Tax resistance in the “Peace Churches” →
Quakers →
18th century Quakers →
David Cooper
Over the course of several issues in and , the Friends’ Review published excerpts from the journals of David Cooper, parts of which concerned Quaker war tax resistance during and after the American Revolution:
At the Yearly Meeting, in the fall of , under a sense of the judgments now in our land, and the many deviations from the simplicity and purity of our profession, into which we, as a people, had slidden, and thereby as justly perhaps as any other of the inhabitants, provoked the Almighty to inflict this scourge; Friends became deeply exercised that under this humbling dispensation a reformation might take place.
For this purpose, a recommendation was sent to Quarterly and Monthly Meetings, to appoint committees; which was done in our Quarter, and they attended Conferences at the several meetings.
A select number visited the ministers, elders, and overseers, and some time after the families of Friends generally.
In the service I assisted.
It was a humbling, laborious season, and the desired effect, it may be sorrowfully said, has too little appeared: too few of us being sufficiently careful to confirm by example what we recommend in words.
A sense of this brought diverse things more closely into consideration, whereby they appeared to me different from what they had heretofore, as respecting dress, Congress money, our peaceable testimony, etc. To bear this testimony faithfully, I clearly saw that I could do nothing which manifestly aided or abetted those who were actually engaged in war, which those who pay taxes directly raised for the purpose of supporting soldiery, do in an essential manner.
For this reason, I have paid no tax for war during all these commotions, nor received a penny of their money for bedding, clothing, provisions, hay, grain, etc., which they have taken from me, offering money or orders therefor; nor have I sold to their commissioners anything I had.
Nor was I free to receive, out of a forfeited estate, a large debt which was due to me, as I considered the selling of those estates, for the most part, cruel and unchristian.
I also found a restraint from having anything more to do with continental currency, which had become a vehicle of such public mischief, that few could touch it without suffering thereby, or causing others to suffer.
This was a pinching trial.
My interest was likely to be greatly affected.
I stood wholly alone among my friends, and expected censure from them, for I had been an advocate for a contrary conduct in both cases.
I also saw how feeble precept is, unless strengthened by example, and being sometimes engaged to enjoin simplicity, and to recommend others to confine themselves to things necessary and useful, I found it obligatory to set an example in these respects.
In the alterations into which I was thus led, I felt the reasoning and struggling of nature harder to overcome, than ever I had in greater matters; therefore, whoever may read this, beware that you account nothing to be a little thing, which the light within you shows you ought to deny yourself of.
In , I had appointed to join Mark Reeve in visiting meetings in the counties of Philadelphia and Bucks; but a few days before the time of starting, my horse, which would readily have brought forty pounds, was taken by a constable for a tax of about four pounds.
Thus I seemed prevented, but Mark was earnest to have my company; I therefore purposed to borrow a beast and to meet him on Fifth-day in Philadelphia, where he was to attend Monthly Meeting.
A severe storm prevented my obtaining one, and I relinquished the thought of going; but on Fourth-day evening a neighbor’s lad brought my horse home.
As he could give no account upon what terms he was returned, I hesitated about receiving him lest I might subject myself to be charged with double dealing.
On weighing the matter, however, I felt easy to take him…
[The Rhode Island] Yearly Meeting was sitting….
By a previous rule, such who paid any tax wholly for the support of war, should be dealt with as offenders, but Friends were allowed to pay mixed taxes, a part whereof was for civil purposes and part for war, nor were the sufferings of those who declined to pay these taxes received or recorded.
This subject now occasioned much debate, which resulted in a minute directing such sufferings to be recorded as their testimony against war.
The committee on Sufferings, appointed in , had in reported that the statement of sufferings sent from Evesham should in their judgment not be sent forward, but remain with the Quarterly Meeting’s papers, as being so clear and explicit as to answer the direction of the Yearly Meeting.
This report was confirmed.
In the standing committee reported that statements of sufferings unmixed and wholly for declining the payment of war taxes, ought to remain among the papers of the Monthly Meeting, and go no further.
This report was objected to, and a minute was made suspending a final decision upon it, till the sense of the Yearly Meeting could be obtained.
