Some historical and global examples of tax resistance →
United States →
Vietnam War, ~1965–75 →
Writers & Editors War Tax Protest, 1967 →
Norman Thomas
Writers and Editors War Tax Protest
Attention: Gerald Walker
145 West 86th Street
Apt. 7D
New York, N.Y. 10024
Fellow Writers and Editors:
Join us in signing the enclosed statement proclaiming our refusal to let our
tax dollars support the war in Vietnam. Tell us in writing that we may list
your name with ours in ads and statements. Send us your check for $10.00 or
more (payable to Writers and Editors War Tax Protest) to pay for advertising
and other expenses. Ask other writers and editors to join. Mail copies of
this letter and the enclosed statement, “We Won’t Pay” (which will comprise
the substance of ads we plan to run), to your own list of colleagues. Extra
copies available at $1.00 per hundred, plus 25¢ for mailing.
How we will go about tax refusal
Should President Johnson’s surcharge be adopted by Congress, we will
refuse payment. We will not add this extra war tax to our current tax
when preparing our return and we will enclose a letter with our return
explaining why.
Many of us will also deduct from our tax the 23% which represents the
amount currently being spent on Vietnam.
Possible consequences
It is a violation (up to one year in prison and/or up to $10,000 in fines) of
Sec. 7203 of the Internal
Revenue Code willfully to refuse to pay federal income taxes. However, of the
421 signers of a similar no-payment ad in ,
not one has been prosecuted and sentenced; of the estimated 1500 additional
protest non-payers, none has been prosecuted since the war began. The
IRS, so
far, has chosen to exercise the power to collect unpaid tax money by placing
a lien on refusers’ income or attaching their bank accounts or other assets,
when these can be traced. In addition, a penalty of 6% interest is charged
annually on the unpaid tax balance, a rate estimated to be less than the
collection expense.
Vietnam drags on. Casualties rise, $28 billion are wasted yearly,
U.S. prestige and
moral fabric rot away. No solution, political or military, is in view. The
President’s prescription is more of the same — 45,000 new men (for a total of
525,000) and a proposed 10% income tax increase specifically for this
undeclared, unconstitutional, unprofitable, and unjust war.
“The needs of this country’s riot-shaken cities are being neglected to pay
the war bill,” The New York Times has
editorialized. It is time for escalation by those who want peace in
order to focus on our critical domestic dilemma. Peace marches have not
worked; nor have pickets, protest ads, teach-ins, or pleas to the President’s
conscience by public figures here and abroad. We are not consoled by reports
of atrocities committed by the other side; we want to stop those committed by
our side. So we must now go beyond mere expressions of dissent to strong,
affirmative, and dramatic action by responsible citizens.
We, the undersigned writers and editors for publications and publishing
houses large and small, have not had to give our lives in Vietnam — that has
fallen on younger Americans. But we have lent our passive support in the form
of our tax dollars. From now on, we are willing to lay our middle-class lives
on the line in pledging:
That none of us voluntarily will pay the proposed 10% income tax
surcharge, or any war-designated tax increase.
That many of us will also refuse to pay that part of our current income
tax (23%) being used to finance the war.
Many of us, too, will give an equivalent sum to humanitarian organizations.
Even so, this was not an easy decision to make. We have been law-abiding,
tax-paying citizens all our lives, and we are now subjecting ourselves to
possible legal penalties of up to one year in prison and/or up to $10,000 in
fines for willful non-payment of taxes. But we believe our taxes should not
be used to support a war that violates not only our own Constitution but the
Charter of the United Nations.
By this act, we aim to awaken the Administration to the fact that a
significant number of responsible citizens are so fundamentally opposed to
this war that they are willing to go to this extreme. And we wish to show
other Vietnam-haunted Americans that there is a simple, swift, effective way
to vote no-confidence in the Administration’s policy. It can be done
individually or in groups. It cannot wait until the 1968 presidential
election. Your ballot is your next tax return, and other ads such as this
placed in every newspaper in the land.
There are not enough prisons to hold the millions in this country who,
according to Gallup and other recent polls, strongly oppose this ugly war.
Time now to end our tacit acceptance of what is being done in Vietnam in our
name.
Much of the text of the above declaration didn’t make it in to the final
advertisement (I’m guessing it was cut down to make room for the many names
of signers, but maybe there was more to it than that). Horowitz himself did
not make the list.
I am enclosing a copy of the statement signed, so far, by 220 writers and
editors who pledge to refuse payment of the proposed 10 per cent income tax
surcharge or any tax increase earmarked for the Vietnam War. At this writing,
seven New York Times writers and editors have signed. We plan to run a
full-page advertisement in the Times in
, giving the quote from
Thoreau, the pledge and the list of names. The placing of the ad will
coincide with Congressional debate on the tax surcharge. By that time we hope
to have 500 persons pledged to refuse payment.
