allows in principle for the opinion of the citizenry in the selection of what to defend and how.

As such, it deserves a weighty appraisal, for certainly reform in this case introduces the possibility of further advances (at the same time that it forces a retreat, even if it is a slight one, of the unilateral militarism of today), but keep in mind also that reform ends up being a closed door if one is not sufficiently careful to take other steps later.

And this requires a sincere reappraisal of much of our work so as not to put the cart before the horse, since in the logic of certain reformist proposals, the long-term goal of demilitarism is nowhere to be found, nor are there further tactical steps that invite the general public to exercise their sovereign power in the face of defense issues.

In this sense, again, I believe it is important not to confuse the peace tax proposals with the tax resistance “human right” proposals, since while the first are a reformist change (as we said) for obtaining other goals, the second have a long-term goal in a stronger sense of securing the right of all “here and now” (although this “now” won’t be any time soon) to end military spending and militarism completely.

Proposals with an “alternative” focus

Of course by so labelling the proposals that we now designate as “alternatives” we are demanding a sympathetic hearing for them, since the “alternative” enjoys good press in certain circles.

It is therefore also necessary to use this gimmick, since we don’t want to have to hunt for sympathy with our point of view here, but to contribute to criticism and the truth.

There are alternative proposals that introduce absolutely new factors from those undertaken unproblematically by institutions.

The alternative proposals intend to strike “at the root” of the war/military problem: it is not necessary to control/cut war spending, it is not necessary to harmonize it with the private choice of some citizens, but the profound necessity “here and now” is an irreversible process towards the abolishment of armies and of military spending, an economic/industrial and trade conversion, by appealing to the public to refuse all collaboration with war, its causes, and its preparation.

There may be various religious approaches that would go along these lines, among which war tax resistance may have a predominant role, and, to some extent, and with some nuance, some of the proposals for peace and peace tax legislation as well.

However, we assert again the substantial difference that clearly exists between war tax resistance as a human right and “peace taxes” or similar issues.

In this regard, I want to refer to two possibilities that I consider more alternative or radical with respect to the problem of military spending:

1. conscientious objection as the specification of a broad human right to substantial peace (a war tax resistance human right)
2. war tax resistance in the form of civil disobedience as a tool to enforce a right to substantial peace

Either one, as we see, comes to the root of the problem, and demands a right of humanity in general to liberate themselves from one of the worst monsters to emerge from humanity: the military.

Certainly, however, the alternative variety of proposals that I mention also have their weak points, and there are well-known examples of this to suit any taste (from those that openly failed, to those that were easily manipulated by the powerful, to those that became mere reformism without the possibility of greater momentum, etc.).

Along with its alternative potential, other risks of these proposals must also be noted: because the character of disobedience which involves the necessity of motivating large segments of the population in carrying them out, their “lawless” or merely future-oriented side — their intrinsic utopianism — make these proposals a difficult road to the future.

Nevertheless, the present work intends to argue that war tax resistance as a “human right”/“defensive disobedience” is an alternative proposal, unlike the peace tax or others that, however, may be intermediate steps.

This implies:

1. that one accommodates arguing for war tax resistance as a human right, provided we move beyond the traditional way this is understood
2. that one must then discard, by reducing to its essence, any proposal for war tax resistance merely as a “conscientious imperative”
3. that one must also rule out as a human right to war tax resistance the peace tax proposal, which is neither tax resistance nor is of the nature of a human right
4. that one must deeply consider, beyond the consideration of war tax resistance as a human right, the dissident and disobedient characteristics of war tax resistance as a plausible defense and struggle to obtain politically a human right to substantial peace, whose boundary is set by social demilitarization

War tax resistance as a human right: What is not and what can be a human right to war tax resistance from the perspective of war resisters

From the foregoing considerations, we note that the right to war tax resistance, ultimately, cannot and must not be confused with various campaigns of refusal or denunciation of military spending

The distance between one and the other is similar to that which exists between, for instance, the human right to a new international legal order (article 28 of the declaration of human rights) and the implementation of legal norms of free trade of the GATT variety, to give an illuminating example.

Diatribe against a reductionist approach to the subject-matter and to the justifications for a “human” right to war tax resistance

As we have said above, we run the risk of a reductionist conception of human rights and, in particular, of war tax resistance as a human right.

Reductionism from my point of view can be approached from two perspectives:

1. in terms of content, if war tax resistance were limited to permission to a “right of exemption” (right to be exempted from personally contributing to national military expenses) or of redirection
2. in foundational terms, if it were limited to an outgrowth of the right to freedom of conscience or religion

The aims of war resisters are greater and different than a right to war tax resistance — to open the way to a radical and complete demilitarization, which is a long-term, though distant goal of a world without armies or military expenditures — and so such a right, at least in the intentions of the groups who promote these things, cannot diminish these aims.

Some considerations about the very concept of human rights will permit us to clarify our position.

(First) criticize the traditional concept of human rights

The traditional concept of human rights is inherited from a concrete historical and territorial ideology (the modern ideology that stems from the enlightenment and from the French and American revolutions in the late 18^th century). Needless to say, a correct understanding of this subject would lead us to delve, also, into religious and philosophical traditions, past and contemporary, but this is not the place for such a digression.

The current configuration of the various existing catalogs of human rights emerged — we know also — from a world view that grew out of World War Ⅱ and its protagonists.

Which is to say, it stems from the interests and from the representations of reality of the diverse peoples of the so-called West.

Its most elemental assumptions are based on the conceptions of modernity concerning such ideas as the “individual,” “human dignity,” the concepts of “human nature,” “subject,” and “conscience,” etc. — all markedly Western forms of representations of reality, but not necessarily shared by other cultures.

This means that their primary points (universality, inalienability, absoluteness, etc.) have been filtered through Western standards and concepts of reality, with an ignorance very relevant to the interests, world views, and realities of non-westernized worlds (I’m thinking of the Arab world, Hindu or Chinese culture, the reality of the peoples of the so-called “third world,” etc.).

In this sense, a concept of human rights that wants to serve the cause of global demilitarization would have to rise above the ethnocentric, Western concepts of human rights and to become, to put it mildly, more ecumenical.

It is greatly discouraging, at least to your humble author, to see how the various defenses heard thus far of war tax resistance as a human right are based almost exclusively on Western worldviews, Western interests, Western preoccupations, and, what is worse, on Western ideologies of private conscience, the individual, the Western god, etc. So it is no surprise that those who do not belong to our world of values are wary of a right like this that reduces the world to the West.

It is necessary to ask our brainy fellow-travelers (that is, Quakers, motley anarchists, liberals, or conscientious objectors of various flavors) to stop navel-gazing when putting forward their claims, if we don’t want to run the risk of saying what is irrelevant to cultures with as much right as ours (or more) to demand, here and now, tools of demilitarization and substantial peace.

Criticize (secondly) the reductionist concept of human rights as individual rights

Following on what I explain above, human rights, from the point of view of war resisters, cannot be understood as individual rights in the classic Western sense, since such a conception — even recognizing the historical importance it has played — would be out of place for countless peoples (I’m thinking of the Arab world, the peoples of Latin America, or in India, for example, and we can say by extension all of the so-called “third world” but also people with their own identity in Europe like perhaps those Gypsies not yet poisoned by propaganda and television) for whom the individual and the subject, as concepts and ideas, are alien, culturally and legally speaking.

The individual does not exist except as an ideological representation, as a sociological invocation, or as a political hypothesis. The real world is not composed of individuals. Rights, for this reason, are not “for individuals,” which are conventional constructs but are no more visible than phantoms.

We must, therefore, expand the term from the individual to the communities, to the peoples, to the security of life on the planet, to the future generations, so that they would be the owners of those rights and not the Western abstraction of the supposed “individual” or other things of that sort.

And in this sense, beyond the concept of the individual as the “owner” of human rights to war tax resistance is an opening of possibilities, because, and this is basic, it is not that “I” have a right to excuse myself from participation in military spending, but “we,” insomuch as the collective have a responsibility to life and to future generations and, so to speak, a right as a community to a substantial peace, which implies that the right to war tax resistance is a right of all against the aggressions of militarism and (above all) the present international order in which nations impose the obligation to contribute to military spending.

The categories of subject and of the rights of individuals insofar as they are limits confronting state action must give way to visions of human rights that contemplate more clearly the ideas of “community responsibility,” “duties and responsibilities” toward life on the planet, “duties” to the community, rights of communities and of future generations in the face of the armament policies of nations, “others” (as opposed to the traditional personal dignity), “duty of brotherhood,” etc.

The fact that we can consider it a right of global society against the states, as we shall see, and against the present international order that inhibits the development of human rights, permits making very few concessions to a supposed right for peace taxes determined by the states themselves and compatible with military spending in general.

Criticize (however vaunted) the fundamentals of conscience based in ethico-religious imperatives

Insofar as we intend that the theme of universality in human rights consists in the extension of its exercise to diverse peoples and cultures, we must be very eager not to offer unilateral rationales based on imperatives of conscience (whether they be ideologically, religiously, or ethically motivated) or that under examination are too essentialist.

We’re going to set down three points through which what we want to say in this respect can be explained:

clarifications concerning the religious foundation: a human right to war tax resistance must overcome an account of itself based on religious freedom, because this invocation implies an unseemly reductionism

This does not imply undervaluing the richness of cultural or religious traditions which in a very clear manner have taken the lead in the struggle for peace and the testimony of nonviolence, but, recognizing their important value and respecting their dignified aspirations, we must focus our rationales in a sound ethical relativism, seeking to meet on a common ground a universal ethical baseline among all traditions and cultures.

For example, an appeal to the ultimate foundation of objection as a requirement of duties supposedly imposed by the Christian god, could not be valid for this human right, for the simple reason that, for example, this Christian god creates suspicion in different worlds.

And this does mean to say, of course, that a faithful Christian inspiration is not laudable or a determined ethical impulse for members of diverse communities to work for this cause, but the motives that lead us to assume responsibilities for others and for life on the planet are one thing, but it is something else entirely from that which will serve as an “ethical consensus” or a rationale that is the basis for a concept of human rights.

And in this sense, we’ll see further on, we must make a clear distinction between motivations and legal foundations, since although while it is true that in the sphere of motivations any strong appeal to values appears obvious, in the order of legal foundations these same appeals may not furnish any effect, since they do not appear to be legal reasons nor arguments shareable by anyone as an “ethico-legal” consensus.

clarifications concerning the ethical foundations in the strong sense or idealistic ethics beyond a “baseline consensus” in universal pluralism

On the other hand, it does not seem convenient either to justify the right to war tax resistance by appeals to a supposed ethics (secular or religious) subject to the state, a preexisting and superior (Platonic) scheme of values, or a conception of the ideal or ideological man based on a supposed (and false) human nature.

To insist on ethical first principles or on a hypothetical initial state of nature will not serve us as war resisters for our war tax resistance proposal, since these appeals to “duties in the strong sense” serve only to reduce human rights to mere ahistorical ideologies and to sow serious doubts in these times of pluralism and relativism about moral concepts.

Reinforcements of the moral component in the strong sense imply a patent reactionary risk and a nostalgia for a lost, premodern moral golden age, but they are not a sufficient basis for the liberatory expectation that wants to be an option for war resisters.

We cannot reduce the human rights that we have been considering to a mere “moral right” of a holistic or decontextualized sort. And this is because the fact of our moral justification of such a right would be legally ineffective, speaking as though it remained a sort of “imperative” (or discourse on how many angels can fit on a pinhead) without the “normative” and “historical” marks of law.

Or what is the same, war tax resistance would be a human right in the respect of its enjoyment of regulations and guarantees of its exercise, recognition and international respect, etc., but not because of its supposed ethereal moral nature that, because of its excellence, nations must tolerate at the price of being considered immoral.

Furthermore there is no moral nor anthropological unanimity concerning that which is considered the moral director of men — humanity, good or any other adjective to use.

The ethical aspect of human rights, therefore, should be considered from a perspective beyond these reductionisms.

The ethical appeal to right that we analyze must aim, in short:

1. to establish a dialog (a multiethnic and multicultural dialog where there are no “superiors” nor “inferiors”) with those “different” societies concerning the basic needs and aspirations of the communities and of life on the planet, based on data and multidisciplinary analysis that considers, above all, that militarization (in this case military spending) is detrimental to the possibilities of life on the planet.
2. to propose as well the advisability of guaranteeing certain friendly behaviors with these as claims of right. Which is to say, it is to transform our proposals (and yes, with its cargo of critical morality) into a dialog with other claims and choices, urging that the communities themselves assume certain initiatives and convert them, by means of practice and ascent, into “human rights” with normative validity.

And this requires (in the step that goes from the proposal until its enactment) preferring disclosure/dissemination of our proposals and participation in them by the people over a proposed lobbying effort toward the political elites.

clarifications concerning the character of a human right of war tax resistance as a form of freedom of conscience

To sum up what I have been preaching so far, war tax resistance that purports to be a human right of global significance and resistance to war must overcome the reductionism of the classic imperative of conscience: the war tax resistance “human right” is not for war resisters a specification of the freedom of conscience or religion (or is not so principally).

The foundation of war tax resistance as liberty of conscience implies an obvious regression that leads us to a justification as a right of mere tolerance, compatible (as an exception, though of an indubitable testimonial value) with the maintenance of a certain “right” of nations to maintain a level of military spending demanded from all those who “do not show” such high morals as to personally oppose contributing to the charges imposed by the state.

On the contrary, we think that the justification of war tax resistance as a right must assume a narrative form and one of ethical rationalism that advocates for a claim to universal validity and enforceability of the commitment to demilitarization. It is not for us a problem of personal conscience, but of collective political responsibility in the face of militarism in its network of institutional and financial support.

Therefore, our aim of establishing a legitimation of war tax resistance in the legal world cannot resolve itself by appealing to the narrow foundation of liberty of conscience because, in the current trend of the age, such an approach implies a clear reductionism and, just as clearly, an elitist and false privilege of we who “have conscience” as opposed to ordinary “unconscious” citizens [in Spanish, conciencia means both “conscience” and “consciousness” so this opposition between having a conscience and being unconscious makes more sense] who could not be urged to enforce a human right not to participate in military spending because they would not adopt the precise variety of pose of some supererogatory moral duty of conscience.

The freedom of conscience implies, in any case, the freedom of all to participate responsibly in the construction of society, but it is no justification for the universalization of a right to war tax resistance because this goes beyond the limit of private actors to come to be a right/duty of the community against militarism and its interwoven collaborations.

(And finally) criticize the traditional record of human rights and the claim that all social needs must be called human rights

We will try, since we already see that the section under review is well-answered, to be brief in this respect.

It has traditionally come to be said that human rights are the historical concrescence of the demands for free and equal dignity (or nature) of human beings, considered in the abstract, that must be protected, and protected by the legal system.

For this reason it is recommended that the catalog of human rights (precisely so as not to become a trivialization in which everything ends up being a human right thanks to the boldness of determined political lobbies or societies introducing their claims in a sort of smorgasbord) sticks to those that are most fundamental, thereby proposing that four categories of rights be considered as human rights:

1. Right to life (a right that will thus imply a series of measures and tools of a political-legal nature aiming to guarantee life to its maximum extent)
2. Right to integrity/health (which will then result in measures and tools appropriate to guarantee this generic right)
3. Freedom of self-determination
4. Rights for “respect for nature or for peace.”

Indeed with respect to the problem of the extension of the catalog to an infinity of proposals, we encounter a significant problem, since it is not desirable for human rights to become an interminable list of stories, supposing that one gathers a catalog of principles with claims of normative validity that serve to advance the establishment of a new, just legal order.

It is perhaps this one additional reason not to argue so much for the express recognition of this human resistance-right in its specificity, as to contribute to the justification of this mechanism as a tool that “would guarantee” the realization/achievement of a right to substantial peace (which implies a zealous right to respect of life, which needs the full protection of health and integrity, which is articulated as political freedom and appears, basically, as a right toward nature and towards future generations).

On the other hand, and leaving for another time the sophistry of whether we find war tax resistance in the light of a true human right or of an instrument of rebellion in defense of a human right to peace, we must analyze, in order to clarify them, the three basic notes that have been sounded in turn concerning human rights (universality, absoluteness, and inalienability) such that, in view of present circumstances, only in a weak sense can one talk of the occurrence of such notes with respect to our structure of war tax resistance.

The note of universality

Because universality, handed down from the most pure Kantism, has declined as a characteristic of human rights and has developed a double meaning, inasmuch as the “universal subject” has been torn into pieces (because there are human rights that affect only certain holders and not “all men”) and because the protection order also obliges us to speak of a relative universality. With respect to war tax resistance, only in a weak sense can we speak of universality, since there are only certain categories of people (and not in the same way) who can claim ownership of the exercise of this right.

In the active sense we refer to those (peoples, cultures, persons) aggrieved by militarization, who exercise their disobedient responsibilities as a human right, which requires from others as passive subjects (states, the military-industrial complex, defense and revenue policies) a duty to the first group and to the maintenance of peace (a duty that imposes a change to the current policy, such as refraining from behaving in a certain way — raising funds to prepare for war, etc.) and that asserts a claim that is to be defended by non-collaboration.

The universality of this right does not require a uniform conduct by all, but respect for a diversity of conduct, enforceable as a right at last to guarantee that demilitarization “becomes universal” as a rule to accomplish here and now.

The note of absoluteness

We find ourselves again facing an excessive claim, in the sense that there cannot be absolute rights, as all of them are found limited in one way or another so as not to convert the rule of law into an impossible mechanism, spangled with paradoxes.

An absolute right, for example the freedom of thought, would lead us to consider justified as a human right the opponent’s political crime. We can extend the list of paradoxes.

For this reason we must explore the meaning of absoluteness for the human right that we are intending to define. In this sense we understand that we must substitute the term “absolute” with that of “prima facie,” a Latinism that means, more-or-less, that it is a right that, in principle, and unless any exception justifies its demotion, must prevail over other claims that enter into conflict with it.

Thus, we find the so-called limit to this right, that we alone can locate after much pondering, in that which most preserves substantive peace. The extent of this limit, for example, implies that the right of war tax resistance cannot be understood as a right to refuse collaboration with any type of taxes, but only with those that truly attack the peace, like for example military taxation.

The limit of this objection appears in consequence of the injury to real welfare of the community. When the exercise of this type of disobedience gravely damages this, the “strong” character of this right must fall away. But only in such a case.

The note of inalienability

This note has disintegrated completely, since inalienable implies something like “never prescribed,” “that one may never renounce,” etc.

In reality no right is inalienable in this strong sense. The evidence of this fact forces us to facially reject without going further the right under discussion.

Consequently, when we talk about a human right to war tax resistance, we refer to it by considering it as a right of a fundamental nature (though not absolutely), that is, as a right with a relative, gradual, historical character, that builds on a strategy in conflict with militarization and on techniques of disobediences that defend the respect for the right to peace, as a “resistant” right but one that can cede (since we do not think of it as some variety of idealist essentialism) to conflicting goods in order to better defend peace.

A resistance right that does not admit exceptions or preemptions (e.g. its neutralization or as a right of exemption or redirection) but is flexible and compatible with other historical strategies for obtaining a peaceful world.

A rest stop along the road

With respect to what remains, I say I have with gusto disposed of what I consider to be a reductionist character of a human right to war tax resistance (if indeed such a right exists).

I believe therefore to have highlighted as signifying narcissism those aspects that, in general, I find magnified in the claims for validity of a right to war tax resistance.

The papers, the dogmatic and scientific reasonings (and also the better part of the proceedings of other international conferences) read to make this work all abuse from good faith (not without, at times of ignorance, indifference and — less frequently — ethnocentric contempt) and reduce/devalue the concept of war tax resistance that one would prefer to be “resistance to war” in a broader sense, something more than and distinct from a mere individual action from an imperative of conscience.

The main claim is that we are not the sort who plant the field of narrow valleys that serve us to justify campaigns — interesting ones — but ones that are limited in their aims.

War resisters cannot settle for people “allowing” us to evade our contribution to military spending by means of legalizing some penalty-free permission.

The excuse that it is difficult to attract people to our disobedience proposals implies a sort of mental laziness that merits no more response than that which comes from the unending testimony of the victims of our history — do they deserve liberation less than we deserve safety?

A human right to war tax resistance does not reduce to an expression as miserly as that which we criticize, because it would a caricature, and history teaches us much of past mistakes. For example, conscientious objectors meant with the legalization of a substitute for military service in the form of a provision for civil service to be for “demilitarizing” society and not — as it turned out, for the purpose of depoliticizing the demilitarized character of the choice of conscientious objectors.

From this point of view we have, in this example, a result that ought to shine light on the ambitions of our proposal of war tax resistance.

I continue below to narrow in on war tax resistance in the form that we assert.

Make a tentative search of the elements of war tax resistance that want to be a human right or guaranteed by a human right.

We now find ourselves among some characteristics that we cannot set aside in the difficult search for the articulation of a plausible legal/political justification for war tax resistance as a human right.

We will highlight some of the “seed” aspects of the tree we are planting, and in time inquire into some justifications that validate such a claim in economic, political, and other fields of analysis.