In it was moved to appoint a committee to aid the clerk in framing a minute for the Yearly Meeting; the necessity of which in so plain a case caused a little debate.
Ten Friends were, however, appointed, in which number I was included, and we met on seventh-day preceding the Quarterly Meeting at Salem at this time, when the object of the appointment appeared very obvious, from the means employed to prevent the matter being sent forward.
The effort failed, however, and our statement of the subject being laid before the Quarterly Meeting was approved, and the clerk directed to send it to next Yearly Meeting.
Thus it stands at present.
This matter appeared rather marvelous to me, when I consider the very small number in this large Quarterly Meeting who suffer on this account, and the great opposition that has constantly been shown, and endeavors even in a Quarterly Meeting capacity, to deny such distraints as being sufferings for our peaceable testimony.
Whether, under the very great falling away from this scruple that we have seen of late, any advantage will arise from sending it up at this time, remains to be seen.
Could the directions of the Yearly Meeting have been simply complied with, it would have been abundantly my choice, in preference to sending up this question.
These New England Friends were truly exemplary in their conduct and conversation.
They declined using West India produce, as coming through the channel of slavery.
Joseph Mitchell had other scruples which did not feel to me of equal weight.
He avoided going to the houses or partaking with those who imported or retailed such produce; he also avoided wearing silver and the use of silver utensils….
At our Yearly Meeting in , were John Storer, from Old England; Job Scott, from New England; Daniel Haviland, Edward Halleck, and Tideman Hull, from York Government.
The question sent from our Quarter, respecting war taxes, was referred to a committee of thirty-six Friends, including three, who, in our Quarterly Meeting, had opposed the sending forward of sufferings on that account.
This committee reported their unanimous sense that an account of such sufferings ought to be kept and sent up as other sufferings are.
This report was confirmed without one word of opposition.
John Storer informed the meeting that he had attended each of the sittings of the committee, and was sensible that Divine good attended their deliberations.
Thus the clear, full, united sense of the body is given, owning those sufferings to be for the testimony of truth; which, I trust, occasioned in many minds reverent thankfulness to the Master of our assemblies, and tended to strengthen and encourage to faithfulness in suffering for his cause and truth.
For, indeed, that this matter should be so calmly and unitedly resulted, appeared marvelous in the eyes of some of us.
At the end of this last excerpt, the editor of the Friends’ Review added: “This question of taxes appears to have elicited much discussion, which was carried on with warmth, and, on one side at least, with no little sophistry, evidence of which is contained in letters now laying before us.
Our Lord’s miracle, providing for the payment of tribute, was much harped upon.”
The Review also printed the text of a letter to Cooper from his nephew, Joseph Whitall:
I read with singular satisfaction the piece which you lent me respecting taxes, as it was very strengthening to my mind, which before was somewhat encompassed with weakness on this account.
Whenever the matter came before me, it appeared very plain that it would be an inconsistency for Friends to pay this tax.
But what weighed in my mind was this: Whether I as an individual had so known the truth and a stability in it, as to lay myself open to suffering by refusing to pay; believing that unless the building is laid on this foundation the storms will overthrow it.
The evening after you first mentioned the subject to me, as I returned home, the matter was brought into more close consideration than I had known it, apprehensive that the time of trial was not afar off.
Several discouragements at that time presented; my situation as being entirely dependent on my father and having no property of my own, I must either consent to his paying it or submit to go to prison; as also the thought of what elder Friends, who did not refuse, would judge of me for so doing.
In this situation, I was engaged to feel after resignation and quietude of mind, which I was favored in some measure to experience, believing that if I should be so required, I should be strengthened to bear up under it.
After I had returned home, and sat awhile in retirement with (I believe I may say) a single desire to be rightly guided in this weighty matter, several Scripture texts were presented to view, and the thing appeared so plain to me, I had then to believe that if I ever consented to the payment of such a tax, I should be condemned by the Light which maketh manifest: and my confidence was greatly strengthened in the holy Arm of Power, which made and sustains all things.
But I have since felt much weakness, and had come to no solid conclusion of mind, until I read your little manuscript, which caused my heart to rejoice, under a feeling sense that it is the truth which leads those who walk and abide in it to hold forth this testimony unto the world.
And oh, says my soul, that I may yield faithful obedience to its monitions, let what will be the consequence.
Soon after I had read the piece, my father came home, when I asked how the present tax was to be appropriated; and being told that none of it relates to war, I was glad notwithstanding that I had felt such a settlement of mind.
Here are some excerpts from the journal of American Quaker David Cooper concerning Quaker conscientious objectors who were imprisoned for refusing to pay militia exemption fines:
On , my son Paul, my brother’s son James, and two other young men, were taken prisoners by a constable and several armed men, for a military fine of £15 each.
They were allowed to return in and ordered to attend on the Colonel at Haddonfield , when they were again permitted to return, with orders to meet in a short time at the same place.
I then felt a freedom to accompany them.
On our arrival, William Harrison, the Sheriff, the Colonel, Captains, and other officers were met.
I had much conversation with them; they appeared very moderate, but were very earnest for me to pay the fine, and not suffer our sons to be committed to prison.
I told them they were aware that our religious principles forbade it; the young men were in their possession, and I had no desire to persuade them to deviate from what they believed their duty as officers required; but only wished them to use their power in a manner that would afford peace hereafter.
It was a matter of conscience; they ought therefore to be very tender, and not use rigor.
If they were committed I saw no end.
They could never pay the fines without wounding their own minds, nor could their friends do it for them.
They appeared friendly, and the young men being under the Sheriff’s care, he directed them to go home, and meet him at Woodbury at an appointed day.
He afterwards sent them word they need give themselves no further trouble till he called for them.
So the matter rested.
In the fore part of the winter of same year, I went with Thomas Redman to Cumberland, to join with a Committee of Salem Monthly Meeting, in endeavoring to obtain the enlargement of a young man, who had been nearly a year in close confinement, for non-payment of military fines, and very severely treated.
But the Friends on the appointment were so timid and fearful, that little could be done.
I desired a meeting with some of their principal men, but it could not then be obtained.
John Reeve went with us to see their Colonel, one Holmes.
He was very sour, and told us the Quakers were only fit to live by themselves, as we would not defend our property.
We had much conversation with him.
He appeared bitter and severe against the young man, saying he would soon have more company, as warrants were out for several others.
We then visited the prisoner, whom we found in a calm, sweet disposition.
He had resorted to making shoe heels, and earned sufficient to maintain himself.
Although our labors afforded little prospect of benefit, we returned home with satisfaction and peace of mind.
On , I went down again in company with Samuel Allinson.
The season had been so warm, that this day we saw peach blossoms. We now obtained a meeting with several of their principal men, an ex-Congressman, a Counsellor, two Judges, several Assembly men, Priest, Sheriff, &c. We spent several hours in answering their questions and endeavoring to remove their prejudices against the present conduct of Friends.
In the main they appeared to be satisfied, and expressed much satisfaction with this opportunity, which we had reason to believe was of considerable use.
Though they alleged it was not in their power, consistently with law, to release the prisoner until his fines were paid, yet they appeared very uneasy with keeping him there.
His fines were soon afterward paid by one not a Friend, and he was discharged.
Notwithstanding the threat of the sour Colonel, they have not committed another since, that I have heard of.
The committee on Sufferings, appointed in , had in reported that the statement of sufferings sent from Evesham should in their judgment not be sent forward, but remain with the Quarterly Meeting’s papers, as being so clear and explicit as to answer the direction of the Yearly Meeting.
This report was confirmed.
In the standing committee reported that statements of sufferings unmixed and wholly for declining the payment of war taxes, ought to remain among the papers of the Monthly Meeting, and go no further.
This report was objected to, and a minute was made suspending a final decision upon it, till the sense of the Yearly Meeting could be obtained.
In it was moved to appoint a committee to aid the clerk in framing a minute for the Yearly Meeting; the necessity of which in so plain a case caused a little debate.
Ten Friends were, however, appointed, in which number I was included, and we met on seventh-day preceding the Quarterly Meeting at Salem at this time, when the object of the appointment appeared very obvious, from the means employed to prevent the matter being sent forward.