The realistic and multidisciplinary vision as reasonable discourse around which to make our “ethical” structure with a normative claim.

Thus, data drawn from diverse fields and analysis concerning the “military expenditures” factor and the effects of it concerning the respect for life on the planet require, in some sense, fundamentals with which we can overcome the “recognition test” of our prospects of making war tax resistance a human right.

In this sense, we find that our claim of “war tax resistance” is a candidate for recognition as a human right of the third generation.

We consider next that we must eventually expose our reasons to the international community (understood not only as the combination of peoples and prevailing worldviews but through dialog and respect for the aforementioned universal perspective) in order to (as was said) “pass the test,” since nothing guarantees in advance the credibility of our proposal nor of the success of our struggle, but we must, as I have said, make ourselves credible and get that recognition “in the battlefield of ideas.”

Like so, as we will explain further on, our proposal of “war tax resistance as a right” cannot emerge from the supposed essential character of some moral rights or from some preexisting and inalterable universal values, but from the most objective analysis possible of militarism and military spending; analysis to which we must bring diverse perspectives and approaches of what the effects are of militarism on the political, economic, ecological, social, and other planes; their impacts on the aspirations of a new world order, for the actual survival of human rights and of an order based on these, for the “rights of future generations,” etc.

And this for one obvious reason: we must convince those who do not share our beliefs nor our values and for that it is necessary to base what we say in flexible and realistic arguments, beyond positions about values, beliefs, etc.

It will be fundamentally an extensive and flexible justification, superior to the reductionisms and the unilateralism of the approaches criticized above, which, in our view, can be reasonably expounded and consented to as a human right.

Consequently, our analysis and structure are dialogical, reasonable aims, mere searches for critico-legal legitimization of this option.

There are reasons to be pondered in the battle of ideas and of political and social proposals.

There are, more accurately, reasons for action in favor of this right to demilitarization so often repeated.

The “additive” character of dissent as a constructor of new human rights

Along with this, as much as we have been emphasizing in this long (if not profound) text, we must highlight a theme that has been constant in the process of positivization of human rights, which is the non-consensual character of the de novum claims of new rights in the face of those enshrined (and also neutralized by the authorities).

Human rights, whether they be positive or those that claim their inclusion as such, imply a political structure and decisively affect policy-making in general.

Therefore the resistants in this long process for the positivization of a right to war tax resistance have to produce — both in the sphere of public discussion and, even more, in practical action.

As many times has happened before with other rights, the positivization of a human right with demilitarizing claims implies strategies of dissent and disobedience with the aim of forcing political responses of another sort and of breaking inertia. Therefore also our misgiving that covered with lambskin (in this case the lamb of war tax resistance) is the wolf of the so-called “peace tax” that implies zero-dissent in the face of the interests maintaining the status quo.

Therefore we must stress the political character of the dissent that human rights must incorporate in the sense in which human rights have historically constituted claims of certain groups or people in light of earlier situations secured by power.

With this we want to influence the political aspect of our struggle and the necessity to understand (but not only) human rights as limits to power or “rights against the state” and that, precisely for this reason, they must be articulated in a very convincing form and, if you hurry, a disobedient one, without excessive concern for obedience to power, because, as we know, what today is law tomorrow may be a crime (if all goes well).

But we must consider that in the present circumstances in which the states appear as a rather obvious reality, human rights must be understood also as basic, urgent needs for protection and defense against the powerful.

The evident dialectic functions in this sense and what is interesting to consider is: human rights are limits on the state and on power, rationalizing elements of these, while at the same time power appears to be the basis of the validity of rights and we must reclaim and demand of it a sufficient guarantee of said rights.

Hence, our role will be to provoke dissent but, also, to demand an ever greater defense of our claims.

Rights of the “first,” “second,” and “third” generation

The process of the positivization of the different human rights has led to talk of rights of the “first generation” that would come to coincide with the individual rights resulting from the liberal thought of the late 18^th to early 19^th centuries, rights of the “second generation” which would be approximately the fruit of the positivization of the social and cultural rights under the socialist flowering, and rights of the “third generation” that would come to be the fruit of the new laws after the charter of Human Rights of the United Nations and that would come linked to the aspirations of decolonized peoples and the new sensibility and planetary emergencies (rights of solidarity, of ecology, and of peace, etc.).

The classification provided is somewhat superficial, but, with respect to our aims, I suppose it serves to frame war tax resistance within the claims to validity that have emerged in recent times as the result of new planetary emergencies in relation to peace and demilitarization.

Therefore we situate this figure of war tax resistance as (aspiration or right) as integral to a (broad) human right to peace. So we find ourselves more accurately confronting the true reasons (ethical, legal, political, etc.) and aims (demilitarization, struggle by civil society against taxes for military spending on national policies, etc.) for the war tax resistance of the war resisters.

On the other hand, the connections clearly emerge with the rights already enshrined in the U.N. charter, such as, principally, the right to life in a broad sense, the right to a just international order, and the very right to popular sovereignty.

The class of resistance to war as an imperative class (the Russell paradigm)

[Rois calls it “the Einstein paradigm” hereafter; perhaps he referred to Bertrand Russell in an earlier draft and then changed his mind?]

Following with our “tentative” search for the proper elements of this form of war tax resistance “human right,” we must highlight the essential element of “war resistance.”

“Non-resistant to war” tax resistance has no reason to be characterized as this right.

The concern with articulating a political commitment to refusing participation in armed conflicts is today an important legacy to humanity.

With no intention of depreciating other important traditions that animated war refusal over the centuries, we want to fix on that which we might call, improperly, the “Einstein paradigm,” to see the significance it may have to our approach.

In an era in which the antimilitarist structure has a very elaborate discourse concerning the meaning of wars and of armies, and investigating proposals for noncollaborations with such instruments, professor Albert Einstein formulated, in a letter sent to the War Resisters League, a reflection that today we can find at the root of our claims for legalization of the war tax resistance of which we speak.

Einstein considers that armies and militarism are the worst monsters that have emerged from the human race and that we must protest for their complete disappearance.

But don’t stop there: realize what is possible if the citizenry, “by means of effective acts” show their governments and and those who direct the plans of the military state their veto against participating in these and collaborating in their diverse preparatory measures (that is, both recruitment, as well as military industry, etc.).

This thereby asserts the power of civil society as the immediate agent of demilitarization, by means it puts forth (public declarations, conscientious objection, etc.) to refuse and its decision not to participate in such vile acts.

It appeals to the actual commitment to undermine support, through noncooperation, of the sustenance of the armies and the wars, in a sort of tenet of “tax resistance to war, its preparation, and its causes.”

Einstein understood that the military-industrial complex is the fruit of obscure interests that only decisive action of the people can expose.

The influence of these positions on important later reflections of conscientious objectors to military service is undeniable.

However, following the reflection of Einstein in his letter to the War Resisters League, this essential action of refusal would have to be accompanied by the realization of some type of educational undertaking by which governments should see that the people, indeed, want to stand up for other things.

It was as a tactical measure with which to be able to find allies on the path, at the time of constructing an alternative conception of defense of human rights and not of borders.

In this sense, war tax resistance can satisfy the function of incorporating the role and the responsibilities of society in the refusal of the arms race, and for making the states see the unwillingness of the people to maintain a huge war machine.

In this path, the fact that individual citizens can divert their taxes from “war resisters” aims to those for peace that openly serve the cause of demilitarization is, obviously, a tactical move of deep interest.

However one must distinguish between the possibility (realized in the form of a proposal from the civil society) to divert these taxes to peaceful ends and the “obligatoriness” built in to the legalization of this right to perform whatever type of diversion.

In this sense we can observe how the proposal “from society” to perform an educational action in defense of other things, has been converted by the states in the case of conscientious objection to military service, into a “misrepresented” obligation of the own “war resister” grade of this form.

I will explain myself: the known laws have converted Einstein’s good device into a legal obligation to “substitute” for military service other (generally more arduous) “extraordinary” service to the nation, and that, to some extent, secures its own overall kind of military service (that is imposed without reference to those non-objectors). With this, the dissident possibilities and those of noncollaboration with armies are depleted in a kind of exchange of obligations for the maintenance of conscription. In this light, if we were to make an assessment of the current momentum of conscientious objection to military service in the world, it has not served, or only minimally, to reduce the size and the political legitimacy of armies.

And this, from the proper design of law, if we were to consider war tax resistance as a human right, confronts us with an important legal paradox: Does the content of human right consist of performing a legal obligation? Can a human right in search of higher doses of demilitarization consist of substituting (but allowing for others) the persistence of military spending?

Therefore, in order to vindicate a human right to war tax resistance, it is necessary to do so it from the fullness of one’s war resister spirit, because our objective, far from considering a personal exclusion from participation in military spending sufficient, instead seeks a model and a call to the values shared by the community, incorporating as an argument of law its own sovereignty, in order to oblige nations to give respect to the noncollaboration undertaken, and the form of these policies might vary.

The choice of peace and the search for a new world order

This way of treating the subject will sketch a sort of epistemology of war tax resistance, in its scope and aims, that we can summarize in the following way:

• It has a normative claim as a third generation right
• based on objective reasons and on multidisciplinary analysis concerning what military spending involves
• that pursues service in the cause of social demilitarization
• fostering a dissident dynamic and incorporating the role of noncollaboration in its essence and its tactical proposals
• and that therefore resists being incorporated into limits “compatible” with a right of exemption or redirection, in order to aim to be, better yet, a legitimization of alternative proposals of legitimate civil disobedience from the standpoint of human rights.

However, it is interesting to note how this proposal provides, in principle, an obvious choice for the construction of a new paradigm of politics, in whose framework is definitively installed the claims of justice and of peace for our planet.

By this I mean to say that war tax resistance would appear as a strategy with claims of right that intends to serve the work of substantial peace.

From this point of view it is evident that it ties in two of the rights proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, in that it draws upon them in a decisive form:

• right to a new international economic and social order based on just relations (article 28 of the Declaration of Human Rights but also “Declaration on the Establishment of a New International Economic Order” in Resolution 3201 of 1 May 1974; “Programme of Action on the Establishment of a New International Economic Order” Resolution 3202 of 1 May 1974; “Charter of Economic Rights and Duties of States” Resolution 3281 of 12 December 1974, etc.)
• right to rebel against an order that does not protect human rights (preamble to the Declaration of Human Rights of 12 October 1948, Resolution of UNESCO 20/c/3/1.1./1 and its last meeting in Freetown of 3–7 March 1981, various international conferences, etc.)

Thusly, the declaration at Freetown clarified that

“the right to resist oppression is found at the center of the struggle of people for the recognition of their rights and is inspired by political philosophies based on democratic principles.”

Outline of a peace with substance and the role of war tax resistance in this ensemble.

a right to peace beyond the panoply of declarations?

For its part, it is clear that war tax resistance aims to be part of the essence of a right to substantial peace, a right still not sufficiently formed but that appears in the outlook and in the aspirations of our planet. The right to peace, reduced in the international purview to a mere declaration of good will, must gain befitting heft in the process of legal construction of the new worldwide society.

The strength of civil societies and NGOs in the conquest of achievements of peace, for that matter, also affects the legal approaches and presently opens diverse paths of thought concerning the wisdom of understanding peace as a fundamental pillar of the new construction of the worldwide society.

Wars, violence, and, as a consequence of this, armies, begin to lose all reason to feel accommodated in the structure of human rights and of rights in general.

The right-to-peace points outlined in our framework, are by assumption translated into legal categories of nonviolent action and also in its ethics, by means of a structure (also legal/political) of active pacifism, and thus a rethinking of such things as authority, coercion, the use of force, the instruments of general and particular prevention, the concept of legal subject, respect for difference, the inclusion of solidarity and development in legal contents, or the role of disobedience in the system of law, among others more obvious, as well as an unconditional and radical rejection of various elements so far unquestioned as tools of international law, principally meaning arms and armies, that will be replaced by other alternatives of conflict resolution, as it is nothing less than contributing to the realization of a right and a political order to promote substantial peace.

We speak then of a right to “substantial peace” not only as a universal ethical consensus, but as a right in its own sense and very different from the traditional jus in belli or jus ad bello, and configured as a true system of safeguards “against war,” as a type of active pacifism translated into the normative categories of law.

It is a right that appeals to its effective guarantee of the promotion of the so-called human rights, with respect to human dignity and the transformation of the sociopolitical structures into a new, just international order.

This right would fall under the rubric of an essential provision, of last resort, of a certain appeal to “resistance” against those practices (including legal ones) that would deny this legal choice of active pacifism. And this is where, again, tax resistance makes sense in the gradual struggle for the right to peace.

It is not, in our framework, that war tax resistance would be essentially a human right, but, better yet, one of the current inevitable defenses “of legitimate dissent” for making progress towards a right to peace.

A right to peace that, at least on paper, aims at gradual standards of social demilitarization and that, even as a voluntary declaration, begins to be reflected in international instruments of broad significance whether it be demilitarizing or encouraging of alternative values and education.

In this sense there are already people who have advanced some novel elements, among which we highlight the “constituent assemblies” of Colombia, that produced a constitutional proclamation of the right to peace (articles 16 and 22), to ecology (articles 58.2 and 79), to cultural and ethnic diversity (articles 7 and 8), to education for peace and human rights (articles 41, 64, and 95), and prohibiting the making and importation of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons (article 81), or of Paraguay, for those that prohibited torture and genocide (article 5), empower ecology (articles 7 and 8), of conscientious objection (article 37), ethnic diversity (articles 62 and 63), education for peace and cooperation (article 73) — or of the achievement of an international order of respect for human rights (article 145). One could mention other examples of constitutional law in which the efforts for peace begin to organize themselves likewise in legal formulas.

justification of war tax resistance as a “defense of a right” from various international legal instruments

Reviewing various international instruments of human rights, we may discover points in favor of the legitimation of an international warrant for war tax resistance:

1. Articles 8 and 9 of The Covenant of the former League of Nations

Said articles stated that the primary aim of this organization, the true parent of the UN, was to bring about the disarmament of the member states.

This reference is interesting because it shows how the law has historically specified proposals in favor of social demilitarization, up to the point of this becoming the raison d’être of the first attempts at world government (a reason that reappears in the current context of rethinking the United Nations).

But it is also interesting to know this fact because said aim and said League of Nations failed in its voluntary attempts.

In my opinion the reason is obvious: the failure must have been due to having entrusted the states with the power of bringing about this disarmament and not having articulated measures that would appeal to civil societies in such an undertaking.

It follows that war tax resistance would provide a social commitment, beyond that of the states, to follow the path of demilitarization, and for this reason it must be incorporated as a mechanism of the construction of international law.

1. The International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (resolution 2200 of 16 December 1966)

Its preamble resolves that

…the ideal of free human beings enjoying freedom from fear and want can only be achieved if conditions are created whereby everyone may enjoy his economic, social and cultural rights…

the obligation of States under the Charter of the United Nations to promote universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and freedoms

And article 1 establishes that all peoples exercise the right to free self-determination and of development

may freely dispose of their natural wealth and resources

Article 2 of this covenant provides that

Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to take steps with a view to achieving progressively the full realization of the rights recognized in the present Covenant by all appropriate means, including particularly the adoption of legislative measures.

The principles and the articles of this declaration, in general, make possible the construction of a likely theory of demilitarization and the end of military spending, as ensuring the survival and respect for human rights.

• The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (resolution 2220 of 16 December 1969)

A reasonable justification for war tax resistance could also equally be deduced from this, since (article 20) says that propaganda for war and its preparation should be prohibited by law.

• The Declaration on Social Progress and Development of the General Assembly of the U.N., Resolution 2542 of 11 December 1969

This recognizes

the urgency of devoting to works of peace and social progress resources being expended on armaments and wasted on conflict and destruction

And shows us that

• international peace and security on the one hand, and social progress and economic development on the other, are closely interdependent

Armies are found among the causes of the interruption in social progress and international cooperation, of which

• it is urgent to devote to works of peace and social progress resources being expended on armaments and wasted on armed conflicts

And for this

• the primary task of all states and international organizations is to eliminate from the life of society all evils and obstacles to social progress, particularly such evils as inequality, exploitation, war, colonialism, racism…

• The Declaration of Principles of International Cultural Cooperation (resolution of the General Assembly of UNESCO of 4 November 1966)

Recalling the above, this adds (Article Ⅳ) to the aims of international cultural cooperation:

2. to develop peaceful relations and friendship among the peoples

5. to raise the level of the spiritual and material life of man in all parts of the world.

And in Article Ⅶ

• In cultural cooperation, stress shall be laid on ideas and values conducive to the creation of a climate of friendship and peace…

• Declaration on the promotion among youth of the ideals of peace, mutual respect, and understanding between peoples (U.N., Resolution 2037 of 7 December 1975.

In the same line it reaffirms the central role of youth in the promotion of peace and the power that education can have in this on the ideals of peace and demilitarization.

In this regard we could reference other, more modern legal texts that speak of the relationship between military spending and an unjust international order, of the necessity of progress along the lines of demilitarization, of providing economic resources wasted on belligerence to the promotion of a new world order and to development, and to the role of societies in achieving these objectives. At the moment those specified will serve as a reference. In any case, we want to point out that the methodical pronouncements of various international instruments give notice of an international ethical and legal consensus about the need to drastically reduce military spending and to advance towards demilitarization.

And from my point of view these declared objectives are an important starting point in our proposal for war tax resistance, for the reason that far from situating ourselves on a metaphysical plane, we can proceed on the basis of these to discover globally shared ideas and to allow a dialog of new proposals.

In any case we must open in this paragraph the question of whether war tax resistance, consisting of the dissident refusal to participate in military spending that is performed with the object of appealing to the values of society and of mobilizing consciences to change the militaristic policies of the nations and to obtain higher levels of demilitarization, is conceivable as a human right or whether it is preferable to consider it as disobedience “in defense” of a human right.

Legal/political justifications of war tax resistance

From the legal/political viewpoint there are various arguments from which to justify this choice:

The purpose of the law is to build peace.

Any theory of law justifies it as a technique of guaranteeing peace, either because it aims to incorporate the essence of social justice, or to resolve social conflicts in a reasonable way, or because it offers an indubitable framework of collective security.

From this aim of the law, and making an analysis of society at the end of the century, it seems appropriate to say that the law should make participation as a normative instrument in social demilitarization one of its medium-term objectives

There are many scientific fields (economic, ecological, etc.) from which the necessity of demilitarization is obvious.

The law itself is questioned nowadays as strategies of conflict resolution which some theories have characterized as a “legal option for nonviolence” as a precondition of the future.

Human rights are incompatible with the arms race

This is a consideration that has legal significance of the first order, since the objective of the law is nothing less than to be the basis of a political structure that justifies the political communities themselves.

For this reason nations cannot legitimately impose burdens that hinder human rights, rather, they must remove obstacles to their full effectiveness.

War tax resistance forms a part, at least via prevention, of the human right of peace and a just and mutual world order

This is an argument that I consider sufficiently explained.

I consider that peace must not be left in the hands of politicians and of state interests, but that it must overrun this narrow border, incorporating mechanisms of “dissenting” participation from the communities themselves.

This ensures, in my opinion, a deepening of substantial peace beyond the panoply of declarations in use.

This treats this right as that of a peace directly enforceable by citizens, without the necessity of recognition or of a prior legislative development by the state.

The theory of sovereignty and the justification of disobedience

War tax resistance is a form of direct exercise of power on the part of the citizenry, when the law and the states, faced with the problems of militarism, show themselves incapable of solving them.

Logically, the exercise of civil disobedience is the possession and exercise of sovereignty by its owner and it forms part of the democratic culture in two senses:

1. Because it appeals to one’s society in order to provoke a debate and a real consensus on issues “sequestered” from public opinion and from participation (and decided by elites for the interests of a few).
2. Because it entails the exercise of a direct democracy that cannot be ignored by governments, on pain of being denied one of the basic conditions of a democratic structure.

War tax resistance therefore appears as a means of direct, democratic participation in tax policy.

War tax resistance considered as a form of democratic participation in the determination of defense policy

It is commonly considered that the right/duty of defense rests with all of society.

Based on the ideas of human rights, we must consider that defense consists of the defense of human rights.

To a great extent states deprive citizens of the right of defense since states do not permit citizens to chime in about what to defend, or the how and who, but citizens are used for the purposes of the military defense interests (as soldiers, as civilian resources, as contributors to military spending).

War tax resistance contributes to a definition of the right of defense of societies, and entails a positioning of these concerning:

1. The what of defense (human rights instead of militarism and the preparation for war)
2. The how of defense (cooperation, social spending, nonviolence, popular participation, instead of arms and military spending)
3. The who of defense (society, instead of the elite)

War tax resistance considered as an invocation of personal responsibility in the legal and political process that enriches the law

In this sense war resisters’ tax resistance in defense of a right to peace forms part of a principle of responsibility and of conscience that recovers a genuine sense of the right of conscientious objection.

We have made at another point in this paper a critique of the principle of the freedom of conscience as the ultimate foundation of war tax resistance inasmuch as it trivializes the genuine “war resister” sense of conscientious objection it could have in its more classical approach.