The effort failed, however, and our statement of the subject being laid before the Quarterly Meeting was approved, and the clerk directed to send it to next Yearly Meeting.
Thus it stands at present.
This matter appeared rather marvelous to me, when I consider the very small number in this large Quarterly Meeting who suffer on this account, and the great opposition that has constantly been shown, and endeavors even in a Quarterly Meeting capacity, to deny such distraints as being sufferings for our peaceable testimony.
Whether, under the very great falling away from this scruple that we have seen of late, any advantage will arise from sending it up at this time, remains to be seen.
Could the directions of the Yearly Meeting have been simply complied with, it would have been abundantly my choice, in preference to sending up this question.
The story has a happy ending, as Cooper reports in a later journal entry:
These New England Friends were truly exemplary in their conduct and conversation.
They declined using West India produce, as coming through the channel of slavery.
Joseph Mitchell had other scruples which did not feel to me of equal weight.
He avoided going to the houses or partaking with those who imported or retailed such produce; he also avoided wearing silver and the use of silver utensils…
At our Yearly Meeting in , were John Storer, from Old England; Job Scott, from New England; Daniel Haviland, Edward Halleck, and Tideman Hull, from York Government.
The question sent from our Quarter, respecting war taxes, was referred to a committee of thirty-six Friends, including three, who, in our Quarterly Meeting, had opposed the sending forward of sufferings on that account.
This committee reported their unanimous sense that an account of such sufferings ought to be kept and sent up as other sufferings are.
This report was confirmed without one word of opposition.
John Storer informed the meeting that he had attended each of the sittings of the committee, and was sensible that Divine good attended their deliberations.
Thus the clear, full, united sense of the body is given, owning those sufferings to be for the testimony of truth; which, I trust, occasioned in many minds reverent thankfulness to the Master of our assemblies, and tended to strengthen and encourage to faithfulness in suffering for his cause and truth.
For, indeed, that this matter should be so calmly and unitedly resulted, appeared marvelous in the eyes of some of us.
I haven’t seen a copy of Cooper’s journal, but have taken these excerpts from an issue of the Friends’ Review (Volume 16, ) where they were published.
The editor of the Review adds here: “This question of taxes appears to have elicited much discussion, which was carried on with warmth, and, on one side at least, with no little sophistry, evidence of which is contained in letters now laying before us.
Our Lord’s miracle, providing for the payment of tribute, was much harped upon.”
Whenever the authorities arrested, prosecuted, imprisoned, or seized property
from Quaker war tax resisters, whatever Meeting that Quaker belonged to was
sure to make note of it in their book of “Sufferings.” These ordeals “for
conscience sake” were marks of honor and proofs of faith and these books were
in turn the evidence of martyrdom that sanctified the Meeting.
“Friends were always careful to put their sufferings on record,” wrote Stephen
B. Weeks, in Southern Quakers and Slavery. “Whatever
else the Quaker might suffer, he could not bear for the shade of oblivion to
come over the record of his testimonies.”
It was easier for a Quaker to exhibit fortitude in the face of government
reprisal if he or she knew that this would be remembered respectfully.
Monthly Meetings press their cases
It was a common practice for Monthly Meetings to pass their records of
sufferings along to be recorded also at the Quarterly Meeting level, and
then finally at the Yearly Meeting.
After the American Revolution, some American Monthly Meetings used this to
press for more respect for war tax resistance in the Yearly Meeting.
Officially, only Quakers whose tax resistance was due to militia exemption
taxes and other taxes that were explicitly and exclusively destined for war
spending were to have their sufferings recorded. But some Monthly Meetings
recorded sufferings for Quakers who were resisting general taxes, the bulk
of which went to pay off war debt.
In , David Cooper wrote of the Rhode Island
Yearly Meeting:
By a previous rule, such who paid any tax wholly for the support of war
should be dealt with as offenders, but Friends were allowed to pay mixed
taxes a part whereof was for civil purposes and part for war, nor were
sufferings of those who declined to pay these taxes received or recorded.