However, conscientious objection considered from a political understanding, and conscientiously disobedient with an aim of resisting war, adds significant content to the right itself that, one might say, “becomes sensitive to the convictions and precepts” in a pacifist sense.

On the other hand, the appeal to personal responsibility in complying with the law tells us that the majority of the political community does not “comply” with the external law out of fear or convenience (quite ugly motives in any case) but that it is able to respect the freedom to reject it from altruistic ideals of respect for others.

There is no duty to contribute to military spending, but only a legal obligation in a weak sense

By this we want to prevent the central argument of states concerning the contribution of everybody to the maintenance of armies.

They tell us that this is a duty, thereby confusing the matter, trying to “elevate” the strict meaning of the military contribution (a legal obligation) to the category of a duty, speaking of a duty to contribute that is based on two types of arguments:

1. the duty of everyone to contribute to defense
2. the duty of everyone to contribute to communal expenses

Such a strategy aims to justify military spending as unquestionable.

Certainly between duties and obligations there are basic differences that we must not lose sight of:

Because duties exist independently of the power that determines them or not.

Because duties affect everyone, at all times.

Because duties are based in a fundamental right.

Obligations, on the other hand, are determined by acts of power and before such acts occur they do not exist. Furthermore they affect certain classes of subjects, and, finally, they are not justified by principles and fundamental rights but by reasons of convenience or some such.

From our point of view the obligation to sustain military spending is a clear example of a legal tax obligation for the convenience of the few, but it cannot appeal to a right of defense (when the defense is defense of human rights) and certainly not by a means as antagonistic to these principles as is the preparation for war.

A duty to defense would be one thing, but another thing entirely is the obligation to military spending.

In turn, it does not appear that military spending has as its basis a fundamental right or a principal of solidarity or the like. It is important to note its lack of consistency with (and its antagonism to) such appeals.

So the lack of democratic justification for the maintenance of armies and the costly expense of preparation for war means that they cannot hold a candle to a higher principle like the authentic right to peace, which in a generic sense has a superior legal standing.

Invoking the duty of defense, this is precisely to say that people can perform war tax resistance, since war taxes represent a legal obligation that, unjustifiably, restricts political, social, and economic freedoms of peoples and impedes the defense of peace.

The comparison of the legal obligation to contribute to military spending with the human responsibility to exercise the right of peace demands that we raise the justification of tax resistance to the level of a duty.

Towards a legal characterization of war tax resistance

It remains to us now to attempt to respond to the choice between a human right or a defensive technique, to which we referred before.

The answer to this question is of relative significance, insomuch as in reality it is difficult to determine the border between one and the other aspect.

I think that we may speak in a conciliatory way of a disobedience that aims at legalization of substantial peace as a human right, but that in turn is treated as a right in itself (or as disobedience with a legal justification), albeit of a provisional nature.

This would then consider the existence of a human right to peace, within which tax resistance would be justified as an example of its exercise.

This perspective permits in turn not to speak of expanding the catalog of proclaimed human rights with such specific cases that it ends up reading more like case law than like a small set of bedrock principles.

War tax resistance will enjoy recognition as a right — not a human right as such, but as a manifestation of the right to substantial peace, compatible with the cast of human rights which this right touches (the right to life, etc.).

My preference for accenting “resistance to war” and disobedience as this option

I believe in principle that tax resistance is a certain form of resistance to established law, seeking further demilitarization, enmeshed in the form of legal prohibitions, that answers better to the character of a disobedience justified “in defense and in the name of a right to substantial peace.”

On the other hand, the fact that it is not a human right does not deprive it of a legal character, for “the law” is composed not only of “laws” and positive human rights, but also of principles, rules of conflict resolution among legal goods, legal and political decisions, etc.

In this sense, that there is no such human right does not imply that it has no participation in human rights, but simply requires a change in its positive statements.

War tax resistance in my opinion is a form of disobedience legitimated by the appeal to human rights, one that joins in their justifications a list of rights to which it intends to give voice:

• the right to life in a broad sense
• the right to peace and a just international order
• the right to solidarity and development
• the right to political participation
• the right/duty of defense
• the freedom of war resister ideology
• the right of contribution to the economic expenses of the people

It is a form of disobedience that has some support in proper human rights which, along with disobedience, aim to be effective against the threat of military spending, and it is perfectly justified from the point of view of the ends of the political community and from the principles of democratic participation since it seeks the fulfillment of the promises of democracy itself.

I understand war tax resistance to be a defense of the right to peace with two aspects:

1. in demilitarization strategy, that is, that which is set fundamentally on the aim of removing power from the military
2. in the construction of a peaceful alternative, which emphasizes not only removing power, but at the same time constructing a sort of cultural relations that is peaceful in the broadest sense

The legal legitimization of this disobedience has a wide scope for obvious reasons:

• because it invites popular participation and the incorporation “by contagion” of many people who are jealous or fearful of exercising their freedoms when they enter into conflict with power
• because it enriches the constitutional process of the people, incorporating ethical aims for peace into their decrees
• because it assumes a commitment to struggle for the respect of human rights and for basic necessities of communities, peoples, human beings, and life on the planet
• because it permits the reduction of the field of militarism by means of effective actions of noncollaboration with them

The legitimization of this disobedience, in time, can lead to the adoption by some nations of diverse, more-or-less demilitarizing legal norms, which might be peace taxes or others.

In this sense war tax resistance should not lower its guard, while disobedience “guarantees” the right to peace in this dual role already referenced:

• because it must be followed-up with some sort of disobedience (or if you prefer, of conscientious objection in the genuine war-resister sense) confronting chronic legislative intentions to merely rearrange militarism without permitting new demilitarizing advances (for example, significant reductions in the military budget or the reorganization of the military to be smaller and more efficient would not be sufficient, but instead we must continue working for complete disarmament)
• because it must continue deepening its alternative character and not allowing some substitution of military spending for any other expenses, instead choosing a more effective demilitarization and the building of an authentic peace (for example, it is not sufficient to replace the military budget with other budget items that encourage consumption, health, or charity, but such things should be sought in the more efficient use economic resources made possible by demilitarization, in the promotion of free NGOs of other peoples, in building peaceful international relations etc.)

In this sense it is outside of its scope to reduce war tax resistance to:

• a right of exemption, since it does not claim the exemption from paying of certain budget items, but rather aims for the disappearance of those items and their replacement by others profitable for peace
• a right of redirection, since it does not consider a claim to choose between military or civilian budget items, but rather the requirement to participate in the defense of peace and society, demanding the global dismantling of military spending and seeking the overcoming of defense policies that are based on the preparation for war

A human right to war tax resistance

While war tax resistance cannot be considered a human right in its own sense, it may merit an explicit mention in the declared catalog as part of the human right to peace.

In this sense, I consider that it is a provisional form (since the time of demilitarization has not arrived) that could appear as the legitimate expression of the objection to contribute to military taxes of all kinds.

In fact the complete elaboration of the right to peace could include a legitimate mention of tax resistance, in the form of something like a declaration that allows that those who submit their refusal to collaborate with military spending will be respected by the states in their objection, in order to sustain the states in their ongoing obligation to reduce their military spending by an annual percentage that involves war tax resistance, and requiring them to allocate the amount of the reduction to peaceful ends.

A mention of this sort would enshrine the legitimacy of tax resistance in the right to peace and would fix the limit of its admission: precisely the demilitarizing will, or what is the same, the political order of human rights.

To introduce the choice in conflict with this must be to reject such objection.

This tax resistance implies the non-interchangeability of taxes, which is to say, it does not mean substituting the challenged obligation with analogous others, but rather to withdraw support from militarism by means of the redirection of military spending on civilian expenses.

In this sense, the “peace tax” options incorporate a package of measures distinct from war tax resistance, ones that have their roots in the same sacred right to peace, but that in no case are interchangeable with it.

One peace tax strategy that would not be a mere replacement incorporates strategic possibilities from the position above for a peace movement, provided your purpose is not the mere rationalization of military forces.

But, we repeat once again, beyond peace taxes may be found a goal of war tax resistance as legitimate disobedience and as the exercise of a right to substantial peace.

Democracy Now! has a good piece on war tax resistance today featuring an interview with Ed Hedemann:

Something that stood out to me in the Hedemann interview was how well he articulates the civil-disobedient-protester point of view on tax resistance (see ♇ 9 January 2013 for my system of categorizing varieties of tax resisters).

Here are some of his comments about the Peace Tax Fund:

I think it would be better if such a Fund existed, but I wouldn’t participate in it, because… part of the reason why I refuse to pay is I want to be an irritant to the government. I want to make a protest that can’t be ignored. And I think that the government would use such a Fund, if it were to be formed, to shuttle away people who are noisy and people who are protesters and people who agitate. And I refuse to do that: I want to do a protest that the government has to pay attention to.

And here he responds to a question about tax resisters who suffer from government reprisals:

I think that’s the risk you take. But, to me, part of the issue is that the protest is as important as how much money is resisted. And I think that there are people who are war tax resisters that do have their salaries seized, but they continue to protest despite that because the point of refusing to pay — from my point of view — is protesting.

Hedemann was also interviewed for today’s RadioActivity show:

Here’s a quote on a similar theme from that interview:

Q: Do you report all this to the IRS?

Hedemann: Oh yes; absolutely. I mean, that’s one of the reasons I do this, is — not just for the sake of purity, because I don’t want to have my money sullied by war and military — but to make a statement, to make a point. I want the IRS to know. So I file my taxes, I include a letter explaining exactly what I’m doing and how much I owe and am not paying the IRS and that I’m giving the money away to other organizations — sometimes I even mention the other organizations, like the New York Times has a “Neediest Fund” [that] gives money to people who are poor, down-and-out, homeless — so I say “okay, I’m giving $1,000 to the New York Times ‘Neediest Fund’ — $1,000 of my tax dollars, instead of to the IRS, to this other fund.” And I tell them directly what I’m doing.

War tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 1978

There was hardly an issue of the Friends Journal in 1978 that did not at least mention war tax resistance, and some issues covered the topic in depth.

In the 15 January issue was an article by Scott Benarde about the Quaker community of Monteverde in Costa Rica. Excerpts:

In October of 1950, a year after the sentencing [of Marvin Rockwell for draft resistance], Rockwell and the small Quaker community of Fairhope made national news. In a short article, Time magazine mentioned that “for the first time in history a group of Quakers were planning to leave the U.S. because of their peace-loving convictions.” Seven Quaker families — including Marvin Rockwell and his parents — twenty-five or thirty people in all, had decided to move to the Central American Republic of Costa Rica.

Twenty-seven years later, Marvin Rockwell recounts why he left the U.S. and what has happened to him since settling 5,000 feet up in the steep, rugged mountains of Costa Rica.

“We had a growing dissatisfaction with what we in Fairhope thought was a military build-up, a wartime economy. We wanted to be free of paying taxes in a war economy,” Rockwell says in a soft, yet deliberate, voice. “When the judge sentenced us he said, ‘If you’re not willing to defend your country, you should get out.’ So we began to think seriously of that possibility.”

That issue also brought the news that Quaker Richard Catlett “has been indicted on criminal charges of willful failure to pay income tax for three years” (the indictment was actually for failure to file).

The 1 February issue — under the theme “Can the Government Cancel Conscience?” — had many mentions of war tax resistance. The opening article, by Ruth Kilpack, began:

Ten years ago, at the height of the Vietnam War, a Friend spoke directly to my condition at Philadelphia Yearly Meeting when he said, “Many of us support our sons’ conscientious objection to serving in the armed forces. But what about ourselves? Do those of us who are beyond draft age, or not otherwise subject to the draft, conscientiously object to giving our money for war?”

For me, this struck deep, as did the words, “Two things are needed to fight a war: warm bodies and cold cash.” For the first, the full flush of youth is required for combat. For the second, there is no age limit for those who must pay tax funds, over half of which are channeled directly into wars, past, present, and future. Everyone is involved. By the payment of taxes, all are required to support the “national defense,” or whatever the current euphemism is.

Kilpack’s article concerned the legal case of Robert Anthony, who was appealing his tax case on religious freedom grounds.

What Bob Anthony’s case was about that day was an effort to break the longstanding precedent set by the case of A.J. Muste, the great peace activist, who in 1961 had challenged the U.S. government in the matter of paying taxes for war. The court had then ruled that the income tax does not interfere with religious practice. Whatever attempts have been made since that time to break that precedent-and there have been many-have been thwarted, federal judges repeatedly refusing to examine the deep issues involved: the issues of rights of conscience and the First Amendment’s protection of religious belief.

As it turned out, according to Anthony, “the court came up with a complete backing of the government’s right to cancel conscience for the sake of the taxing system.”

The same issue reprinted excerpts from a letter that Media Monthly Meeting had sent to the court that was hearing the Anthony case, in which it said:

As a Meeting, we have consistently backed and encouraged [Anthony’s] position on military taxes. We believe that any citizen who on the basis of religion or conscience is opposed to paying for armaments or war should not be compelled by the tax laws to pay taxes for these purposes. Refusal to participate in any way in killing and warfare is a basic principle of the Quaker faith.

…Robert Anthony’s refusal of military taxes constitutes an essential and consistent implementation of Quaker religious principles.… We assert that the free exercise of the Quaker religion entails the avoidance of any participation in war or financial contribution to that part of the national budget used by the military.

In the same issue, Bruce & Ruth Graves wrote of how their war tax resistance had grown out of their conscientious objection to the draft.

[O]ur early married years were largely those of family and professions, years in which we were no longer pressured by government to form external written attestations of belief to satisfy the draft board. After all, we had done that. What else could just we two do to alter this evil? The pacifist ideas could safely rest — or could they? In retrospect, those beliefs that had been yanked forth from us by society, perhaps too early in our lives, needed more time to mature, to become integrated into our very beings.

Perhaps ten years of integration preceded our realization that a different and subtler written attestation of belief was being required of us by our society. This attestation was made not once, but every year and it was an attestation of beliefs we did not believe. It was a lie. It was our income tax return. We signed it every year, and thus gave money, without objection, to buy the tools of war, even though we did not believe in killing. It was subtle because it was money and did not look like death. But when you put them together, it is a contract.

…All of this occurred during a time when militarism increasingly permeated national policy. Here, then, we finally reached a point where the idea of our financing the arms race became unbearable. After all, warfare was becoming more automated, thus relying far more on the expenditure of tax money than on the conscription of lives. In fact, it now appears that conscientious objection itself may be tending toward irrelevance, unless the concept is expanded beyond the confines of the Selective Service system — especially for those over draft age.

At this point we changed our tax returns into something we could in conscience sign and our remittance checks into contracts for the Internal Revenue Service. Each year, the item “Foreign Tax Credit” and about fifty percent of our normal tax “due” was entered. Carrying that credit over to the first page as instructed, we showed each year on our signed returns a credit balance due us from the IRS. To reduce IRS profit from interest and penalty, we still paid tax “owed” as calculated normally, but our check required the IRS to promise to refund the war tax we claimed by their endorsement because of a restrictive clause we placed on the back of the check.

Rather than our refund, the IRS has usually sent a notice for us to sign, correcting our return. We have never signed these, because that means agreeing to the original war tax. Yet the IRS seems to need our agreement to resolve each case legally — that is, unless it should decide to initiate proceedings against us in U.S. Tax Court. That, in fact, happened to us in 1975 for tax year 1973.

From here, the Graveses write about their frustrations with the legal system, which seems eager to latch onto superficial technicalities to avoid having to face head-on the issue of whether the government can force people to violate such core tenets of conscience as “thou shalt not kill” via the tax system. They also express the need they feel for a stronger and more sustaining national war tax resistance organization:

At present, the community of war tax resistance appears to us to be a loosely-structured communications network of interpersonal contacts, newsletters, and small organizations perhaps not always widely known. Entrance to this network, we presume, is often gained through need for help by individuals who then grow, gain experience, and are later able to help other newcomers in their various situations. Whether they do help others or just gradually fade out of the network, however, is crucial to the power of the community. If we, ourselves, were to fade out as our own tax problems become less immediate, for example, the experience and knowledge we will have gained (even though far from complete) would be lost to the others. It would seem to be a sad waste to have this process repeated over and again for each member passing through the community.

There are a few organizations emphasizing war tax resistance (e.g., WTR, Peacemakers, etc.), from which a range of handbooks and information is available for individual action. Some may provide counseling: for example, we have recently learned that CCCO is in liaison currently with the Philadelphia Office of War Tax Resistance (WTR), thus affording the wider range of counseling needed by this more recent form of conscientious objection.

They added:

There are other courses of individual action besides variations on how to fill out a tax return. One such course is to reduce one’s income to a level of lower — or no — taxation. For some, this would mean a change in profession, or else a donation of one’s professional services to his or her current employer. If it is not desirable to put that kind of commitment into that particular employer’s pockets, one can give away up to fifty percent of taxable income to tax deductible organizations, thereby reaching three simultaneous objectives: a) continue one’s profession, b) support human interests of choice, and c) decrease war tax payments. Tax liability on interest income can also be reduced by buying tax-exempt bonds or shares in exempt bond funds. Both Individual Retirement Accounts and Deferred Tax Annuities (sometimes available through the employer) enable the postponement of income to retirement years, when, hopefully, the World Peace Tax Fund Act will have become law. This provides a reasonable chance for legally claiming the exemption on a part of current income, the exempted funds then being redirected to the WPTF Trust Fund for uses more closely aligned with human values.

Also in that issue was an update on the Richard Catlett case, in which he was charged with “willfully and knowingly failing to file income tax returns for the years of 1971, 1972, and 1973” — he in fact hadn’t filed since 1947.

The Brandywine Peace Community wrote in with “some fundamental questions of reality and responsibility” for Quaker taxpayers. The community ran an alternative fund “comprised of refused war taxes, personal savings, and group deposits, [that] makes interest-free loans to groups working for social change or providing change-oriented services. Thus, the alternative fund is a small-scale act of beating swords into plowshares and initiating our own peace conversion program.” Also:

In past January–April tax seasons, the Brandywine group and its supporters have been present at local IRS offices, presenting the option of war tax resistance, and posing the question, “H-bombs or Bread?” with peace tax counseling available.

The 15 March issue shared the story of John and Louise Runnings, who…

…have withheld payment of their income taxes since he became self-employed in 1973 in order, as they state, “to resolve the conflict between the spirit that dwells within and the violence implicit in surrendering our substance to the building of the war machine.” They have submitted a brief to this effect to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

The Runnings feel that since their action makes them answerable to “those Quakers whose light allows them to pay the federal tax,” they must plead their case before the Society of Friends as well as before the Federal Court. In doing so, they stress the fact that they share Friends’ testimonies against war but feel that these testimonies will be muted if they are not supported by actions which speak louder than words. They question how we can “speak truth to power” when so large a part of our income supports that power. They invite Friends to join them “in taking those uncomfortable actions which put us in conflict with the government rather than with the Spirit.”

That issue also brought the update that Robert Anthony’s appeal to the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals had been rejected. It also noted that, according to the Albuquerque Monthly Meeting’s newsletter, the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting and the AFSC were contributing to the legal expenses in the case.

At the March, 1978 Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, according to the Journal, “[a] minute on nonpayment of taxes for military purposes was adopted” — but not one that required much explanation, apparently.

A letter from Austin Wattles appeared in the 1 April issue in which he encouraged the Journal to continue to cover war tax resistance, saying that to him, “[t]he movement seems to be growing.” He told of the support he had received from Meetings in his area — specifically the Old Chatham (New York) Monthly Meeting and Worcester (Massachusetts) Meeting. He concluded:

[T]ax resistance can have its penalties. You don’t have money to send your kids to college if you change your profession in a way not to pay withholding tax. I think certainly one reason so few Friends have considered this witness is it can hurt one’s profession so seriously. It’s not only losing the wages, but Friends enjoy doing a good job where they are working and don’t know how else they can live.

I like Quakers very much. I’ve always been an active Friend. But I feel our being part of the world to the degree we are prevents us from following Christ if the price is too high.

Molly Arrison also had a letter in that issue, but she thought war tax resistance “to be a most unrealistic and disrupting idea” because it would lead to a slippery slope of every citizen withholding taxes for whatever items of government spending they disapproved of, leading to “50 million contingencies” that would overwhelm the government’s revenue system. She recommended that Quakers instead “orchestrate consistent barrages of phone calls, letters, and lectures until the general public has more influence than the Pentagon.”

David Scull considered this same argument in a letter in the 1 May issue:

We wish not to pay taxes for what we so strongly disapprove of. But there are those who equally strongly feel that government contributions to the United Nations, or government money to pay for abortions, violate their principles. It would not be difficult to compile a long list of purposes objected to; of course we say that our cause is a matter of high principle, but one person’s principle is another’s foible.

Is there some guideline which would make it easier to distinguish between two paramount obligations when they seem to be in conflict, one to support those purposes which our society has determined (no matter how imperfectly) to be for the common good, and the other to obey our consciences? It seems to me that this can best be judged by our willingness to make some tangible sacrifices on behalf of conscience.

Scull went on to say that this made him skeptical of the World Peace Tax Fund plan: “[I]f I understand it correctly, there is no personal sacrifice involved. It is just too easy to say to the government, ‘Please send my money where I want it to go instead of where you want it to go.’ ” He suggested improving the World Peace Tax Fund idea by “add[ing] the principle of personal sacrifice”:

Suppose I say, “Instead of $1000 which you say I owe you, here is $1100 as evidence of my sincerity; now will you allocate it in these ways? That is how much extra I am willing to pay for the privilege of having my money not go to pay for machines of war.”

The inclusion of such a sacrificial element in the WPTF program would make a great deal of difference in my own ability to argue for it, and I think it would make a very convincing argument as we work toward its widespread acceptability.

…When we ask to relieve our consciences because of the way our money is spent, we should be… willing to put a price tag on the privilege.

A letter-to-the-editor in response to Scull’s argument, from Bill Samuel, thought that while the personal-sacrifice angle “has some surface attractiveness…”

Put another way, the proposal amounts to a government tax on conscience, which is quite a different matter from a voluntary personal sacrifice. Not only is it morally questionable for the government “to put a price tag on” conscience, but some legal authorities believe it would constitute unconstitutional discrimination as well.

The World Peace Tax Fund bill would not be a special privilege. Rather, the WPTF bill is a practical means of implementing the rights of conscience guaranteed by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Like women, blacks and homosexuals, pacifists should take the position that we need not earn our rights but that they should be respected as a matter of course in a free and pluralistic society.

There is, of course, nothing wrong with the concept of people of conscience making a sacrifice for their deeply held beliefs. Rather than impose a ten percent tax on conscience, concerned Friends might send an amount equal to ten percent of their tax payment to the National Council for a World Peace Tax Fund…

Corporately, Friends can also act to support those working to secure the right of pacifists not to pay for war. One yearly meeting recently agreed to give $1,500 to the NCWPTF and several monthly meetings include the NCWPTF in their budgets. Mennonites and Brethren each give a full time volunteer service worker to the NCWPTF. While Friends do not have the kind of organized volunteer service effort that the other historic peace churches have, meetings can do their part by together contributing enough to support a full-time salaried worker.

Ross Roby also had some words to say about Scull’s argument against the World Peace Tax Fund plan. He first begged for “immediate self-sacrificial labor and giving, on behalf of passage of a WPTF bill” and then wrote:

I would like to remind those who, like David Scull, have “difficulty with the World Peace Tax Fund as presently offered,” that there is nothing sacred and immutable about the present wording. We can be quite certain that, when Congress takes a serious scrutiny of provisions for an alternative fund for C.O.s, much rewriting will be done. The final bill. when passed, may look very different from the WPTF bill as now published.

He suggested that conscientious objectors to military spending should “soft pedal” the arguments amongst themselves over the details of the WPTF plan and instead concentrate on trying to convince the government to enact “a change in the income tax laws that will allow ‘free exercise of religion’ and give us the opportunity to build institutions for nonviolent solutions to international conflict with our present war tax dollars.”

His advice seems to have been followed, and the current campaign for “peace tax fund” legislation seems to have become so unwilling to use critical judgment and so eager to pass legislation of any sort that it has ended up backing a bill that would do nothing to help people with genuine conscientious objection to supporting military spending, nothing to reduce the military budget, and indeed nothing to increase spending on nonviolent conflict resolution — and yet even this bill has gone nowhere in Congress. Such is the cost of “soft pedaling” internal debate.

John J. Runnings confronted Molly Arrison’s argument more head-on in the letters-to-the-editor column of the 1 September issue. Excerpt:

Our actions are determined by the degree of urgency we feel. When our house is on fire we may exit by way of an upstairs window rather than by the conventional route via the stairs. Many of us see the arms race as a fire out of control, and we are so adverse to feeding the flames that we are prepared to suffer considerable discomfort rather than do so.

So we break the law and are prepared to suffer the penalty.…

To break the law openly and expose oneself to the wrath of the power structure is to witness to the urgency and depth of one’s convictions.…

The early Quakers started at the places that Molly suggests, in the heart and in the community, but they went further. They broke the law. And they got themselves hanged and imprisoned; and they were heard above the contending clamors of their day. And when the Constitution was written it contained provisions for freedom of religion and freedom of speech.

Modern Quakers continue, as of old, to work from the heart and in the community, but if we are to outshout the Pentagon we will have to use a louder and more urgent voice than we have used heretofore. Perhaps more and more and more of us will have to break the law.

Franklin Zahn also responded to Arrison’s slippery-slope argument: “In practice, the portion of federal income tax for the military is far greater than for any other item. Currently thirty-six percent goes for present costs and another estimated seventeen percent for past wars. Objectors to smaller items would not find withholding worth the bother… [W]ords alone eventually lose all effect if no one ever acts. But if a few other than war objectors choose to refuse, I see no objection to their doing so.”

Sally Primm interviewed Lucy Perkins Carner for the 15 May issue. Among other topics, Carner addressed her war tax resistance:

[Q:] “Did you ever consider not paying part of your tax?”

[A:] “Oh yes, for years I’ve taken out of my income tax payment a portion that the Friends Committee on National Legislation says is equal to what the Pentagon gets. Then I write a letter to the income tax people. It’s good propaganda. I send copies to my representatives in Congress and the President.

“I know my failure to pay isn’t going to impoverish the Pentagon, but it’s good propaganda. They go to your bank and get the money. I send them a copy of the letter, too. Some people have refused to give them the information and go to jail as a result, but I’m not heroic. They get it out of my bank every year.

“The bank has a right to charge for that, a service charge. Well, in the last few years, believe it or not, I’ve received a letter from the bank saying they won’t make the charge any more.[”]

[Q:] “Why did they say that?”

[A:] “Well, that just shows you what good propaganda will do. They know why I’m doing it.”

[Q:] “And how long have you done this?”

[A:] “I don’t know; when I became a pacifist, whenever that was [around the end of World War Ⅰ, according to another part of the article —♇]. I don’t even know when the income tax started.”

The 15 June issue covered the “New Call to Peacemaking” in which representatives from the three historic “peace churches” (Quakers, Mennonites, and Brethren) got together to try to put some oomph behind their peacebuilding efforts. There was actually less about war tax resistance in this article than in much of the mainstream media coverage of the Call — perhaps because the civil disobedience angle was thought to be more newsworthy or attention-catching. Here is where taxes were mentioned in the Friends Journal coverage:

The Friends Committee on National Legislation points out that all the federal income taxes withheld from your paycheck from January 1 to June 23 go for military purposes. Not until June 24 do you begin to support any other part of the budget.

Especially in recent years — in light of increasing military budgets and the trend toward fewer soldiers and more expensive weapons systems — many conscientious objectors have chosen to witness against war by refusal to pay voluntarily those federal taxes that will be used to fund present, past, and future wars. Some have done this by lowering their income below the taxable level; others who owe taxes have refused to pay the portion that would go for the military.

In the same issue, Robert C. Johansen wrote about the challenge of putting forward a pacifist alternative to mainstream political thinking. In the course of that, he wrote:

Even though their goals are radical in the sense of seeking fundamental system change, political moderates will feel most comfortable using conventional means of education, consciousness-raising, lobbying, campaigning, organizing, and personal witness. Those people who have tried such means and found them weak and insufficiently penetrating politically will search for other actions, such as tax resistance and civil disobedience, that convey a seriousness and urgency more equivalent to the threat of planetary militarization.

Maynard Shelly gave the Mennonite perspective in the wake of the New Call conference, and claimed that “[r]esistance to the payment of war taxes is becoming the witness of choice for a growing number of Mennonites.”

Charles C. Walker wrote in to the 1 September issue to suggest a token $1 resistance to the Pennsylvania state income tax as a way of protesting against its anticipated adoption of capital punishment.

The 1 November issue noted in its calendar that the Media Pennsylvania Friends Meetinghouse would be hosting a “National Military Tax Resistance Workshop” that would be “[i]ntroducing the program and services of the newly organized Center on Law and Pacifism.”

War tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 1979

War tax resistance was a frequent topic in the issues of Friends Journal in 1979, though there was still no consensus about how to go about it, and there was a lot of hesitance among Quaker institutions about how strongly to endorse it.

The 15 February issue was another special issue devoted to the peace testimony, which might as well have been a special issue on war tax resistance for how frequently it was mentioned. Clearly by this time, there was no talking about peace work without talking about war tax resistance.

Editor Ruth Kilpack opened the issue. She noted:

I see the billions of dollars (including taxes from my own earnings) being poured into the “defense” budget. I hear of vastly increased crime and see the wanton waste everywhere, much of it the direct legacy of our last war; I remember the lives still festering in military hospitals, the suffering from the wounds of war both here and across the world.

But now, there is a handful of people who are beginning to take a new view of war and war-making, realizing that it takes place not only when the bombing and shelling begin, but in the will of the people who make — or allow — it to happen. War-making must be paid for. As it is said elsewhere in this issue, “we pray for peace, but we pay for war.” When we once understand that, great change will come about. And especially, as war becomes more and more impersonal, with computerized strategic commands and weapons, more people are increasingly going to ask, “Who is waging this war? Are we ourselves responsible, since we pay for it?” (As the old saying goes, “Your checkbook shows where your heart is.”)

Take Richard Catlett, for example, a Friend who — as I write at this very moment in early January — is beginning his jail sentence of two months at the Kansas City Municipal Rehabilitation Institute (for first offenders) in Kansas City, Missouri. That will be followed by three years of probation. Richard Catlett has been an antiwar activist since 1947, refusing to file his income tax return since that time. In 1976, his health food store was closed for non-payment of taxes (it is now under his wife’s ownership), and now, at sixty-nine years of age, Richard Catlett is treated as a criminal.

Clearly, he is being held up as an example of what can happen to a trouble-maker who dares to go against the tax law.… Richard Catlett’s age gives added emphasis to the warning to those no longer young and foolhardy. (Besides, the pockets of those in his age bracket are usually better filled, and not to be overlooked by IRS.)

Catlett’s case was covered in more depth later on in the same issue by means of lengthy quotes from a Colombia Missourian article (see “Local war protester leaves for jail term” in ♇ 5 January 2013) and the following section from a Wall Street Journal article:

Tax Report

A protester got loads of publicity that drew criminal charges for nonfiling.

The IRS selects tax protesters for criminal prosecution based on the amount of publicity they get. Usually protesters who don’t seek the spotlight are pursued by civil actions; criminal is reserved for the publicity hound. Richard Ralston Catlett is a notorious war and tax protester. The sixty-eight-year-old Columbia, Missouri, health food store owner argued that criminal charges of failing to file returns should be dropped because the IRS was guilty of “selective prosecution.”

The government is barred from selecting people to prosecute on grounds of race, religion or the exercise of free speech, or other “impermissible grounds.” Catlett claimed that basing a criminal prosecution on publicity isn’t permitted. But an appeals court disagreed. His exercise of free speech wasn’t involved here, the court noted. The IRS seeks criminal prosecution against publicized protesters to promote compliance with tax laws, the court observed.

“The government is entitled to select those cases for prosecution which it believes will promote compliance,” the court declared.

Next, John K. Stoner wrote a strong, challenging essay inspired by William James’s The Moral Equivalent of War titled “The Moral Equivalent of Disarmament.” Excerpts:

For some decades now we have been hearing the Church call on governments to take steps toward disarmament. And it would be difficult to think of a thing more urgent or more appropriate for churches to say to governments. It is hardly necessary here to give another recitation of the monstrous and unconscionable dimensions of the world arms race, culminating in the ever-growing stockpiles of nuclear weapons and the refinement of systems to deliver their carnage. The Church has done part of its duty when it has said that this is wrong.

But the time has come to say that the good words of the Church have not been, and are not, enough. The risks, the disciplines, the sacrifices, and the steps in good faith which the Church has asked of governments in the task of disarmament must now be asked of the Church in the obligation of war tax resistance. It is, at the root, a simple question of integrity. We are praying for peace and paying for war. Setting euphemisms aside, the billions of dollars conscripted by governments for military spending are war taxes, and Christians are paying these taxes. Our bluff has been called.

In all candor it must be suggested that the storm of objection which arises in the Church at this idea borrows its thunder and lightning from the premiers, the presidents, the ambassadors, and the generals who make their arguments against disarmament. War tax resistance will be called irresponsible, anarchist, unrealistic, suicidal, masochistic, naive, futile, negative and crazy. But when the dust has settled, it will stand as the deceptively simple and painfully obvious Christian response to the world arms race. A score or a hundred other good responses may be added to it. We in the Church may rightly be called upon to do more than this, but we should not be expected to do less.

Let the Church take upon itself the risks of war tax resistance. For church councils to take the position that the arms race is wrong for governments and not to commit themselves and call upon their members to cease and desist from paying for the arms race is patently inconsistent. This is probably a fundamental reason why the Church’s pleas for disarmament have met with so little positive response. Not even governments can have high regard for people who say one thing and do another. If governments today are confronted with the question whether they will continue the arms race, churches are confronted with the question whether they will continue to pay for it. As specialists in the matter of stewardship of the Earth’s resources they have contributed precious little to the most urgent stewardship issue of the twentieth century if they go on paying for the arms race. How much longer can the. Church continue quoting to the government its carefully researched figures on military expenditures and social needs and then, apparently without embarrassment, go on serving up the dollars that fund the berserk priorities? The arms race would fall flat on its face tomorrow if all of the Christians who lament it would stop paying for it.

It is not, of course, simple to stop paying for the arms race as a citizen of the United States, or anywhere else for that matter. If you refuse to pay the portion of your income tax attributable to military spending, the government levies your bank account or wages and extracts the money that way. If your income tax is withheld by your employer, you must devise some means to reduce that withholding, such as claiming a war tax deduction or extra dependents. If, as an employer, you do not withhold an employee’s war taxes, you will find yourself in court, as has recently happened to the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors. All of these actions are at some point punishable by fines or imprisonment, and none — in the final analysis — actually prevents the government from getting the money. Nevertheless, it must be said that the Church has not tried tax resistance and found it ineffective; it has rather found it difficult and left it untried.

The Church has considered the risk too great. Individuals fear social pressure, business losses, and government reprisals. Congregations, synods, and church agencies equivocate over their role in collecting war taxes. There is the risk of an undesirable response — contributions may drop off, tax-exempt status may be lost, officers may go to jail. To oppose the vast power of the state by a deliberate act of civil disobedience is not a decision to be made lightly (an unnecessary observation, since there are no signs that Christians or the Church in the United States are about to do this lightly).

It would be inaccurate to give the impression that Christians, individually, and the Church, corporately, in the U.S. have done nothing about war tax resistance. There have been notable, even heroic, exceptions to the general manifest lethargy. The war tax resistance case of an individual Quaker was recently appealed on First Amendment grounds to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the court refused to consider it. A North American conference of the Mennonite Church is grappling with the question of its role in withholding war taxes from the wages of employees. Among Brethren, Friends and Mennonites — sometimes called the Historic Peace Churches — there is a rising tide of concern about war taxes. The Catholic Worker Movement and other prophetic voices in various denominations have long advocated war tax resistance, but they have truly been voices crying in the wilderness. For all our concern about the arms race, we in the churches have done very little to resist paying for it. That has seemed too risky.

But then, of course, disarmament also involves risks. Could there be a moral equivalent of disarmament that did not involve risk? In this matter of the world arms race, it is not a question of who can guarantee the desired result, but of who will take the risk for peace.

Let the Church take upon itself the discipline of war tax resistance. Discipline is not a popular word today, but it should be amenable to rehabilitation at least among Christians, who call themselves disciples of Jesus. How quickly does the search for a way turn into the search for an easy way! And how readily do we lay upon others those tasks which require a discipline we are not prepared to accept ourselves!

War tax resistance will involve the discipline of interpreting the Scripture and listening to the Spirit. In a day when the Bible is most noteworthy for the extent to which it is ignored in the Church, it is an anomaly to see the pious rush to Scripture and the joining of ranks behind Romans 13, when the question of tax resistance is raised. In a day when the authority of the Church is disobeyed everywhere with impunity, it is a curiosity to see Christians zealous for the authority of the state. In a day when giving to the Church is the last consideration in family budgeting, and impulse rules over law, it is a shock to observe the fanaticism with which Christians insist that Caesar must be given every cent he wants. As the Church has grown in its discernment of what the Bible teaches about slavery and the role of women, so it must grow in its discernment of what the Bible teaches about the place and authority of governments and the payment of taxes.

War tax resistance means accepting the discipline of submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ in the nitty-gritty of history. Call it civil disobedience if you wish, but recognize that in reality it is divine obedience. It is a matter of yielding to a higher sovereignty. Those who speak for a global world order to promote justice in today’s world invite nations to yield some of their sovereignty to the higher interests of the whole, and those persons know the obstinacy of nations toward that idea. It may be that the greatest service the Church can do the world today is to raise a clear sign to nation-states that they are not sovereign. War tax resistance might just be a cloud the size of a person’s hand announcing to the nations that the reign of God is coming near. It is clear that Christians will not rise to this challenge without accepting difficult and largely unfamiliar disciplines.

But then, of course, disarmament also involves disciplines. The idea that one nation can take initiatives to limit its war-making capacities is shocking. To do so would represent a radical break with conventional wisdom. How is it possible to do that without first convincing all the nations that it is a good idea?

Let the Church take upon itself the sacrifices of war tax resistance. It is never altogether clear to me whether Christians who oppose war tax resistance find it too easy a course of action, or too difficult. It is said that refusing to send the tax to IRS and allowing it to be collected by a bank levy is too easy — a convenient way of deceiving oneself into thinking that one has done something about the arms race. And it is said that to refuse to pay the tax is too difficult. It is to disobey the government and thereby to bring down upon one’s head the whole wrath of the state, society, family, business associates, and probably God as well. Moreover, the same person will say both things. Which does he or she believe? In most cases, I think, the second.

The sacrifices involved in war tax resistance are fairly obvious. They may be as small as accepting the scorn which is heaped upon one for using the term “war tax” when the government doesn’t identify any tax as a war tax, or as great as serving time in prison. It may be the sacrifice of income or another method of removing oneself from income tax liability. It can be said with some certainty that the sacrifices will increase as the number of war tax resisters increases, because the government will make reprisals against those who challenge its rush to Armageddon. Yet, there is the possibility that the government will get the message and change its spending priorities or provide a legislative alternative for war tax objectors, or both. In any case, for the foreseeable future, war tax resistance will be an action that is taken at some cost to the individual or the Church institution, with no assured compensation except the knowledge that it is the right thing to do.

But then, of course, disarmament also involves sacrifices. The temporary loss of jobs, the fear of weakened defenses, and the scorn of the mighty are not easy hurdles to cross. A moral equivalent will have to involve some sacrifices.

Let the Church take upon itself the action of war tax resistance. The call of Christ is a call to action. It is plain enough that the world cannot afford $400 billion per year for military expenditures, even if this were somehow morally defensible. It is plain enough that the dollars which Christians give to the arms race are not available to do Christ’s work of peace and justice. In these circumstances the first step in a positive direction is to withhold money from the military. If we say that we must wait for this until everybody and (and particularly the government) thinks it is a good idea, then we shall wait forever.

Having withheld the money, the Church must apply it to the works of peace. What this means is not altogether obvious at present, but there is reason to believe that a faithful Church can serve as steward for these resources as wisely as generals and presidents. The dynamic interaction between individual Christians and the Church in its local and ecumenical forms will help to guide the use of resources withheld from the arms race.

This is a call to individual Christians and the Church corporately to make war tax resistance the fundamental expression of their condemnation of the world arms race. Neither the individual nor the corporate body dare hide any longer behind the inaction of the other. The stakes are too high and the choice is too clear for that, though we can have no illusions that this call will be readily embraced nor easily implemented by the Church.

But then, of course, we do not think that disarmament will be an easy step for governments to take either. The Church has an obligation to act upon what it advocates, to deliver a moral equivalent of the disarmament it proposes. If effectiveness is the criterion, it is certainly not obvious that talking about the macro accomplishes more than acting upon the micro. A single action taken is worth more than a hundred merely discussed. (When it comes to heating your home in winter, you will get more help from one friend who saws up a log than from a whole school of mathematicians who calculate the BTUs in a forest.) To talk about a worthy goal is no more laudable than to take the first step toward it, and might be less so.

Michael Miller wrote an article for the same issue that noted that the National Guard is a U.S. military combat function that is largely paid for out of state budgets, not the federal budget. He concluded:

I am now more fully aware how the military affects our daily lives and activities. I also realize that not only is the objection to payment of war taxes a federal issue, but it is also a very real state issue. State budgets contain rather large amounts in this respect.

As Friends, we must be constantly aware of the issues involved with our tax dollars. The military has a great influence over our lives and our tax dollars, whether or not we recognize it. We have a responsibility to make ourselves aware of the issues and how they influence our lives.

Alan Eccleston contributed an article on war tax resistance as a method of testifying for peace — aligning ones life with ones values. This, he felt, could be done in a variety of ways:

We do not have to be prepared for jail to be a war tax resister. We do not have to be ready, at this moment, to subject ourselves to harassment by the Internal Revenue Service. We do, however, have to be truthful on our tax returns. We do have to be clear about our belief in the peace testimony and our desire to align our lives with this belief. And that is all!