This subject now occasioned much debate, which resulted in a minute
directing such sufferings to be recorded as their testimony against
war.
In another case around the same time, the monthly meeting in Evesham, New
Jersey tried to forward the sufferings of its members who had refused to pay
war taxes, but their Quarterly Meeting in Salem balked at recording them and
forwarding them further. This led to a great deal of debate in the Quarterly
Meeting and kept war tax resistance on the front burner there — and also in
the Yearly Meeting, which appointed a committee of 36 Friends who unanimously
recommended that these sufferings be accepted and recorded.
Badges awarded by the Women’s Tax Resistance League
As I mentioned
the British
women’s suffrage movement awarded badges to women who had been imprisoned
for the cause, which is a different way of making note of and commemorating
such things.
Poll Tax resisters in the United Kingdom
When local council governments in the United Kingdom tried to shame tax
resisters by publishing their names in the newspapers during the Poll Tax
rebellion of the Thatcher era, the newspapers who published the lists of
“shame” found themselves on the receiving end of letters to the editor from
resisters who were outraged that they had not made the list — and demanding
that their names be included too!
There are many ways to support tax resisters when they are targeted by the
police or courts, including:
Today I’ll finish off this series by mentioning some other examples of ways
sympathizers, supporters, and organized campaigns have responded to the arrest,
trial, or imprisonment of tax resisters.
Mass action in response to arrests
When elderly pensioner Sylvia Hardy was imprisoned for refusing to
continue to pay her ever-rising council tax, supporters started a daily
vigil outside Exeter Cathedral to bring attention to her plight. “Judging
from the passers-by,” one said, “most people are fully aware of what’s
happened to her and we’ve had a lot of sympathy and interest.”
When Australian miners refused to pay a license tax in
, they resolved that if any one of them
were arrested: “it should be reported to the [tax resistance] committee by
the nearest observer; they would immediately call a monster meeting, and
the whole of the people would deliver themselves into custody.”
In , Australian miners were at it again,
this time resisting the income tax. They voted on a resolution that said,
in part, that upon “any member being sent to prison for refusing to pay,
that all unionists be called on immediately to stop work, and refuse to
recommence until such member is released, or the garnished money is
refunded.”
In Beidenfleth, Germany, between the World Wars, farmers were unable to
keep up with their tax payments, and decided to strike rather than see
themselves further impoverished. When fifty-seven were indicted for
interfering with a tax seizure, hundreds of others who either had been
involved with that action (or who wished they could have been), demanded
to be tried alongside them:
[A] fever seemed to grip the countryside. From far and wide the peasants
poured into Itzehoe, where the case was to be tried, with wild cries of
self-accusation. The public prosecutor could not walk down the streets
without being at once mobbed by powerful, earnest men begging him to
lift the heavy weight of guilt from their shoulders and to restore their
inner peace of mind by issuing a writ against them.
Honor prisoners
While people were desperately trying to get themselves indicted for tax
resistance in Beidenfleth, those who succeeded were honored:
The Beidenfleth Heifer Case developed into a regular popular festival.
Maidenly hands strung garlands about the necks of those enviable
peasants who had achieved the honour of receiving a writ.
I’ve mentioned before the badges awarded by the Women’s Tax Resistance
League to those who had gone to prison in the course of the campaign, and
how those so awarded were given the place of honor at campaign events
(see The Picket
Line for ).
It was also common for the League to throw luncheons or other such events
to honor imprisoned resisters upon their release.
The annuity tax resisters in Edinburgh, Scotland, honored one imprisoned
resister with “a piece of plate for his conduct on this occasion.” Another
time, they passed the hat for contributions, which, when the money was
given to resister Thomas Russell, he said: “We shall give it to the
Annuity Tax League, to enable them to carry out their operations in the
abolishment of the tax.”
A plaque on the Cass County, Missouri courthouse building honors the five
county judges who were imprisoned for contempt for refusing to order the
county to collect taxes to pay off fraudulent railroad bonds
.