If you are clear about that, you can withhold some amount of your tax. It can be a token amount, if that is where you are, say five dollars or fifty dollars. Or it can be the same percent of your tax as the military portion of the current budget, currently thirty-six percent excluding past debt and veterans benefits. (An easy way to do this is to insert the amount under “Credits” as a “Quaker Peace Witness,” line forty-six. Alternately, some people declare an extra deduction, but this is more complicated, since the deduction must be substantially larger than the amount you desire to withhold.) It may bother you that three times or even ten times what you have chosen to withhold is going to be spent for war preparations. But far better to take this small step than to turn away from the witness. Write your congresspersons and tell them of your concern. Urge them to pass the World Peace Tax Fund which would acknowledge your constitutional right to practice your religious beliefs without harassment and penalty.

Alternatively, if the government owes you money fill out the (very short) Form #843 “Request for Refund,” asking that they refund the amount you wish for peace witness.

One can also anticipate the withholding problem by filling out a W-4 Form at your place of employment declaring (truthfully) an allowance for expected deductions that includes the amount of your peace witness.

Then what? You can expect a series of computer notices stating that you calculated your tax incorrectly and you owe the amount shown on the notice. This may also include an addition of seven percent annual interest on the amount owed. (Currently IRS seems not to be adding on penalty charges but that is a possibility.)

You have a choice: you can ignore the notice; you can write or call IRS and discuss it; or you can pay the tax. Sooner or later you will receive a printout that says “Final Notice.” If you again fail to pay the amount owed, you will probably receive a call from someone at IRS who will try to convince you that the whole process has gone far enough and that your purpose is better served by paying the government. IRS wants to collect. That is their job; when they have done it, they are through with you. They cannot, by law, be harsh or punitive. There is no debtors’ prison in this country. If you declare the intent of your witness on your tax form and by letter to Congress, you cannot be convicted of fraud; therefore, you are not risking criminal penalties.

In other words, the tax resister controls the process. One can witness to peace so long as it can be done lovingly and, if it is to be a meaningful witness of peace, that is the only way it can be done.

However, if one’s family obligations or other matters are too pressing, or if one’s spiritual resources are being unduly strained, it is time to lay down this particular witness. One can carry on the witness and still bring the process to a conclusion by letting the payment be taken from a bank account or peace escrow fund. Another round of letters to Congress and the president will testify to your continuing concern even after the pressure of collection has been relieved.

In your witness, no matter how small the amount withheld or how short the duration, you will gain strength and courage and insight. This brings new resources to your next witness. It gives you knowledge and resources to share with others, which in turn helps their witness. In sharing, you both are strengthened. Thus, a personal witness becomes a “community of witness,” and the “community of witness” gains strength, courage, and insight in its mutual sharing. This witness and this sharing of Christian love becomes its own witness to the testimony of peace — the testimony of love for God, for ourselves, for humankind.

(A letter from Dorothy Ann Ware in a later issue credited the Eccleston article for spurring her to “make a token Quaker Peace Witness by withholding a very small portion of my income tax. So Step One has been taken…”)

The same issue reprinted a Minute from the March 1978 Philadelphia Yearly Meeting which encouraged Quakers “to give prayerful consideration… to the option of refusal of taxes for military purposes.” Furthermore:

We reaffirm the Minute of the 1970 yearly meeting which states in part that “…Refusal to pay the military portion of taxes is an honorable testimony, fully in keeping with the history and practices of Friends… We warmly approve of people following their conscience, and openly approve civil disobedience in this matter under Divine compulsion. We ask all to consider carefully the implications of paying taxes that relate to war-making… Specifically, we offer encouragement and support to people caught up in the problem of seizure, and of payment against their will.”

We request the Representative Meeting to arrange for the guidance of meetings and their members on the form of military tax resistance suitable for individuals in accordance with that degree of risk appropriate to individual circumstances, for advice on consequences, and for consideration of legal and support facilities that may be organized.

We also request Representative Meeting to provide for an Alternate Fund for sufferings, set up under the yearly meeting to receive tax payments refused, for those tax refusers who may wish to utilize this fund.

We recommend cooperation with the Historic Peace Churches and other religious groups in further consideration of non-payment on religious grounds of military taxes.

Following that, John E. Runnings wrote of his and his wife Louise’s war tax resistance, and decried the injustice of a “society that requires that Quakers, who renounce war and recognize no enemies, must pay as large a contribution to the support of the war machine as those who fully accept the malicious nature of other nationals and who are so frightened of their ill intent that no amount of extermination equipment is enough to assure security.”

The social reforms that we credit to George Fox’s influence did not come about by his waiting on the Spirit but rather by his responding to the Spirit. If just one man could accomplish so much by responding to the Spirit, what would happen if several thousand modern Quakers were to respond to their spiritually-inspired revulsion to assisting in the building of the war machine?

If Quakers could be induced to discard their excuses for their financial support of the arms race and to withhold their Federal taxes, who knows how many thousands of like-minded people might be encouraged to follow suit? And who knows but what this might bring a halt to the mad race to oblivion?

There was a brief update about Robert Anthony’s case. Anthony hoped to use his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination (presumably in response to a government request for financial records or something of the sort). The judge in the case asked if the government would grant Anthony immunity from prosecution for anything he disclosed, which would have cut off the Fifth Amendment avenue of resistance, but the government wasn’t prepared to do that, and that’s where the matter stood.

The 1 May issue included a notice that the Center on Law and Pacifism had “recently published a military tax refusal guide for radical religious pacifists entitled ‘People Pay for Peace’ ” but also noted that “the Center states that it is in ‘urgent and immediate need of operating funds.’ ”

A later issue gave some more information about the Center:

The Center was started after a former Washington constitutional lawyer and theologian, Bill Durland, met a handful of conscientious objectors who were appealing to the U.S. courts for their constitutional rights to deny income tax payments for the military.…

That was in 1978. The Center is now producing regular newsletters and has published a handbook on military tax refusal. It has organized war-tax workshops for pacifists representing constituencies in the Northeast, South and Midwest. One of its projects was the “People Pay for Peace” scheme, under which it was suggested that each individual deduct $2.40 from his/her income tax return to “spend for peace”: that sum being the per capita equivalent of the $193,000,000,000 which will be consumed in fiscal 1979 for war preparation in the United States. This was a protest action against the fifty-three percent of the U.S. budget allocated to military purposes.

The Center on Law and Pacifism is a “do-it-yourself cooperative” which relies on both volunteer professional assistance and individual contributions.

Hmmm… my calculation for 53% of the federal budget in 1979 is more like $214,618,730,000… and per-capita (by U.S. population, anyway) that would be $953.63 per person. If you use the $193 billion value, that’s still $857.57 per person. Even if you use world population, you still get $44.08–$49.02 each. Somebody’s confused… maybe it’s me.

Wendal Bull penned a letter-to-the-editor in the same issue about his experience as a war tax resister twenty years before. Excerpt:

In 1959 I received a lump sum payment of an overdue debt. This increased my income, which I normally keep below the taxable level, to a point quite some above that level. I distributed the unexpected income to various anti-war organizations. I anticipated pressure from IRS officers, so in the autumn, long before the tax would be due, I disposed of all my attachable properties. This action, under the circumstances, I believe to be unlawful. But it seemed to me a mere technicality, far outweighed by the sin of paying for war, or the sin of permitting collection of the tax for that purpose. After disposing of all attachable properties, I wrote to IRS telling them I had taxable income in that year but chose not to calculate the amount of it because I had no intention of paying it. In the same letter I explained my reasons for conscientious non-cooperation with Uncle Sam’s preparations for war in the name of “defense.”

My letter appeared in full or in generous excerpts in at least three daily papers and several other publications and I mailed copies to friends who might be interested. I am not a publicity hound nor a notorious war resister. The publicity did seem to effect a fairly prompt visit from the Revenue Boys. They paid me three or four visits. On one occasion two men came; one talked, the other may have had a concealed tape recorder, or was merely to witness and confirm the conversation. After quizzing me for an hour or more they left courteously, whereupon I said I was sorry to be a bother to them. At that the talker said, “You’re no trouble at all. I brought a warrant for your arrest, but I’m not going to serve it. It’s the guys who hire lawyers to fight us that give us trouble.” If they had caught me in a lie, or giving inconsistent answers to their probing questions, I suspect the summons would have been served. I was fully prepared to go to court and to be declared guilty of contempt for not producing records to show the sources of my income. I had told the men I was in contempt of the entire war machine and all officers of the legal machinery who aimed to penalize citizens for non-cooperation with war preparations.

Later came two visits from a man who attempted to assess my income for that year, and the law required him to try to get my signature to his assessment. I considered that a ridiculous waste of taxpayer’s money. The man agreed with a smile. Still later, there came several bills, one at a time, for the amount of the official assessment, plus interest, plus delinquency fee, plus warnings that the bill should be paid. These I ignored, of course. The head men knew I would not pay; and they knew they had not any intention of trying to force collection.

I have no idea who decided to quit sending me more bills. I think the claim is still valid since the statute of limitations does not apply to federal taxes.

It is inconvenient to have no checking account, to own no real estate, to drive an old jalopy not worth attaching, and so on. Some of us choose this alternative rather than to let the money be collected by distraint.

In the same issue, Keith Tingle shared his letter to the IRS, which he sent along with his tax return and a payment that was 33% short. He stressed that he didn’t mind paying taxes — “a small price for the tremendous privilege of living in the United States with its heritage of freedom, equal protection, and toleration” — but that “I do not wish my labor and my money to finance either war or military preparedness.”

Stephen M. Gulick also wrote in. “Because the military and the corporations need our money more than our bodies, war tax resistance becomes important — in all its forms from outright and total resistance to living on an income below the taxable level,” he wrote. “Fundamentally, war tax resistance must lead us to look not only at warmaking and the preparation for war, but also at the economic, social, and political practices that, with the help of our money, nurture the roots of war.”

Colin Bell attended the May 1979 Southern Appalachian Yearly Meeting:

“I think,” Colin said, “that as a Society we are standing at another moment like that, when our forebears took an absolutely unequivocal stance” and we don’t know what to do. Are we looking for something easy, he wondered, suggesting that it probably should be tax resistance. Accepting the title Historic Peace Church, he declared, makes it sound like a worthy option, rather than it being at the entire heart and core of Christendom.

A letter to the editor of the Peacemaker magazine from John Schuchardt is quoted in the 15 June issue:

I have recently received threatening letters from a terrorist group which asks that I contribute money for construction of dangerous weapons. This group makes certain claims which in the past led me to send thousands of dollars to pay for its militaristic programs. The group claimed: 1) It was concerned with peace and freedom; 2) It would provide protection for me and my family; 3) It was my duty to make these payments; and 4) I was free from personal responsibility for how this money was spent in individual cases.

Last year, for the first time, I realized that these claims were fraudulent and I refused to make further payments…

That issue also noted that the Albany, New York, Meeting “joined the growing number of meetings which are calling on their members to ‘seriously consider’ war tax resistance…” That Meeting was also considering establishing its own alternative fund, and was hoping Congress would pass the World Peace Tax Fund bill.

This “seriously consider” language, along with the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting’s earlier-mentioned call for Quakers “to give prayerful consideration” to war tax resistance, is a far cry from the sort of bold leadership John K. Stoner was calling for. But then again, Quaker Meetings were no longer the sorts of institutions to bandy about Books of Discipline and threaten “disorderly walkers” with disownment, or even to give them “tender dealing and advice in order to their convincement.” Meetings had in general become much more humble about what sort of direction they should provide and what sort of obedience they could expect. It is hard to imagine a Meeting from this period adopting a commandment along the lines of the Ohio Yearly Meeting’s 1819 discipline — “a tax levied for the purchasing of drums, colors, or for other warlike uses, cannot be paid consistently with our Christian testimony.”

The 1 September issue included a review of Donald Kaufman’s The Tax Dilemma: Praying For Peace, Paying for War, a book that defends war tax resistance from a Christian and Biblical perspective. “What is the individual’s responsibility in the face of biblical teachings and the history of tax resistance since the early Christian centuries? Some biblical passages have been used to justify the payment of any and all taxes. But Kaufman warns us to consider these passages in their historical context and in the light of the primary New Testament message: love for God, oneself, one’s neighbor, and one’s enemy.”

That issue also included an obituary notice for Ashton Bryan Jones that noted “[h]is courage in the face of the harsh treatment that he endured in the struggle for social justice and against war taxes…”

The 15 December issue reported on the New England Yearly Meeting, which held a workshop on war tax resistance, and also agreed to establish a “New England Yearly Meeting Peace Tax Fund.”

Recognizing that each of us must find our own way in this matter, the new fund is seen not as a general call to Friends to resist paying war taxes but specifically to help and to hold in the Light those Friends who are moved to do so. The fund will be administered by the Committee on Sufferings, which came into being last year to support Friends who are devoting a major portion of their time and energies to work for peace.

New Call to Peacemaking

The “New Call to Peacemaking” brought together representatives of the Mennonites, Brethren, and Quakers in 1976, 1977 and 1978 to try to strengthen their respective churches’ anti-war stands. It continued to ripple through the pages of the Journal in 1979. Barbara Reynolds covered the Green Lake conference that drafted the New Call statement in the 1 January issue. Among her observations:

In my own small group, I saw social action Friends struggling with Biblical language and coming to accept many scriptural passages as valid expressions of their own convictions. And I saw a respected Mennonite, a longtime exponent of total Biblical nonresistance, courageously re-examining his position and corning out strongly in favor of a group statement encouraging non-payment of war taxes.

Elaine J. Crauder gave another report on the project in the 1 November issue. Excerpts:

Quakers, Mennonites and Brethren are known as the Historic Peace Churches. How do they witness against evil and do good? Where does God fit into their witnessing? Are they responding to the urgency of the present-day world situation, or are they truly “historic” peace churches, with no relevance to today’s complex world?

The New Call to Peacemaking (NCP) developed out of exactly these concerns: Where is the relevance and what is the source of our witnessing? The answers were clear. To seek God’s truth and to witness, in a loving way, by doing good (through peace education, cooperation in personal and professional relationships, living simply and investing only in clearly life-enhancing endeavors) and by resisting evil (working for disarmament and peace conversion, resisting war taxes and military conscription).

Crauder says she first started thinking about her support of war through her taxes in 1978:

The 1040 Income Tax form didn’t have a space for war tax resisters. Either I would have to lie about having dependents, or my taxes would be withheld. l didn’t feel that I had a choice. It did not occur to me to claim a dependent and then support that person with the funds that thus wouldn’t go for war. So, I did what was easiest — nothing — and paid my war taxes.

In 1979, she says:

I started to think about my taxes again. Maybe I could lie on my form. It was definitely not right to work for peace and pay for the war machine. I even went to one meeting of the war tax concerns committee. But there were enough meetings that I had to go to, so I managed not to find the time to struggle with my war taxes. Words of John Woolman seemed to fit my condition:

They had little or no share in civil government, and many of them declared they were through the power of God separated from the spirit in which wars were; and being afflicted by the rulers on account of their testimony, there was less likelihood of uniting in spirit with them in things inconsistent with the purity of Truth.

Woolman was referring to the early Quakers when he said it was less likely that they would be influenced by the civil government in questions of the truth. It seemed to me that in Woolman’s time it was also easier to be clear about the truth — we are so much more dependent and tied to the government than they were. Perhaps it is always easier to have a clear witness in hindsight.

I think Crauder has it a little backwards here. Woolman was speaking of early Friends in England, who were being actively repressed by the government and banned from much of any exercise of political power, and contrasting them to the Quakers in Woolman’s own time and place (colonial Pennsylvania), where Quakers held political power, and were by far the dominant party in the colonial Assembly. In Woolman’s time the government and the Society of Friends were as tightly linked as they ever have been.

Historical notes

In the 1 April issue, Walter Ludwig shared an interesting anecdote about Susan B. Anthony’s father, Daniel Anthony:

During the Mexican War he made the quasi tax-resisting gesture of tossing his purse on the table when the collector appeared, remarking, “I shall not voluntarily pay these taxes; if thee wants to rifle my pocketbook thee can do so.”

I hunted around for a source for this anecdote, and found one in Ida Husted Harper’s The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (1898), where she put it this way:

In early life he had steadfastly refused to pay the United States taxes because he would not give tribute to a government which believed in war. When the collector came he would lay down his purse, saying, “I shall not voluntarily pay these taxes; if thee wants to rifle my pocket-book, thee can do so.” But he lived to do all in his power to support the Union in its struggle for the abolition of slavery and, although too old to go to the front himself, his two sons enlisted at the very beginning of the war.

John Woolman was invoked in the 1 December issue as someone who “took as clear a stand on payment of taxes for military ends as he did on slavery.” He was quoted as saying:

I all along believed that there were some upright-hearted men who paid such taxes but could not see that their example was a sufficient reason for me to do so, while I believed that the spirit of Truth required of me as an individual to suffer patiently the distress of goods rather than pay actively.

Bruce & Ruth Graves

The 15 January issue brought an update on the case of Bruce and Ruth Graves, who were pursuing a Supreme Court appeal in the hopes of legally validating their approach of claiming a “war tax credit” on their federal income tax returns. They were trying to get people to write letters to the Supreme Court justices, in the hopes that they would find influential the opinions of laymen on such points as these:

1) petitioners right to First Amendment free exercise of religion and freedom of expression, 2) paramount interests of government not endangered by refusal of petitioners to pay tax, 3) petitioners should be able to re-channel war taxes into peace taxes (via World Peace Tax Fund Act, etc.), 4) IRS regulations should not take precedence over Constitutional rights of individuals, 5) threat of nuclear war must be stopped by exercise of Constitutional rights, 6) other pertinent points at the option of correspondent.

There was a further note on that case in the 15 April issue — largely a plea for support, without any otherwise significant news. Included with this was a message from the Graveses with this plea: “How can Friends maintain the secular impact of the peace testimony expressed through conscientious objection when technology has replaced the soldier’s body with a war machine? Does it not follow that technology then shifts the emphasis of conscientious objection toward reduction of armaments by resisting payment of war taxes?”

The 15 June issue brought the news that the Supreme Court had turned down the Graveses’ appeal. “[W]hen asked whether the frustrations of losing the long court battle had ‘generated any thoughts of quitting,’ Ruth Graves replied, ‘Never. If I were going to let myself be stopped by seemingly hopeless causes, I’d just die right now.”

World Peace Tax Fund

A note in the 1 May issue reported that some people who had “sent in cards or letters expressing support for the [World Peace Tax Fund] bill” had reported that they had “been subjected to IRS audits and other harassment.”

A letter from Judith F. Monroe in the 15 June issue expressed some concern about the World Peace Tax Fund plan. Excerpts:

I fear the World Peace Tax could become a device to appease the consciences of those of us who are not willing to face the consequences of civil disobedience.…

…One important purpose of the tax is to shake the complacent into a realization of the madness of our current armaments race. I don’t believe the casual matter of checking a block on a tax form will ever cause extensive introspection on the part of most people.

How will peace tax funds be handled? Will such a tax require more complex tax laws, IRS investigators, and tax accountants? How can we believe in the government’s ability to use such funds constructively? I can envision the Department of Defense receiving peace grants. After all, they’re the boys who fight for peace. This may be an exaggeration. The point is I do not feel we can trust any large bureaucracy with the task of peacemaking.

If the majority or at least a sizable minority do not opt for the peace tax, all that will happen is a larger percentage of their taxes will go to armaments to compensate for the monies diverted by the few who chose a peace tax. Under such circumstances, the peace tax would accomplish little.

Evidence of some critical appraisal of the “peace tax” idea is also found in a note in the 15 November issue, which summarizes an address by Stanley Keeble to the June General Meeting in Glasgow, Scotland:

If this were permitted, would not government simply raise military estimates to compensate for expected shortfall? Would not people not conscientiously opposed to military “defense,” take advantage of such legislation? Would the procedure be destructive of democracy and majority rule? Should not individuals rather reduce their earnings to a non-taxable level, or would that deprive useful projects of legitimate funds? Other such questions were raised, relating to possible effects on national “defense” policy. For his part, however, Stanley Keeble felt that it was important to “bring a peace decision right to the level of the individual,” and added that of fifteen replies so far received from monthly meetings on the subject of a Peace Tax Fund, only one was completely negative, two uncertain, and “the rest endorsed the proposal whilst acknowledging certain difficulties.”

There were occasional reports on the bill’s status in Congress scattered through the issues of the Journal. One, in the 15 December issue, said:

Endorsed by the national bodies of the Unitarian-Universalist Association, the United Methodist Church, the United Church of Christ, the Roman Catholic Church, the Church of the Brethren, the Mennonites, and the Religious Society of Friends, this bill provides the legal alternative for taxpayers morally opposed to war that the military portion of their taxes would go into the WPTF to be used for a national peace academy, retraining of workers displaced from military production, disarmament efforts, international exchanges and other peace-related purposes; alternatively for non-military government programs.

That issue also quoted the newsletter of the Canadian Friends Service Committee on the legislation, saying: “Thousands of letters and postcards were sent to members and many meetings held across the country as well as slide-tape shows, television and radio programs. Newspaper coverage was also good. The U.S. government is beginning to act in response.”

War tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 1985

There was lots about war tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 1985, including an active debate about the worth of the World Peace Tax Fund legislation.

In the 1 March issue Jill Penberthy shared how a “committee on clearness” organized by the Middlebury (Vermont) Friends Meeting helped her decide how to use an anticipated IRS levy as an outreach opportunity. Excerpts:

…I struggled to figure out how to respond to an Internal Revenue Service computer’s $1,800 bill for taxes, penalties, and interest on my 1980–81 account withheld as a war tax protest. I also remembered a tai chi class in which we were taught to yield with the aggressor, using his or her energy and our own creativity to change the process. I was puzzled about how to use these concepts with the IRS. The computer was not listening to my numerous letters explaining my position as a war tax resister. I was unable to contact anyone within the IRS with whom I could share my witness.

I brought my quandary to Middlebury Friends Meeting in Vermont and asked for a committee on clearness. We gathered at my home and in the silence were moved to initiate a Peace Witness Fund under the care of the meeting that would be transferred to a local bank for seizure by the IRS. The process became one of grace among us and within the Middlebury community.

The committee asked to share the penalty and commitment to peace represented by the withheld taxes. Quaker history bears witness to conscientious objection through tax resistance. We struggled to move beyond resistance to “yielding and overcoming,” and this we did with the guidance of the Spirit.

Letters of purpose were sent to Friends and sympathetic supporters requesting acknowledgment of the commitment to peace and offering a share in the assessed penalty. They were asked to send copies of the purpose to elected officials and the IRS, and to join us on the Green in the center of Middlebury for singing and dancing before depositing the Peace Witness Fund in the bank.

We announced the peace gathering in the local papers — “Everyone is welcome.” At the gathering we distributed leaflets explaining our concern about the present military escalation and preparation for nuclear war. Babies and siblings, parents and grandparents, and retired military men all joined hands on the Green in a dance of peace, recognizing the Light within each of us. “We are all one planet, all one people on earth,” sang a myriad of voices.

During the silence that followed, a professor from France said, “There are people you don’t even know about who are supporting you. Let that be your strength.” Another witness said, “This isn’t happening in my home state. I’ll take it home with me.”…

…Our group proceeded up the hill and into the local bank where tellers and customers witnessed our Peace Fund deposit.

A brief note in the same issue said that “[s]ignatures of war tax resisters are being collected by the War Tax Resistance National Ad Campaign for placement in newspaper ads in 1985” and gave an address for the campaign. A second brief announcement read:

A Peace Tax Fund has been established by Friends United Meeting. The FUM general board established an escrow account this past fall into which war tax resisters who belong to FUM may deposit taxes withheld from the government. Should the IRS take action against the depositor, the money may be withdrawn later. Income generated from the fund will be used to finance FUM peace and justice programs. For more information…

The 15 March issue brought news that the Palo Alto (California) Meeting had endorsed phone tax resistance: “In keeping with our Peace Testimony,” a minute from the Meeting read, “Friends are encouraged to refuse payment of taxes which would otherwise be used primarily for killing and war preparation.” The Meeting suggested redirecting resisted taxes to an alternative fund set up by the Pacific Yearly Meeting in 1983.

At the Friends World Committee for Consultation meeting in mid-March, the group formed a new committee: “Friends Committee on War Tax Concerns.” According to a Journal article on the meeting:

Sponsorship of the FCWTC followed two broad-based consultations the FWCC initiated in 1984 on questions of conscience raised by the use of Friends’ taxes for war and war preparations. Drawing upon decades of experience with conscientious objection to conscription, representatives of all Quaker organizations formed the FCWTC to prepare a series of papers for discussion and to organize regional conferences and a conference for Quaker employers on the complex issues involved.

A later issue mentioned Wallace T. Collett as the new Committee’s clerk and Linda Coffin as “staff.” It reported:

The FCWTC initially is focusing on three areas of work. The first will be publication of educational materials, with the hope of reaching a broader understanding among Friends of the concern about war taxes. The pamphlets will cover such topics as the biblical guidance for war tax refusal; Quaker history and recent Quaker statements on war tax concerns; recent experiences of individual Friends; positions of other churches and Christian denominations on the payment of war taxes; legal issues, IRS codes, and alternatives for those with war tax concerns; spiritual and rational bases for war tax concerns; possible legislative remedies for conscientious objectors; and a general annotated bibliography.

The second area is consultative services to Quaker employers who are involved in the issue through the actions of their employees and through their own role in the collection of taxes. A conference for Quaker employers is being planned for April or May.

The third area is facilitating consultation and study throughout the Society of Friends through a series of regional conferences. The first of these conferences, “Paying for War; Paying for Peace,” was held in Washington D.C., September 27–29, 1985, under FWCC auspices. The FCWTC also hopes to develop informal ties with other groups working on the issue of conscience and war taxes, including both those of other denominations and those outside the United States.

Barbara Harrison mentioned in a letter-to-the-editor in the 15 April issue that as her husband has an income that “meets most of our needs (wants, though, are beyond us), and as I wish to limit the amount of money we pay in taxes that goes for military expenses, I avoid most paid employment” and that this has freed up her time to volunteer to help at a local elementary school.

The 15 May issue brought an update on Karl Meyer’s “cabbage patch resistance” technique:

The Internal Revenue Service seized a trailer and a station wagon from Karl Meyer of Chicago during the night of February 26. Early the next morning two IRS officers came to his door and served him with a levy for $20,160 in frivolous tax return penalties and a “Notice of Seizure” for the vehicles they had already removed. In 1984, Karl Meyer, a long-time peace activist and pacifist, filed a daily protest tax return to the IRS — 365 in all. On the day after the seizure, about 30 supporters joined him in a protest demonstration at the Chicago IRS office. Meanwhile, he has been taking public transportation to his work as a carpenter.

The same issue also mentioned a sort of round-about form of tax resistance being pursued by Lucy & Sheldon Clark and Dorothy & Edward Snyder, Quakers from Baltimore, who were filing a lawsuit against the government for the return of that portion of their taxes that they believed had been spent on illegal acts of military aggression in Central America. The 15 December issue noted that the suit was dismissed.

That issue also mentioned a seminar on war tax resistance would be among those offered at “The Rise of Christian Conscience, a national conference of Christian nonviolence and civil disobedience sponsored by Sojourners Peace Ministry.” It also noted a quarterly newsletter from a General Conference Mennonite Church-associated group called “God and Caesar” concerning conscientious objection to military taxes.

The Lake Erie Yearly Meeting in June approved a minute that “suggested that Friends General Conference set up a fund for Friends who wish to withhold the military portion of their taxes.”

In mid-September a weekend retreat was planned in Voluntown, Connecticut to discuss “the Philosophy of War Tax Resistance”. Bob Bady appears to have been an (the?) organizer.

The 1 December issue noted that NWTRCC had published some brochures on topics like “Your Taxes Pay for the War in Central America,” “Your Taxes Pay for the Nuclear Arms Race,” and “Your Telephone Tax Pays for War” as well as “a Telephone War Tax Resistance Poster Kit.”

The 15 December issue noted that the IRS had seized an alternative fund from a Meeting to collect a tax debt:

Four IRS agents seized Craig MacDonald’s pickup truck on August 30 in Wappingers Falls, N.Y., in lieu of his 1982 and 1983 federal income taxes. Craig MacDonald, a member of Purchase (N.Y.) Meeting, attends Cornwall (N.Y.) Meeting, where he is clerk of the Peace Committee. The IRS had ordered Craig to pay $1,440.85, which includes interest and penalty charges. The original amount of taxes owed, $1,159.90, was put into the Stamford-Greenwich Friends Meeting Peace Tax Fund. The IRS seized this money in addition to the truck. The IRS explained in a letter that it did not know about the account until after seizure of the truck. Neither truck nor money has been returned to Craig. To pay the additional IRS charges, Cornwall Meeting has set up a fund for suffering for Craig.

The same issue noted that the Quaker Council for European Affairs had published a second edition of its pamphlet, Paying for Peace containing “facts for Friends concerned about conscientious objection to military taxation,” and that Conscience Canada had published a booklet called The First Freedom: Freedom of Conscience and Religion in Canada to promote the Maple Leaf State’s version of the peace tax fund proposal.

The “Peace Tax Fund” Debate

In the 1 March issue was an article by Christopher Hodgkin entitled “Second Thoughts on the World Peace Tax Fund.” Excerpts:

The World Peace Tax Fund ranks almost as a motherhood-and-apple pie issue for Friends.… [It] now offers a legal basis for conscientious objection to taxation along with the chance to support a national, tax-supported peace fund.

Indeed, a multitude of pacifist organizations have endorsed the fund, including such Friends organizations as the American Friends Service Committee, the Friends Committee on National Legislation, Friends United Meeting, Friends General Conference, and various monthly, quarterly, and yearly meetings. Such heavyweight support is impressive. It is also, however, a nagging cause for concern. Quakers have historically, and with good reason, been religious “contrarians.” Often the proposals with the widest support need the closest scrutiny. Truth most often comes on tiptoe and alone. Is there something in this well-regarded and well-supported measure that needs to be more carefully examined?

[Proponents argue that] Conscientious objection to conscription of the body is recognized; why shouldn’t conscientious objection to conscription of the dollar be recognized equally?

Unfortunately, they are not parallel for two principal reasons. First, one’s person and one’s dollars are not the same thing. One’s person is a creation of God; one’s dollars are a creation of the state. Jesus dealt with the different responsibilities for the two quite succinctly; I do not need to add to his teaching.

Second, military conscription and taxation have completely different scopes. The draft is a single-purpose instrument. It conscripts U.S. men for military duty. It has no other dimension. It is relatively simple to say that one accepts or rejects military service, and therefore accepts or rejects conscription.…

The income tax, on the other hand, is a multipurpose vehicle that supports the entire range of programs and activities of our government.…

Assume for a moment that our government conscripted people, as it conscripts dollars, to perform the complete range of government activities. Does anyone doubt that the equivalent of C.O. status would be granted to, say, Catholics to exempt them from performing Medicare abortions? If we conscripted people to teach the theory of evolution as truth in our schools, does anyone doubt that fundamentalist Christians would become conscientious objectors to that service? If we conscripted people to perform death sentence executions, would all citizens perform such duty, or would some seek exemption? Conscientious objection to war is the only conscientious objection currently sanctioned by our government not because there is something special about war resisters but because military service is the only bodily conscription now sanctioned by the government.

He later extends this point into the familiar slippery-slope argument in which if conscientious objectors to military taxes are granted a legal exemption from paying such taxes, the government would be acting inconsistently if it did not offer similar exemptions to people who have conscientious objections to other aspects of government spending.

[The promoters’ statement that war taxes mean “conscientious objectors must either violate their beliefs or violate the law”] is, of course, not true. A number of individuals who object to paying taxes for war arrange their incomes and live so that they are not subject to taxation and therefore pay no taxes for war. No law is violated. What this argument really says is that conscientious objectors who are unwilling to undergo economic discomfort in support of their beliefs must either violate their beliefs or violate the law. These objectors would not be likely to impress those early (and not so early) Friends who over the years have suffered a great deal more than economic discomfort in their commitment to Truth.

The simple fact is that any person who objects to paying taxes for war can legally avoid paying them. What they may not be able to do is avoid paying taxes for war without making some sacrifices. It is not the exercise of conscience that is at stake, but convenience. Are Friends ready to endorse a major change in national policy and in the principles of shared representative government to support those whose principles may be less important to them than their comfort? Those who would ask for the crown without the cross?

Perhaps the greatest irony in this issue is that the bill diverts attention from the real issue of peacemaking. The World Peace Tax Fund bill is a special interest bill for a special interest minority. If we truly believe in the need for a national peace effort — and I believe that many individuals who are not conscientious objectors recognize the urgent need for serious new approaches to peacemaking — we should be supporting legislation to add a serious commitment to peacemaking to the budget, legislation supported by all taxpayers, not just conscientious objectors.

Many U.S. citizens not yet ready to reject all defense spending are desperately afraid of nuclear war and would strongly support an active national peacemaking program. But the World Peace Tax Fund allows no role to such individuals. It demands that its supporters renounce all military spending at whatever level as a condition for participating in a tax-supported peace effort. This exclusionary approach reduces the funds and personal commitments that could be available to a nationally supported peace program.

The World Peace Tax Fund claims to protect conscientious objectors to war from having their dollars conscripted for military purposes. But that right already exists. This proposal does not create the right; it makes its exercise painless. The World Peace Tax Fund seeks special privileges for one religious minority that will inevitably lead to special privileges for a multitude of other religious minorities, quite possibly doing serious damage to programs that the fund’s supporters consider most important. The World Peace Tax Fund seeks to provide taxpayer support for a national peacemaking effort, but ironically the approach taken may actually reduce the funds that could be made available if such an effort were undertaken as a normal part of our national budget.

As you might expect, this led to some debate in subsequent issues:

• Brandt Chamberlain thought that Hodgkin’s slippery slope didn’t have anything very frightening at the end of it: “Laws permitting the diversion of tax dollars from programs felt to be morally objectionable could meet the demands of individual conscience while increasing our democratic influence on setting government priorities.” He also is skeptical that resisting taxes by lowering income is such a great idea, as “economic disengagement in this manner could limit us in our efforts to help define and meet the material needs of our society.”
• Wallace T. Collett wrote in to say that he is on the whole supportive of the federal income tax system as “the most equitable way to raise the funds needed for necessary government services,” and regrets that an overwhelming conscientious imperative forces him to noncooperate with it. “But… we cannot separate the collection process from the use of the funds that are collected… military policies that lead toward the death of all life on earth.” He hoped that once “a million” Americans either refused to pay war taxes or chose to pay into the World Peace Tax Fund, “then the dominance of the military on our nation’s policies will be overcome and our country and the world will be set on a new course.”
• Robert Hull, then chairperson of the National Campaign for a World Peace Tax Fund, also wrote in. He disagreed with Hodgkin’s scriptural interpretation of money as being a creature of the State, and therefore the State’s to do with as it will. Conscripting a person’s money is tantamount to conscripting the time they took to earn that money.

  When such large proportions of the exchange value of one’s labor (i.e., money) is confiscated through the federal treasury for military purposes, I believe there is a strong case for speaking of “military conscription.” And if “military conscription” is operating, then conscientious objection is appropriate. In our technological age, the young few have at times been conscripted for military duty; the many older are continually being conscripted through their labor.

  Hull also had no fear of Hodgkin’s slippery slope.

  …Hodgkin’s fear [is] that if we are allowed to divert our taxes away from military expenditures, the floodgates will open to every group with a conscientious dissent. So be it! Let each of them go to Congress and make their case, as we are doing. We trust our representatives to sort out the true grievance of conscience from the false greed of opportunism.

• Alan Eccleston defended the World Peace Tax Fund bill this way (excerpts):

  …[A]t either a symbolic or substantial level, we can refuse voluntary compliance with a tax system that has God’s priorities turned upside down. The institutional wheels of government start grinding and, in time, the IRS will collect the money withheld plus interest and penalties. What has been accomplished? Is this just an act of self-righteousness? Has the world changed?

  Yes, it has changed! I know this experientially.

  Praying for peace is powerful in itself. When the prayer is made manifest in one’s daily life its power multiplies. There are many ways for the manifestation to be expressed, and each of us must listen to our inner guide for direction. Those of us who, through love, are led to say no to war taxes announce we trust God, not armaments, for our security.

  In addition to creating a new ethical choice for most of the adult population, the World Peace Tax Fund bill establishes a separate trust fund that will disburse over one billion dollars a year for programs of health, education, and welfare. I know of no other peace initiative that has this potential.

• James B. Eblin wrote that the option of lowering his income below the tax line was not available to him as “I am morally and legally obliged to support my children.” He therefore sees the World Peace Tax Fund as his only possible relief.
• Lissa Field also criticized Hodgkin’s stark distinction between conscription of bodies and taxation of earnings. “[W]e are responsible for both… as my taxes pay for the destruction of other humans and that of God within them, I am responsible for responding on the level of God’s rules, not Caesar’s.” She also, as someone who had faced a $5,000 fine for her resistance, found “particularly tedious” Hodgkin’s casting of tax resisters as unwilling to sacrifice.
• Joe Marinello also thought that since income is the fruit of his labor, his person is very much wrapped up in his income, and so Hodgkin’s distinction does not hold. “My labor (directly represented by my earned income) is the fruit of my being in this world. I will not let my actions, my labors, be used to create weapons of mass destruction. Nor will I allow my labor to be used by others to kill our neighbors.” And he reminded Hodgkin of the sorts of sacrifices above-the-line resisters have to make so “that the government does not steal my labor. I am self-employed, have no savings accounts, no property in my name, and I give away most of my income. I have no desire to go to jail, but I will go to jail before I willingly pay any war taxes.”
• Linda Coffin prefers the World Peace Tax Fund to living below a taxable income because the latter “would be shirking our responsibility to support the life-affirming programs of our government. I could not take that option because it would mean ceasing my support for public schools, federal programs for the poor, health assistance programs, U.S. contributions to the United Nations and international aid agencies, and so on.” In contrast, “The Peace Tax Fund bill… uniquely demonstrates the depth and sincerity of our concern for the moral use of our tax dollars.”
• Ira Byock felt that conscientious objection wasn’t really what the World Peace Tax Fund was about. “The real value of the Peace Tax Fund — like so much of what we do in peace work — lies in its symbolism, in its potential for heightening general public awareness of the percentage of our tax money spent on the military. We bear witness to the morally objectionable so that others may pause to notice.” That said, “the issue of conscience remains real. To write one’s elected representatives, contribute to peace campaigns and organizations, take part in public peace activities, and then send in money for guns, subs, missiles, and bombs is inconsistent.” And this is true even for people not willing to live below the tax line.
• Anne Friend agreed with Hodgkin in his opposition to the World Peace Tax Fund. Weirdly, though she was most persuaded by Hodgkin’s argument “that having a witness made easy dilutes its power and will probably deflect it from its ultimate goal,” she didn’t see this as a call for her to make a difficult witness instead, but rather to wait and meanwhile do nothing: “I am not yet ready to refuse the military portion of my income taxes. But when that becomes an option [?], I expect the action required of me will be noncooperation, even if special status is available.”

Historical Notes

Margaret Hope Bacon penned an article on “Effective Peacemaking” in the 15 February issue that discussed the history of war tax resistance in the Society of Friends:

[T]he Quaker testimony against paying war taxes began with a few individuals who felt an opening and a “stop in my mind.” Theirs was an even more difficult path than that of C.O.s, for the Society itself was not always behind them. Friends have always refused to pay purely military tithes, but when the taxes are “in the mixture,” that is, war taxes and civilian taxes mixed together, or when the tax is not publicly stated as being for war, they have urged members to pay. In 1695, London Yearly Meeting disciplined a woman member who was advocating that Friends refuse to pay a new tax that she thought was clearly for war purposes. She was told that for the past 1600 years Christians have always paid their taxes. In this case the individual was trying to respond to the dictates of conscience (religion) while the group was concerned to prevent further persecution (politics). This uneasy balance continued for years, until today, at last, monthly and yearly meetings are beginning to give more support to tax objectors, and some believe we will eventually have legal provision for the conscientious objection for our tax dollars as well as ourselves — a political result of a religious impulse.

War tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 1999

In 1999 long-time Friends Journal editor (and war tax resister) Vinton Deming stepped down. The amount of coverage of war tax resistance in the Journal had been declining throughout the decade, and 1999 was no exception to this trend.

A note in the August issue read:

In signing A Call to Noncooperation with the War in Yugoslavia, 55 opponents of the conflict expressed a commitment to refuse to pay taxes for the war. National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee in May released the group’s declaration along with the list of signers. On releasing the call, Bill Ramsey, a Friend from St. Louis, Mo., and a signer, said, “We oppose this diversion of public money [from the Social Security surplus] to a new war, but most urgently we are refusing to pay for war on Yugoslavia because it is killing people in Kosovo, Serbia, and Montenegro. We are choosing to redirect our taxes to heal people.”

The September issue included a letter-to-the-editor from Bill and Fran Taber announcing a particularly large war tax redirection:

A few weeks ago we received several phone calls from a Friend who, like us, has long been concerned about how to avoid paying taxes to support the military-industrial complex. Our friend had recently been in touch with an Olney Friends School graduate who was excited about new governance arrangements being worked out to allow the official control of the school to pass from Ohio Yearly Meeting to a board composed of alumni and friends of Olney. This enthusiasm and the school’s need for scholarship funds at this time of transition prompted our friend to ask us to be transmitters of an anonymous gift of $100,000 to the Friends of Olney, Inc., (the group responsible for the school beginning July 1, 1999).

Naturally we said we would be glad to do this. We soon received an express package containing an anonymous $100,000 check from our friend’s financial agency as well as the friend’s letter explaining how this gift was a way of placing money in a worthy cause rather than allowing it to go for destructive purposes.

After we had passed the check and the letter on to the new board, our friend suggested and we agreed that the publication of the letter which accompanied the check would be a good way to continue the ongoing Quaker exercise on how to avoid complicity in war, as well as showing one way to put excess money to good use. The letter follows.