Formal shows of support
When John Brown Smith, a lone Christian anarchist tax resister who was
imprisoned for tax resistance for about a year
, a convention of
“Liberalists” in Boston passed a resolution in support of Smith’s stand,
saying: “That in suffering eight months’ imprisonment in the orthodox
Republican hell of Northampton, rather than pay his taxes, John Brown Smith
has shown discerning wisdom and invincible courage, which place him high
among the world’s benefactors, and disclose a practical way to vanquish
sanguinary forces without shedding innocent or vicious blood.”
One of the Cass County judges who went to jail for refusing to obey a
higher court order to impose taxes on the county to pay for fraudulent
railroad bonds, was elected to the state legislature by the citizens of
the county while he was in prison.
When war tax resister Zerah C. Whipple was in jail for his stand, the
Connecticut State Peace Society passed a series of resolutions in support.
For example: “Resolved: That it is a great, previous, and sanctifying
privilege of us all, to feel that in his bonds we are bound with him, and
to pour our heart’s holiest sympathies into his cup of trial.”
The Women’s Tax Resistance League and allied organizations would pass
resolutions in support of imprisoned resisters, send telegrams of
congratulation to resisters who were being jailed for the cause, and hold
meetings to especially commemorate and support their stand.
Petition the government for leniency
When a number of young Quaker men were imprisoned for failure to pay a
militia exemption tax in , David Cooper
followed them to jail, and met with the officers who were holding them
captive. He wrote:
I had much conversation with them; they appeared very moderate, but were
very earnest for me to pay the fine, and not suffer our sons to be
committed to prison. I told them they were aware that our religious
principles forbade it; the young men were in their possession, and I had
no desire to persuade them to deviate from what they believed their duty
as officers required; but only wished them to use their power in a
manner that would afford peace hereafter. It was a matter of conscience;
they ought therefore to be very tender, and not use rigor. If they were
committed I saw no end. They could never pay the fines without wounding
their own minds, nor could their friends do it for them. They appeared
friendly, and the young men being under the Sheriff’s care, he directed
them to go home, and meet him at Woodbury at an appointed day. He
afterwards sent them word they need give themselves no further trouble
till he called for them. So the matter rested.
The Women’s Tax Resistance League would write letters of inquiry to
government officials whenever one of them was imprisoned. For instance,
when Kate Harvey was jailed, Charlotte Despard wrote to her representative
in Parliament to point out the discrepancy between her cruel sentence and
the wrist-slaps given to men for similar offenses. “I cannot believe,
sir,” she wrote, “that you will permit this injustice to be done. … Mrs.
Harvey is one whose time, service and money are given to the rescue of
little destitute children, and to the help of those not so fortunately
placed as herself. While such injustices as these are permitted by the
authorities, can you wonder that women are in revolt?” League member Marie
Lawson started what she called a “snowball” protest — a sort of chain
letter that sympathizers were supposed to send to their friends that
included a postcard-sized petition they could send to various government
figures.
When American war tax resister Maurice McCracken was imprisoned, supporters
sent a telegram to President Eisenbower, asking him to release the
prisoner (they got a vague, noncommittal reply).
Somewhat related to this is that when the American Revolution broke out,
one item on the agenda of the revolutionaries from North Carolina was the
legal rehabilitation of the tax rebels who had been convicted at the end
of the Regulator movement of
.
When trying to bring new tax resisters into a movement, there are lots of hopeful short-cuts, but sometimes there is no substitute for addressing potential resisters individually: whether that be through letters, petitions, or face-to-face meetings.
When the United States approved a billion-dollar military aid package to the government of Colombia in , the president of the Mennonite Church of Colombia, Peter Stucky, and Ricardo Esquivia, the director of that church’s Justapaz organization and the coordinator of the Evangelical Council of Colombia’s Human Rights and Peace Commission, wrote a letter to their sister churches in the U.S..
In that letter, they explained the disastrous consequences of fueling the civil war and the military wing of the war on drugs there, explained how the church there was trying to respond more productively to the crisis, and called on churches in the U.S. to do their part:
In reality, the government of the United States, using the tax-payers money, is supporting the Colombian government in what we consider to be a negative form.
This means that the message arriving from the North to the Colombian people becomes a message of death and destruction.