---

Dear Friends of Olney — 

In the spirit of Isaiah’s prophetic calling that would have us turn our swords into plowshares and in concert with Creation’s own declarations of God’s transforming power as recorded and envisioned in the Bible, I have been led to transfer to you these funds in the amount of $100,000, that they might serve to support your new tenure at Olney School. It is my wish that this contribution be utilized to provide partial scholarship funding for ten or more students who might thereby be enabled to attend school there next year.

I offer this gift as one who has long wrestled with and refused payment of military taxes to our government, and has now resolved to cease paying such taxes in light of revelations through written and other sources that our nation has over many years been engaged in the development and testing of “doomsday weaponry” — acknowledged at a recent Pentagon news conference as likely to become a “growth industry.”

By way of sorting out my own personal response to such darkness, I have been endeavoring to turn my daily walk, personal and financial resources, and whatever presence and service I can offer, towards honoring that living Word which would have us dwell together in peace with all our neighbors and ourselves — “not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit saith the Lord.”

And in this regard, I have become particularly concerned with some of the problems that our families and children are experiencing, living as we are under the shadow of an increasingly mesmerizing, materializing, and mortifying “high-tech” way of life, dominated and fueled by our nation’s military-industrial complex, which President Eisenhower himself tried to forewarn us of more than 30 years ago.

It is my fervent prayer that we will all be moved by the Spirit and our own lives’ particular needs and concerns to invest ourselves in helping shepherd our young ones back into the fold of that “everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure” which David knew (Ⅱ Samuel 23:5) as his felt experience of God’s rainbow covenant (Gen. 9:12) “which I make between me and you and all living creatures that is with you for perpetual generations.”

Indeed, my own personal experience in recent years persuades me that as we covenant together to re-engage ourselves in more reverently-related interactive ways of living (as early Friends and many native cultures have and do) we will recover that love of life Way of experiential truth-seeking, together with our own “still small voice.” And hopefully, as we become more attentive to and enlivened through this wider context of God’s creation “in which we live and move and have our being,” we shall realize all the blessings it holds for our own health, balanced living, and well-being.

So I have great respect and hope for your Friends of Olney group and the new course you are charting and pray it will prove an exciting and successful adventure in community learning for all involved.

May the Spirit bless and abide with you!

Yours in good faith,

A Friend

The November issue noted:

Lake Erie Yearly Meeting minuted support for David and Miyoko Inouye Bassett as conscientious objectors to the payment of military taxes. Since 1969 the Bassetts have refused to pay voluntarily the military portion of their federal taxes. They have actively worked for U.S. Peace Tax Fund legislation, resubmitted this year, that would allow a person to pay full taxes but direct that none of the money be used for military purposes. The couple worked for years as doctors in India with American Friends Service Committee.

Spencer Coxe attacked the Peace Tax Fund scheme in an op-ed in the December issue:

The Peace Tax movement has dangerous implications

David Bassett’s article on the Peace Tax movement, which appeared a couple of years ago [see ♇ 14 August 2013] was of interest to me, for I had long been unclear (and uneasy) about the concept. As a Friend and a pacifist with a lifelong affinity to dissent and lost causes, my heart sympathized with the movement, but my head warned me it was in error. Even after reading David Bassett’s article, my head, which writes this essay, has prevailed.

The Peace Tax is meaningless in practical effect. Congress determines; and will continue to determine, the military budget. “Earmarking” one’s taxes for non-military purposes will have no influence whatsoever, except in the inconceivable event that so many subscribers signed up that there were not enough non-earmarked funds to satisfy what Congress considered military needs — at which point Congress would repeal the law. A large number of subscribers would be required to reach this point. A smaller number of determined lobbyists and agitators could persuade Congress to curb military expenditures, even though the protesters represented a minority of the electorate, just as the gun lobby is effective despite the rejection of its agenda by a majority.

A Peace Tax Fund is not only meaningless, but counterproductive and potentially dangerous. It would ease the conscience of pacifists by creating the illusion that they are influencing policy, but it would deflect attention from meaningful and essential activity aimed at a) electing sympathetic members of Congress and a sympathetic President and b) lobbying, demonstrating and agitating to persuade the executive and legislative branches to reorder the national agenda.

The movement has dangerous implications. It undermines representative democracy, the only viable system of government for a huge, diverse nation. Policy-making is entrusted to democratically elected representatives who can be (but often aren’t) held accountable to the electorate. On any issue, there are bound to be voters who disagree with a decision of Congress. Our social contract requires us to accept — with rare exceptions to be discussed below — decisions we dislike. To allow an end-run around this compact for one group invites other interests to demand equal treatment. The lumber baron can forbid the use of his taxes to extend national parks. Rightwing bigots will withhold their taxes from a school lunch program. Permitting individuals to allocate their taxes as they see fit would probably result in a government agenda worse than what we have now, and it would ultimately lead to chaos.

For several reasons the Peace Tax movement will have symbolic significance of little or no value. First, the movement will not generate publicity. It is so low-key and so “legal” that it will be disregarded. Second, unlike the tax-refuser, the peace-taxer courts no risk of prosecution or penalty. His or her act will not be seen as brave or noteworthy; it will evoke no admiration, no controversy, no reflection (in fact, it will be invisible). Third, since the earmarking will be sanctioned by statute, its use will cause the government no embarrassment and almost no inconvenience. By legally sanctioning the earmarking, Congress is effectively removing the movement’s symbolic significance, and channeling a potentially effective resistance movement into a harmless backwater.

Each of us should, as a general rule, abide by decisions of Congress. For today’s pacifist — as for last century’s abolitionist — the occasion will arise when an act of government is so repugnant to conscience that one must resort to civil disobedience. This point is reached when in one’s estimation the issue of conscience transcends the demands that society lays upon us.

The Peace Tax movement boils down to a feel-good means of salving the conscience of those of us distressed by militarism. It deflects us from hard work within the democratic process, and it absolves us from the penalties inflicted upon those who choose civil disobedience.

This long-overdue criticism of the Peace Tax Fund scheme would provoke a great deal of debate in the letters-to-the-editor column the following year.

War tax resistance in the Friends Journal in 2000

The 2000 issues of Friends Journal had a few mentions of war tax resistance and an extensive debate about the wisdom of supporting the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund act.

The January issue mentioned that J.E. McNeil had been named the head of the National Interreligious Service Board for Conscientious Objectors, and that her legal experience had included “cases involving war tax refusers and conscientious objectors to military service.”

The February issue included an article about the Monteverde community in Costa Rica, which was founded by American Quakers who fled the United States in part to avoid paying military taxes there. Excerpts:

Many Friends know about Monteverde, the Quaker community established in Costa Rica in the 1950s. “They came here to be free to practice religion in the way they felt was important.” They wanted no military taxes. They wanted to send their children to Quaker schools and to bring them up with a good sense of priorities, away from materialism and militarism. Some came out of a sense of adventure. Four of them had just spent time in prison for their beliefs. They wrote: “We hope to discover through Divine Guidance a way of life which would seek the good of each member of the community and live in a way that will naturally lead to peace rather than war.”

[At the trial of four Quaker conscientious objectors to draft registration], the judge said, “If you are not willing to defend this country, you should leave.” They decided to do just that but had to wait until their jail sentences were over. One couple in the meeting had visited Costa Rica, and several families had already been thinking of moving there. Besides being a fairly prosperous and democratic country, and not very crowded, Costa Rica abolished its army in 1948. Forty-one people from the meeting eventually moved there, including the teacher of the meeting’s private school.

“We were looking for a peaceful place to raise our families without being involved in the military preparedness of the United States,” recalls Marvin Rockwell.

Marvin Rockwell ran the Flor Mar Pension, a simple hostel-like bed-and-breakfast with a pleasant restaurant serving delicious food. He says he was never disappointed in the hopes he had when he moved to Costa Rica. “Costa Ricans are a friendly, helpful people.” He smiles, “And I do not feel bad at all paying taxes in Costa Rica. The largest item in the tax budget is for education.”

In the same issue, Chuck Hosking (in the course of a larger article on ethical investing), said: “If I hadn’t had to start an IRA to lower my income below the taxable minimum (to avoid financing U.S. militarism), I would have put these retirement savings in the same place we’ve put most of our contingency savings — into no-interest loans to American Friends Service Committee and Right Sharing of World Resources.”

In March there was a “Religion & Social Issues Forum” titled “Building a Culture of Peace” at the Pendle Hill Quaker conference center. Among the speakers at the conference was Gordon Browne, who “told of his experiences as a ‘military tax refuser’ for over thirty years” during “a session on how Friends can make a personal difference today.”

The July issue commented on the Rosa Packard legal case:

The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to hear a Quaker appeal of Internal Revenue Service penalties on religious practice. Rosa Packard, a Greenwich, Conn., Quaker, had challenged the authority of the IRS to penalize her for religiously based non-payment of war-related federal income raxes. For the last 18 years Packard has filed her income tax return, notifying the IRS by an attached letter that her core religious beliefs prevent her from paying a tax if any part of the money collected from her is used to fund war or preparation for war. Every year she has placed the full amount of her taxes, as her letter to the IRS states, in trust for the government in an escrow account maintained by Purchase (N.Y.) Quarterly Meeting. In 1998 Packard requested that the federal government waive the discretionary penalties imposed by the IRS for late payment and failure to pay estimated taxes. Packard appealed the lower court’s dismissal of this request to the Supreme Court.

An obituary notice for Richard R. Catlett in the same issue noted that “Richard was a founding member of Columbia Meeting and an active war rax resister, for which he was imprisoned briefly about 25 years ago. In his war tax resistance, he was supported by both Illinois Yearly Meeting and Columbia Meeting, which held an open meeting for worship at the prison where he was held.”

The “Peace Tax Fund” debate

The last issue of 1999 had included an op-ed by Spencer Coxe in which he cast a skeptical eye on the Peace Tax Fund idea (see ♇ 16 August 2013). Boiled down, his complaints were these:

1. The Peace Tax Fund bill would ostensibly allow conscientious objectors to earmark their taxes for non-military government spending, but this will not in fact make any practical difference whatsoever in how Congress spends tax money.
2. Conscientious objectors could have more practical effect on actual military spending through such mundane political activities as lobbying, demonstrating, attempting to influence elections, and the like; and attempts to get a Peace Tax Fund bill passed distract from this.
3. The idea behind the Peace Tax Fund concept — that individual taxpayers can override the spending priorities of their elected representatives with their own conscientious imperatives — is corrosive of democracy, which requires people to compromise and accept the decisions of their representatives rather than engaging in a free-for-all.
4. If it were enacted, the Peace Tax Fund would make conscientious objectors to military taxation legal, and therefore mundane and unworthy of attention. In contrast to the war tax resister of today, whose sacrifices evoke admiration and controversy and government inconvenience, the Peace Tax Fund payer would just be another citizen checking a box on a form — which would “[channel] a potentially effective resistance movement into a harmless backwater.”

I have less faith in the democratic process and in democracy in general than does Coxe, but his criticisms are sound, and, from my perspective, way overdue. A sentimental, blinkered, panglossian take on the Peace Tax Fund bill had become part of the Quaker canon, and, disturbingly, had crowded out other discussion of the dilemma of paying for war with your taxes.

But now that the criticisms had finally been aired, how would the scheme’s supporters respond? Voiciferously, as future letters columns showed:

Edward F. Snyder partially conceded the point. “The aim [of the Bill] is not to reduce the military budget… The main purpose of the bill is to honor and respect the conscientious objections of those citizens who are opposed to war in any form, including the financing through their tax dollars…” He compared it to draftees who do “alternative service” rather than serving in the military. “If I thought the primary purpose of the Peace Tax Fund were to reduce the military budget as Spencer Coxe does, I’d be hard pressed to give the proposal the time of day, and for many of the reasons he cites. There are many more direct and effective ways to challenge military spending and the policies on which it rests.” But he believes that since this isn’t the purpose, the bill is still worthwhile. He also thinks that the fact that war is such a clear violation of a bedrock conscientious value, and because it is such a large part of the budget, it holds a unique place, and carving out an exemption for conscientious objectors here will not necessarily open the floodgates for vast numbers of objectors to every little this and that in the budget.

Joe Volk wrote an extensive op-ed in response (which, alas, is partially obscured in the PDF I have). He said that he had shared Coxe’s letter with the Friends Committee on National Legislation’s Policy Committee (Volk was the FCNL executive secretary) as a way of provoking a discussion as to whether that group ought to change its policy of supporting the Peace Tax Fund bill (they decided to continue supporting it). Volk shares Snyder’s views that the slippery slope is not so slippery in this case, and that one can support the bill without believing that it would reduce military spending (“On the contrary, another argument for the Peace Tax Fund is that it would not alter Congress’s control of the purse strings” and “Of course, federal funds are fungible. Thus, whatever the Peace Tax Fund pays for simply frees other funds for the military.”) Volk asserted that were the Peace Tax Fund passed into law, rather than defanging conscientious objectors, it might free them from their current troubles in tax court to take up more productive struggles. Besides “the absence of the Peace Tax Fund does not seem to be generating the waves of protest and tension that Spencer Coxe fears we would lose were it enacted.” He also felt that rather than being corrosive of democracy, it was supportive of that essential element of democratic legitimacy that requires respect for minority opinions. And besides, Congress is carving out deductions and exemptions and other things all the time — it seems petty to pick out our own concern as the only one that’s corrosive of this manifestly imperfect democracy. Volk concluded:

My wife, Beth, and I have refused to pay our war taxes voluntarily since 1970. We want to pay our entire tax bill, but we won’t pay for weapons and the salaries of the people who use them. Having seen so much war and its effects, we could not voluntarily pay that portion of our tax that goes for war. So, we pay only that portion of our tax bill that does not pay for war. Every few years the IRS levies our bank account, wages, or savings. They take the principle, interest, and penalties on what we have refused to pay. We end up paying more to the government than had we paid the war tax. Once they took and auctioned our car. We no longer park it at our residence. We have never been able to own real estate; it would be confiscated. In the U.S. owning real estate has been a principal way for poor and middle-class people to accumulate wealth. Many of our friends could borrow on their land and property to put their children through school. We have not had that option. We are not complaining. We are happy following our conscience on this matter. We consider that these consequences of our war tax refusal are aspects of the voluntary self-suffering that nonviolent action uses to reveal truth to ourselves and to others. But we think the government should recognize our conscientious objection to paying war taxes so that we voluntarily can pay our entire tax bill. Today, we feel that we are being punished for our religious beliefs, a violation of the U.S. Constitution and of our human rights. Recognition of our claim to conscientious objection will not cut the military budget, will not end war, will not bring the Kingdom of Heaven. It will allow us to practice our faith without being punished for it. That’s a fairly radical idea still. It’s a dangerous thing too, but it can work without leading to anarchy.

Richard N. Reichley thought that Coxe was missing the point — that the Peace Tax Fund was not meant to put a dent in the military complex, but to permit certain taxpayers to follow their consciences. It might, he suggested, help spread the idea of conscientious objection to military spending: “Once the Peace Tax Fund Bill is passed, every taxpayer will know that it is law. IRS instructions will include the option to file as a conscientious objector. Perhaps we will be pleasantly surprised to learn how many Americans do not want to pay for war.”

Silas Weeks shared his frustrating experience with war tax resistance: “Eventually, the IRS invades our bank account and recovers [the] amount, plus interest and penalties. We end up paying more tax than we would otherwise have to, plus our income is reduced by whatever we have put in the local [alternative] fund.” He says that while “[i]t is extremely unlikely that the U.S. Congress will ever establish a legal peace tax alternative” it is “an improper judgment of others” to insist, as he says Coxe did, “that effort on behalf of a Peace Tax Fund wastes time and is a balm to individual conscience.”

Bruce Hawkins thought the Peace Tax Fund was not meant as an ultimate goal but as “an organizational and educational tool” for outreach and lobbying, and one that helps keep pacifist ideas on the agendas of legislators. “Don’t think for a moment that any of us will heave a sigh of relief and cease all political activity if the Peace Tax Fund passes! We would continue in the same political activity that we are in now, including support of sensible candidates for office. And we would encourage everyone we know to consider using the fund. One of our next goals would be to get enough people to use it so that it would make a difference. It will only be ‘low-key’ if we let it be low-key.”

Ben Tousley thought that while paying into a Peace Tax Fund might indeed have no practical effect on the military budget, the same could be said for many respected acts of “witnessing” — these things aren’t meant to be immediately, directly effective, but to have an eventual “transforming effect on both individuals and the larger society.”

Rosa Covington Packard echoed the idea that the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill was never meant “to influence the military budget” but instead “to acknowledge the inalienable right of conscientious objection to paying taxes for war and preparations for war and to accommodate it as a matter of religious freedom.” She also asserted that those who would take advantage of the Peace Tax Fund were not thereby engaging in a risk-free and invisible act:

When the bill passes, the option will be described in the tax forms everyone receives. Reports of numbers of conscientious objectors and amounts of taxes redirected to nonmilitary purposes will be published in the Congressional Record. The conscientious objector will affirm a statement of belief and ille it with his or her tax form. Even if conscientious objectors to paying for war are given legal status and accommodated, they will continue to suffer many forms of discrimination from the public and the military. Making slavery illegal did not end racial discrimination. Recognizing and accommodating conscientious objection to paying for war will not end religious discrimination.

Conscientious objectors were among the first to go to the gas chambers under Hitler. When we study the Holocaust, we mourn the atrocities against Jews, homosexuals, Gypsies — and “others” — our memories of the victims of war rarely even name conscientious objectors. Risk free indeed! We who choose a visible legal status may be more vulnerable to hostility.

Finally: “Without visible legal status, without acknowledgment that it is indeed legal to act upon our beliefs, our ‘democracy’ will continue to confuse and seduce each generation into thinking that war is honorable or necessary and that there are no other options.”

Mary Moulton addressed only the idea that the Peace Tax Fund would “ease the conscience of pacifists and [thereby] deflect them from hard work.” She said: “This prediction certainly would not apply to any of the peace activists I have known over the years.”

Samuel R. Tyson wrote in with his own set of objections:

1. Conscientious objection laws discriminate in favor of members of historical “peace churches” which has the effect of adding a religious bias to the law.
2. Such laws also (because they require objectors to convincingly testify to their conscientious beliefs) discriminate against people with less verbal or reasoning capabilities (a class bias).
3. Such laws also, for the same reason, favor people with a paper trail in the “historically dominant white paper-based culture” which leads to a racial bias.

He concluded: “A Peace Tax Fund will make it easier for the few, without a full explanation in tax forms. Do we really want another federal bureaucracy to sit in judgment on conscience?”

Coxe wrote back, and in a letter that appeared in the October issue. Excerpts:

The letters convince me that I overlooked two considerations, first that passage of the bill would signal a reaffirmation of our country’s respect for religious dissent (though in symbolic fashion), and second, that legislation would relieve the personal distress of pacifists.

I am surprised that no correspondent pointed out that logically my position is an attack on the legal recognition of conscientious refusal of military service.

As a matter of fact, I have come to the conviction (in my old age) that the pacifist movement might be strengthened if the government offered no alternative to military service except prison. Then the issue raised by the resister would be the government’s claimed power to conscript. In my view, conscription is the basic evil.

The government’s recognition of religious objection to military service blunts resistance to conscription.

Those who during the Viemam War said “Hell no we won’t go” were on the right track and did more co bring the war to an end than did the COs.

Debate aside, the December issue noted that the Radnor, Pennsylvania, Meeting had approved a minute endorsing the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Bill, and considered this a way by which the Meeting “expresses its commitment to our historic Peace Testimony.”

Ten years ago today, Albuquerque’s local newsweekly, the Alibi, published a feature by Singeli Agnew about war tax resisters. Here are a few excerpts:

Maureen, an Albuquerque peace activist in her 40s who just recently began resisting taxes, credits a situation that happened in the ’80s for planting the seed that now inspires her resistance. Alexander Haig, secretary of state during the Reagan Administration, commenting on anti-nuclear weapon protesters gathered outside the White House said, “Let them protest, as long as they are paying taxes.”

“For me,” Maureen said, “I think this kind of lay dormant. You know how you get influenced by something but you don’t act on it but it stays. [Haig’s comment] was truly to me a revelation, like, ‘you know you can stand there, you can go on a hunger strike, you can fast and you can march and have your signs, but we have your money and we’re going to do what we want with it.’ And that I think stuck with me in a big way, even though I didn’t really start acting on it until recently.”

Maureen said that more and more people are beginning to connect their money with war. “Now that people are struggling with health care, 30 percent of Americans are living on $8 an hour or less, the gap between the rich and the poor is increasing — people are becoming more aware of this and they hear, ‘Oh yeah, they’re spending a billion dollars a day in Iraq.’ People are like, ‘Wait a minute, they need to be spending that money here.’ So even if they’re not necessarily anti-war… people start to get it.”

Max and Nancy Rice, Albuquerque residents and long-time peace activists, have been involved in several methods of resistance for several decades. They claim that they got a refund back one year after claiming “war tax deductions” in the “Other Deductions” column. The IRS overlooked the details and dutifully sent a check. The Rices took the refund, matched it with money of their own, and donated half the money to hospitals in North Vietnam, and half to hospitals in South Vietnam, publicizing the event openly.