For that reason we are calling the churches in the North to redeem their taxes, on one hand by demanding that the U.S. government invests this money in life-producing projects, and on the other hand by redirecting part of their taxes toward a different project in your community or the world that promotes abundant and dignified life, as our Lord Jesus Christ has commanded us.
The American Mennonite Central Committee responded by urging taxpayers to redirect their taxes from the U.S. government to the Mennonite-run “Taxes for Peace” fund, which in turn would be dedicated that year to peace-building efforts in Colombia.
This sort of advocacy can be dangerous, as this next example will show.
In , R.W. Benner, a Mennonite minister, got worried reports from members of his congregation who were being told in no uncertain terms that they would buy so-called “Liberty Bonds” to support the U.S. war effort, or they would answer for their refusal.
Benner wrote to his bishop, L.J. Heatwole, who responded with a letter in which he reiterated the position of the church that Mennonite brethren “Do not aid or abet war in any form… [and] Contribute nothing to a fund that is used to run the war machine.”
He noted:
In a number of places where brethren have refused to contribute to the different war funds, outlandish threats have been made and in a few cases have been put into execution — such as, tar and feathering, painting houses yellow, decorating autos and buildings with flags to test them out on their principles of nonresistance.
But he urged his fellow-Mennonites to keep the faith and to embrace this sort of martyrdom like good Christians.
Benner conveyed this message to his flock.
For this, both of them were charged under the Espionage Act and convicted.
(To give you some idea of the railroading involved, Heatwole did not learn that a guilty plea had been entered on his behalf by his court-appointed attorney until after he appeared for the trial!)
Letters, or “epistles,” from war tax resisting Quakers to their fellow-Friends were an important way of spreading and maintaining the practice in the Society.
American war tax resistance can be said to have begun on , when John Woolman, Anthony Benezet, and several other Quakers addressed a letter in which they explained to other Friends why
as we cannot be concerned in wars and fightings, so neither ought we to contribute thereto by paying the tax directed by the [recent] Act, though suffering be the consequence of our refusal, which we hope to be enabled to bear with patience.
David Cooper reflected on how thoughtful letters like these helped him maintain his war tax resistance in times of doubt:
I read with singular satisfaction the piece which you lent me respecting taxes, as it was very strengthening to my mind, which before was somewhat encompassed with weakness on this account.… I have since felt much weakness, and had come to no solid conclusion of mind, until I read your little manuscript, which caused my heart to rejoice, under a feeling sense that it is the truth which leads those who walk and abide in it to hold forth this testimony unto the world.
And oh, says my soul, that I may yield faithful obedience to its monitions, let what will be the consequence.
Yearly Meetings would sometimes send letters to Quarterly or Monthly Meetings to reiterate the Quaker position on war tax resistance and give instructions as to how it should be enforced.
For instance, this is from an letter from the North Carolina Yearly Meeting:
…all our members should stand firm, and be faithful in bearing their testimony against war and military operations; taxes and fines appertaining thereunto, either directly or indirectly; or any way conniving or compromising with the specious and plausible offers of the legislature, by the tax proposed in the late act, to screen us from muster fines or military services.
And in order that all our members may be clearly informed on this subject, and be fully prepared to meet the trial likely to come upon us by this law, we have thought it best to send it down in this epistle.
An organizer of the Dublin water charge strike recalls:
…months of work had been done in local areas convincing people of the primacy of [non-payment].
This was done through local public meetings, door-to-door leaflets and even knocking on doors and talking to people… The building of the campaign in this way was crucial.
Local campaign groups were built and then came together and federated, rather than a central committee being formed first and then coming along to organise people.
…it became clear that while people might not have come out to the meeting, they had kept the information about the campaign and the campaign contact numbers had their place on a lot of fridge doors.
American women’s suffrage activist Anna Howard Shaw wrote a letter to women in the movement in , urging them to refuse to fill out income tax returns.
“In this manner we can show our loyalty to those who struggled to make this a free republic and who laid down their lives in defense of the equal rights of all free citizens to a voice in their own Government.