Max Rice is one of the few people who have served time in jail for war tax resistance. Only about 20 people have been jailed in the last 60 years for reasons related to war tax resistance. In Rice’s case, the charge was actually contempt of court, for failing to provide financial information requested by the IRS.

Aanya Adler Friess is an activist in her 70s living in Albuquerque who also began resisting taxes during the Vietnam War. Recently, she has lived below the taxable minimum, but still finds ways to be active around the issue. Her primary method of resistance when she did owe taxes was to include a letter with her tax return, indicating the amount she was refusing to pay. A letter from 1992 states: “Please Note: I owe the IRS $87 for 1991. [I am] a tax protester of conscience, protesting the huge military budget which has crippled the economy of the USA and which is in no way related to defense needs but only to enrichment of the military industries. We are now seeing, finally, the results of 45 years of Cold War idiocy! I believe that eventually the military budget will be reduced, for economic reasons. I, in the meantime, will continue to withhold one-third of my taxes until the defense budget is reduced to some reasonable level. Therefore I am refusing to pay $30 of my tax. I enclose my check of $57. The refused portion will be added to the Albuquerque War Tax Alternative fund and interest on the fund is given to peace and other life affirming organizations. Signed, Yours Sincerely…”

At one point, the IRS entered her bank account and appropriated approximately $1,500, Aanya said. “It took so much time and effort. I mean, I’m not afraid of the penalties particularly, because I wouldn’t go to jail, I would pay the money. But, you’re costing them money and making them work to get your tax. It’s a very cumbersome process.”

“The fear of the IRS has been so strong,” Maureen added. “People think ‘Oh, they’re going to come and take everything away and throw you in jail.’ I know I would be not truthful if I said I’m not worried about this, or I don’t think about dealing with some of that one day. It is very scary. So that’s why I think it’s kind of like taking little baby steps. You try something, see what happens and then maybe you get a little braver about it.” The IRS wields power by making the tax system complicated, and changing it all the time to keep people confused and a bit intimidated. People think breaking the law means you automatically are in jeopardy of losing everything.

“It’s always a process,” Aanya contends, “You have control because you can always give them the money. I know where my limits are, so I wouldn’t go to jail. My main concern is, do I want my time and energy to go into fighting the IRS, is that a good use of my limited resources?”

The advantage for those that don’t file is that they can often escape being noticed. It is common, especially for women, to change their tax status or change their names, things which make it easy to get overlooked by the IRS.

“Any time that your fighting a really huge bureaucratic organization, it’s going to suck up a lot of time and energy (trying) to build an alternative world. I want to be organic gardening, and looking into alternative energy… that’s one of the reasons I haven’t written a letter” Maureen said. “My philosophy has been well, if they figure it out, let them come get it from me.”

Also, in 1972 the U.S. Peace Tax Fund Bill was introduced in the House of Representatives. It has been sponsored most years since, but has failed to pass into law. It would provide a legal means to direct one’s personal income taxes toward nonmilitary uses. Some war tax resistors disagree with the proposal, however, feeling that someone else would simply pick up the amount, failing to affect the amount we spend on military. It would make it easier for people to “swaddle the fact” that they were paying for war, Max Rice said. Theoretically one’s federal taxes would be going to peaceful purposes, such as roads and social services, but someone else would just be picking up the amount missing from the military budget.

“That’s going to undercut the whole idea of tax resistance.” Rice added. “We need to resist the evil that we know is much huger. If people have a legal out then they’re not going to deal with the fact that so much of their money goes to the military.”

Bill Brunson, an IRS spokesperson in Phoenix who was contacted for this article, said he wasn’t aware of war tax resistance as a movement. Eighty five percent of the nation’s population are fully compliant with federal income taxes, he said. Ten percent are not fully compliant for a variety of reasons, but are not opposed to the taxation system. Five percent of the nation’s population refuse to pay taxes because they are constitutionally opposed to the taxation system, he said, but he was not aware of people refusing to pay taxes because of opposition to military spending. He made no differentiation between anarchists, libertarians, or others simply trying to avoid paying and those resisting due to pacifist beliefs.

Some war tax resistance news in brief:

• At War Tax Talk, Erica Weiland reflects on the 70^th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Japanese cities. Excerpt:

  Nuclear weapons really keep the war economy going since their very presence requires a constant readiness for war, not to mention maintenance and supervision. Over the next ten years, the U.S. is estimated to spend about $348 billion on nuclear weapons. Why work for a nuclear-free world but pay for those weapons yourself?

• Members of the U.S. Agape community were at Walden Pond to commemorate the anniversary. Suzanne Shanley remarked:

  We join with peacemakers throughout the world in mourning and repentance for this unspeakable act of deliberate slaughter of a civilian population, our sisters and brothers in Japan. Yesterday, Agape members walked with friends from the Buddhist Peace Pagoda through Walden Pond, commemorating the Anniversary among the crowd on the beach as the spirit of Thoreau’s refusal to pay a poll tax for war, inspired and sustained us.

• One variant of the “peace tax” idea would allow taxpayers who are conscientious objectors to redirect the portion of their federal taxes that pays for armaments and militaries to a new government-run Peace Institute that is designed to promote national security and international stability through nonviolent means. Sounds pretty good, until you realize that we already have a government-funded United States Institute of Peace, chartered to promote international peace through nonviolent conflict resolution…

  But its chairman, Stephen Hadley, is a relentless hawk whose advocacy for greater military intervention often dovetails closely with the interests of Raytheon, a major defense contractor that pays him handsomely as a member of its board of directors.

  Hadley, formerly George W. Bush’s national security advisor, was appointed to the Institute of Peace by President Obama, recipient of the similarly ironic Nobel Peace Prize. “Peace Tax” payers may one day be able to pool their funds with Lockheed Martin, which made a $1 million grant to the Institute in 2009.

Irlanda Jerez, merchant from the Mercado Oriental in Managua, Nicaragua, and leader of the tax resistance movement there (see ♇ 9 June 2018), was arrested by masked police yesterday.

She had just spoken at a press conference to announce a 22 July protest march in the Nicaraguan capital. Her current whereabouts are unknown.

The Nicaraguan government has been under increasing pressure both from grassroots civil disobedience and from international condemnation of its killings of demonstrators and its use of pro-government paramilitary groups to attack the opposition.

This is the fifteenth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was reported in back issues of The Mennonite. Today we continue our trek through the 1960s.

Over the past several years, war tax resistance in The Mennonite has gone from “of course not — render unto Caesar after all” to “maybe we should look into this” to “hey everybody, let’s start resisting!” A backlash was inevitable. Here’s an example from the 19 January 1965 edition. It complained both that war tax resistance is foolish because the American military and its “defense of the free world” is necessary, and that promoters of war tax resistance were becoming too pushy. Excerpt:

I refer to the letter in the Dec. 29 issue [see yesterday’s post] suggesting that Mennonites and others should refuse to pay income taxes used for military purposes.… I am afraid that this program amounts to an attempt to force certain Mennonite beliefs on other people whether they wish to accept them or not… I am afraid that, having the right to practice our beliefs as we see fit, we are showing a growing tendency to be pretty insistent that others be made to do as we see fit also.

Another letter, in the 2 February 1965 edition, criticized tax resistance for providing an illusion of aloofness. Excerpt:

Paying taxes is one vital link the individual has with society and I question whether we as individuals and Mennonites can afford to sever this link. To do so I fear would be a giant step backwards toward isolationism and the delusion inherent in such a philosophy that we are thereby free from responsibility for what our nation does… If one would refuse to pay taxes as a form of protest (symbolic) without deluding himself about his guilt and involvement (thus a protest even against himself) I could see a case for it.

Another letter in the 2 February 1965 edition was skeptical about the plans for a peace tax fund law. Excerpt:

It is good to hear an effort is being made to allow us to pay an alternate tax, but won’t this remove the potency of a resounding “No” just as the law permitting alternative service did? This points out the necessity of opposing the evil as a whole, not just opposing a contributing factor. If my taxes are used 100 percent for peace, my neighbors’ will go 100 percent for war or defense. The government will get defense funds one way or another. Therefore we should start at the top, to change the policy of the leaders — we can never stop this mad arms race by cutting off our little contribution. Of course, if refusing to pay taxes for defense spending will spotlight the issue enough to change the policy, we should use it, but only after we have used all legal methods and resources, such as writing to our congressman and lobbying.

The 22 June 1965 edition brought this news:

Brewster B. Kneen is apparently an American citizen living in London at 114 Ferme Park Road. In a letter published to the Internal Revenue Service he indicates that he is withholding the $72.22 balance on his 1964 income tax in protest against the United States involvement in Vietnam. He also says, “I am sending a check for the amount of the tax due, $72.22, to the Catholic Worker [which published the letter], to be used either in its own work against the war in Vietnam or for the relief of human suffering, or to be sent by the Catholic Worker to a Catholic relief agency working in Vietnam. (I am a Protestant, but know of no Protestant church body calling for an end to the war.)”

This is the earliest mention of the Vietnam War in particular that I found in discussions of war tax resistance in The Mennonite. Kneen’s action was also mentioned in the 1 November 1966 edition:

Brewster Kneen, a Christian pacifist, used another means of witness. He refused to pay $72.22 in taxes he owed last year. Instead he sent a letter to the Director of Internal Revenue in Brooklyn.

“The war in Vietnam,” he wrote, “is a blatant contradiction of the ideals of freedom… our country was founded upon… As a Christian and an American, I must dissociate myself from this criminal behavior… I see no alternative to withholding my tax due as a form of resistance and protest.” He sent his $72.22 to a relief group instead.

The 21 September 1965 issue included an article by Vincent Harding titled “Vietnam: What Shall We Do?” Harding gave a list of eleven suggestions, one of which concerned taxes:

7. Should we not consider refusing to pay income taxes on the grounds of our Christian convictions concerning war, and our specific concerns about this war? This money could be sent to relief and peace-making organizations also. I think the time has come for serious discussion and action on this.

Michael Smith wrote in to the 19 October 1965 issue to add his two cents. Excerpt:

Since modern armies require vast funds to operate, nonpayment of income tax is a particularly apt form of peace witness in the present situation. I, for one, would be willing to be imprisoned for nonpayment of taxes (tribute), as were the early Christians. The Friends, in England and in America, about the time of the Revolution, refused to pay war taxes, and that is what the income tax is, in essence, at present. Eighty percent of it goes for war. This we must protest! Let us instead send at least as much as we “owe” the government to be used in the work of peace and reconciliation.

“The peace and social concerns committee in consultation with the executive committee of the General Conference Mennonite Church” prepared a “statement for its congregations” which was presented at the Mennonite World Congress in July 1967. It was also “adopted by the Council of Boards”. The statement called for a variety of actions aimed at the Vietnam War in particular, one of which was war tax resistance:

We urge congregations to counsel together about the proposed surcharge of 6 percent on income tax and the already imposed 70 percent of the 10 percent federal excise tax on telephone use. Since these are clearly levied to support the war in Vietnam, should not the Christian object to payment of these taxes on the same grounds as he conscientiously objects to military service?

In view of the gravity of the U.S. actions in Vietnam and the kind of witness called for at this time, we urge congregations and groups within congregations to retest the validity of a law requiring conscientious objectors to pay a war tax. We urge that this form of witness be made to communicate as clearly as possible, and that those refusing to pay a war tax contribute an equivalent amount to peacemaking agencies such as MCC and in this way communicate that they seek no personal gain by their objection.

We also ask congregations to adopt a resolution of willingness to support, emotionally and financially if jobs and funds are threatened, those whose conscience leads them to refuse to pay the tax increases for war purposes because of obedience to Christ.

James Juhnke returned (see ♇ 16 July 2018 for his earlier piece) in the 10 October 1967 issue to discuss “Our almost unused political power.” He asked why Mennonites had been successful in their political battles to obtain and maintain exemptions or civilian-run alternative service for conscientious objectors in the military draft. He concluded: “the core of Mennonite power… lay in their threat of civil disobedience. The Mennonites promised that ‘thousands of conscientious objectors’ would violate the law and accept imprisonment rather than… induction into the armed services. This threat was credible.… Mennonites in 1967 were reaping political rewards from the sacrifices of their fathers and grandfathers in 1918. Because Mennonites in the First World War had been willing to take the awful step of civil disobedience, their descendants during the Vietnam war were spared the necessity of proving all over again to the government their sincerity of conviction.”

Juhnke suggested that Mennonites apply the same sort of pressure to change the government’s war policy in Vietnam. Excerpt:

If the Mennonite witness in Washington regarding the Vietnam war is to achieve the same intensity and urgency as the Mennonite witness regarding the draft, we will need both qualified men and effective instruments of power. A Washington-based staff of politically-experienced Mennonite leaders should be charged specifically with the duty of using Mennonite influence for a decision to deescalate the Vietnam war. And this lobby should be equipped with the kind of political leverage which our threat of civil disobedience gives us on the draft issue.

A parallel act would be the declaration by hundreds of Mennonites that they would refuse to pay the proposed 10 percent surcharge on the income tax, a measure resulting directly from the war. Armed with such a threat, the Mennonite lobbyist would have political power far out of proportion to his small constituency.

There was also coverage of war tax resistance in The Mennonite that was unconnected, or largely so, with the tussle over withholding from Conference employees.

A 2 March 1977 letter to the editor declared the writer “fascinated by the views on tax payment… when Jesus made a fairly clear statement on that subject almost 2,000 years ago.” In his mind, Americans’ high earnings relative to those of citizens of other countries are due to the actions of the American government, so “in a way our earnings are Caesar’s to start with.”

Carl Lehman penned a third in his series of patiently exasperated essays arguing against war tax resistance. He reiterates his assertion that there are no “war taxes” — no tax whose proceeds are devoted solely to military expenses. And he says that the common practice of refusing to pay a percentage of your income tax that is equivalent to the percent of the federal budget devoted to military expenses doesn’t make much sense when you hold it up to scrutiny. There’s little to suggest that withholding some number of dollars from the government is going to mean even a dime less will be spent on the military. Bothering IRS agents, who don’t set government spending policy, is pointlessly annoying. Furthermore he wanted it known that Mennonites like him who oppose war tax resistance are also being conscientious, and should not be asked to violate their consciences.

Marge Roberts responded. For her, war tax resistance was at its core an outreach tool:

[T]he center of my using this method of resisting is the opportunity present to witness to many individuals and groups about my feelings around peace issues. My tax resistance brings my convictions into the awareness of a much wider forum of my fellows than just the IRS; many facets of my life are touched and opened to people not otherwise thinking of how much we allow ourselves to be used by the government to do evil.

She gave several examples: her employers at a Lutheran church who ultimately decided to stop withholding taxes from her salary, a real estate agent who learned of a federal tax lien against her, the officers of a bank who refused her a loan because of that lien, IRS agents who came to seize her car.

Eric Coursey was even more fed up than Lehman. Just look at the darned Bible, he wrote. He gave the by-now-familiar tour of Romans 13, Matthew 17, Matthew 22, and so forth, and accused those who weren’t willing to go along with his interpretation of those verses of preferring modern cultural trends to the Word of God.

Harold R. Regier, the Commission on Home Ministries secretary for peace and social concerns, had an op-ed in the 17 May 1977 edition on the social responsibilities of Christians. At first he struck a tone that harmonized with Coursey’s complaint: “Too often we buckle under the heresy some call ‘civil religion.’ Social, political, and economic values determine the shape of our faith. The world presses us into its mold.” But rather than counseling obedience, as Coursey did, he counseled “prophetic witness,” and gave this example:

On November 19, 1976, the judgment of a U.S. tax court ruled that the levying of taxes for war purposes does not interfere with the individual’s free exercise of religion. If religion means only to worship together in a building or only to relate your personal self to God, then paying military taxes is no violation of religion. But if our religion moves us from the pew to see our neighbors as part of God’s world, then that court couldn’t be more wrong.

Some overdue skepticism about the World Peace Tax Fund act started to surface in the pages of The Mennonite in 1977 too. This brief note comes from the 13 September edition:

Objections to the World Peace Tax Fund Act were stated in the first prize essay of the C. Henry Smith Peace Oratorical Contest. Winner Phil M. Shenk, student at Eastern Mennonite College, Harrisonburg, Virginia, points out that the fund would not reduce the military budget and may lull the consciences of nonresistant persons, diluting “the church’s prophetic voice against the world’s ungodly love for war.” The fund is a proposal in the U.S. Congress in which conscientious objectors could designate their federal income, estate, and gift taxes for a special fund devoted to nonmilitary purposes.

An article by Shenk followed, in the 13 December edition:

Mennonite church bodies are officially recognizing the World Peace Tax Fund (WPTF) as an attractive option for a peace witness. Yet, is the WPTF a biblically faithful response to a war-mongering world? Does it fit the nature of Christ’s gospel?

The WPTF would change the Internal Revenue Code, allowing conscientious objectors to channel the military portion of their federal income, estate, and gift taxes to a special fund devoted to “nonmilitary purposes.” But here, as in conscription, does the legitimization of objection to war strengthen the protest or does it mortally wound personal conviction and severely weaken social impact?

The church confronts a world at odds with its values. The world values its military budgets. The polaric opposite of this value system is found in the love of Christ which prioritizes life. Because of Christ’s spirit of love, the church’s whole mission must call the world to change its doom-full directions away from death into life. This is a call to salvation, and, Andre Trocme declares, it is a “doctrine applicable to a society, as well as to an individual.”

The character of this salvation is found in the suffering-servant nature of the Savior. Christ did not withdraw in the face of suffering. He purposefully rejected the temptation to create an insulated life and instead faithfully extended his life and values among people who finally killed him for it. Today we call this agape or self-giving love. Agape finds its sole justification in the revelation of God as interpreted in Scripture.

The WPTF concept, on the other hand, appears to rely heavily on the state-decreed right of the individual to the free exercise of religion. By offering the opportunity to avoid financial participation in war, the state claims to respect the consciences of those persons opposing war. But what exactly is being respected here? Does this conscience have only to do with individual personal values, or does its sphere of influence penetrate the social realm as well? The latter is a political challenge.

The WPTF obviously would strengthen official respect for the personal consciences of those persons opposed to financial participation in war. But what impact would the WPTF have on the social consciences of persons opposed to war? Might it not tend to dilute the church’s prophetic voice against the world’s ungodly love for war?

The early church was seduced by the Roman emperor Constantine’s legalization of the church. Its strength was sapped; its faith made tolerant by tolerance. Official recognition of the church was fourth-century doublespeak for subsuming it within the state’s umbrella of political support, itemization, and diluted plurality.

The Mennonite church has been aptly characterized as the “quiet in the land,” and more recently, the “silent in the suburbs.” We would do well to critically look at how special legal exemptions in the past have influenced our convictions against war. Special niches tend to foster reclusive passivity.

The objection could be raised that the WPTF is an act of positive involvement instead of an act of withdrawal. It diverts tax monies into peace-promoting activities. Just as doing voluntary service is seen as more constructive than sitting in jail, the legal alternative in the WPTF is taken to be more responsible than tax resistance. But is this really true? I think not.

The church’s faithful response would include both positive action and negative protest. What if the draft-age persons illegally refused to comply with the draft while nondraftable brothers and sisters voluntarily furthered peace positively in voluntary service? Is this not a more balanced peace agenda for the church? Similarly, though the war tax issue hits all wage earners, the current high standard of living allows the church to do both again — protest by refusing to pay war taxes and at the same time promote peace positively by giving time and money to peace projects.

It is vain thinking to proffer the WPTF as a way to reduce the military budget. The military will get its money anyway, as long as the majority of people are oblivious of the inhumanness and ungodliness of killing. It is imperative that the strongest most diligent efforts of protest be maintained, even when confronted with an unbelieving and hostile generation. Though affirmed years ago, Tertullian’s words still ring true: “The blood of martyrs is seed.”

What resources then does the church have to protest with? I cannot improve on John Howard Yoder when he says that at times “the most effective way to take responsibility is to refuse to collaborate… This refusal is not a withdrawal from society. It is rather a major negative intervention within the process of social change, a refusal to use unworthy means even for what seems to be a worthy end.”

Thus, as an alternative to the WPTF, I submit simple yet active tax resistance as the best, most faithful way in which the church can witness to society on war taxes. True, the money will be eventually taken by the Internal Revenue Service and the military, yet not without sparking some public interest and provoking numerous forums in which to voice one’s concern.

Worldly priorities must be objected to in word and deed. If the objecting deeds are performed legally, they register little if any protest. If consciously illegal, they register an unequivocal refusal to agree with the world’s values. The latter gets the attention of the state, the former does not.

Simple tax resistance would free the church to spend its energies calling the whole world to salvation rather than saving just itself.

The church’s “in-ness” but “not-of-ness” demands that it be actively concerned about the nonchurched world. Christ as Lord is subject to no other authority. Because of this, the church’s most crucial task is to prophetically and faithfully enact and promote Christ’s values in life without regard for political limitations or definitions. The politics of Jesus are not those of compromise, but those of dogged, active, and consistent faithfulness.

Finally, the 20 December 1977 edition included a brief note about Margaret and Weldon Nisly who were withholding the federal excise tax on their phone service and sending the money to charity.