… Let our protest be universal, and let every believer in justice unite in this mode of passive resistance and steadfastly refuse to assist the Government in its unjust and tyrannical violation of its fundamental principle that ‘taxation and representation are one and inseparable,’ and thus prove ourselves worthy descendants of noble ancestors, who counted no price too dear to pay in defense of liberty and equality and justice.”
She told a reporter: “Since my letter was sent all over the country, I have received letters of encouragement and support from all directions,” and she soon thereafter won support for her stand from the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage.
Only some of the women’s suffrage activists in Britain were responsible for paying taxes, so although tax resistance was an important part of the campaign there, it was a part not everybody could participate in.
The movement made a special effort to find women who had taxes they could resist.
For example, at one meeting in , Margaret Kineton Parkes “asked anyone present who knew women who paid taxes to send in their names, that they might be approached by her society.”
In , Marie Lawson launched what she called a “snowball” protest: a sort of chain letter in which she sent out letters that advocated tax resistance (and protested on behalf of an imprisoned resister) and that asked the recipients to join her and to in turn send the same letter “to at least three friends.”
Public burnings of poll tax notices were good excuses for people to join in festive resistance activities.
The campaign to resist Thatcher’s Poll Tax used some creative outreach techniques (quotes from Danny Burns’s history of the movement):
“The Aberdeen Anti-Poll Tax group was formed when people from the radical bookshop came together with a community arts group:
“…The local community arts group had a theatre group called “Wise Up” and they got a show together about the Poll Tax.
They took this show around the estates with information for people about registration and how to fight it, to encourage them to set up local groups and support networks.
The plays were performed in local community centres.
Attendance for the plays varied from about 10 to 40 or more.
The meetings which followed were encouraging because people gave their names as contacts or asked people to set up future meetings.”
“In my local group… the union was built up through a door-to-door campaign.
A group of five or six people (mostly friends) formed the core.
They advertised a public meeting on the Poll Tax and about 50 people turned up.
Out of these some joined the organising group.
This small group then mass-produced a window poster which said ‘No Poll Tax Here.’
The poster was dropped through the letter-boxes of 2000 households and the group waited to see who put them up.
Posters appeared in about 100 windows.
Activists then went round and spoke to these people individually, inviting them to attend the next organising meeting; about fifteen did — enough to form the core of a group.”
“[Our] network was strengthened by a door-to-door survey of over 500 households.
The survey was not intended to be scientifically accurate.
Its purpose was to give the APTU a fairly accurate picture of what was happening on the ground, and, perhaps more significantly, it was a pretext for engaging people in conversation about the Poll Tax, informing them of the non-payment campaign and encouraging them to join their local APTU.… Over a third of the people canvassed became paid up members of the union.
By the end of the exercise Easton had over 300 members and street reps for almost every street.
The canvass was not left there.
The key to its success was the second visit.
The group compiled all the statistics on a street by street basis and many of the reps then went back, door-to-door, and told people the results of the survey in their street and the neighbouring streets.
A newsletter was delivered to everyone telling them what the overall results were for Easton.
This meant that people knew how few of their neighbours were going to pay and it gave them confidence not to pay themselves.
They had spoken to the canvassers personally, so they knew that the survey was genuine.”
“An independent television company approached the Easton group in order to work with us on a film about the Poll Tax.
The film was never shown, but the way the community was engaged in the process of making it is instructive.
The film producers wanted a shot of all the doors in the street, opening one by one as the occupants came out of their houses with banners and signs.
Charles, the local street rep, went round to people’s houses every evening for a week and explained to them what was wanted.
Out of 30 houses in the street (a cul-de-sac) 28 agreed to participate.
The street is multi-racial with a fairly wide class mix.
It was inspiring to see white working class men standing shoulder to shoulder with Asian women and their kids, holding the same banners and engrossed in conversation.
Some of them had never spoken to each other before.
The film was made, but more importantly, as [a] result of making it, virtually every one of those households joined the Union, and most still had posters in their windows a year later.
People were brought into the campaign, not through a leaflet or a canvasser, but through an interesting activity.
They didn’t have to go to the campaign, it came to them.”