If you would be interested in signing the statement, please fill in the blank
and mail it in as soon as possible. And please tell your writer and editor
friends about it and urge them to do the same. As Thoreau said, “If a
thousand men were not to pay their tax bills this year, that would not be a
violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State
to commit violence and shed innocent blood.” During his incarceration for
refusal to pay his war tax, Thoreau was paid a visit by Emerson, who asked,
“What are you doing in here?” To which Thoreau replied, “What are you
doing out there?”
I feel strongly that the collective involvement of writers and editors in the
nation’s politics should not stop with the War Tax Protest. Many of our
colleagues share this view, and are preparing this fall to organize local
chapters of what can become a national writers and journalists association.
An organized and articulate “intelligentsia” can be a political force in
America as it is in France. And it must become a political force if
the increasingly oppressive policies of the present United States government — in Vietnam, in Southern Africa, in Latin America, and here at home — are to
be permanently reversed. Not to organize, not to amplify our voices so that
an ill-informed America may hear alternatives, is to accede, in effect, to
the policies of the present government. For more information, please write me
immediately at 377 Green Street, San Francisco, California 94133.
Included with this letter is a somewhat different version of the proposed ad:
— Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience,
commenting upon American involvement in the Mexican War.
We the undersigned writers and editors, believing that American involvement
in Vietnam is morally wrong, pledge:
None of us voluntarily will pay the proposed 10% income tax surcharge or
any war-designated tax increase.
Many of us will not pay that 23% of our current income tax which is
being used to finance the war in Vietnam.
Following this was a sign-up sheet, asking signers to agree with the statement
“I believe American involvement in the war in Vietnam is morally wrong,” and giving three further options:
“As a writer/editor, I wish to add my name to the Writers and Editors War Tax Protest. I dissociate myself from my government’s actions in Vietnam and I am willing to use my next tax return to vote no-confidence in the present Administration. I enclose a check (payable to Writers and Editors War Tax Protest) for $10.00 or more to help pay for running this statement as a newspaper advertisement and for other expenses.”
“I am in sympathy with what you are doing. Enclosed is my check for $____.”
“I would like more information. Please send me your fact-sheet on tax refusal.”
A number of additional signers had been added to the list by this time:
(Spock was listed out-of-order and in a different typeface in the original.)
On the government took
war tax resister Maurice McCrackin to court for his refusal to produce records
for the
IRS.
Here’s the photo, with the caption that accompanied it
in the Binghamton [New York] Press a couple of days later:
Hauled Into Court… Yep, Literally – The
Rev. Maurice McCrackin, who
has refused to pay income taxes because part of the money goes for military
purposes, again had to be carried into
U.S. District
Court at Cincinnati . He again
refused to plead to an indictment and was sentenced to jail for contempt. It
was a repeat performance. Carrying the pastor are Deputy
U.S. Marshal Ernie
Damico, left, and Internal Revenue Agent Vincent Brennan.
New York (AP) —
A clergyman said a White House
statement concerning a pacifist Presbyterian Minister jailed in Cincinnati
“doesn’t really deal with the issue.”
The comment came from the
Rev. John Swomley of Nyack,
national secretary of the Fellowship of Reconciliation, which describes
itself as an interdenominational, anti-Communist pacifist organization.
Swomley was one of 13 ministers who, with Norman Thomas, veteran New-York
Socialist, had appealed in a telegram to President Eisenhower to free the
Rev. Maurice F. McCrackin.
The Rev. Mr. McCrackin
declines to pay taxes because, he says they help pay for war weapons and he
believes war is evil. He was jailed for contempt and went on a fast that he
continued until . He will be tried
on income tax charges.
The petitioners said the jailing “takes on the appearance of persecution.”
The reply, signed by David W. Kindall, special counsel for the President, and
addressed to Thomas, said: “In reply to the telegram from you and 13
ministers, dated ,
the Justice Department advises the contempt action against Maurice McCrackin
was imposed on the Court’s own motion.
“Prompt action under indictment on charge of failure to obey summons insured
setting trial for .”
The Rev. Mr. Swomley said
the reply “told us what we already knew.”
Pacifist Minister Wheeled Into Court – The
Rev. Maurice McCrackin,
looking wan after a 15-day fast in jail, smiles as
U.S. deputy
marshals wheel him into Cincinnati court to face trial for failure to respond
to an internal revenue service summons. McCrackin, a Cincinnati minister, has
refused for years to pay a portion of his income taxes he figures go for war
purposes.
Attorneys for Pacifist Minister Battle On, Despite Denunciation by
U.S. Judge
Cincinnati (AP) —
Stung by a scathing denunciation of their client by a federal judge,
attorneys for a pacifist minister were ready today to fight on — whether
their disciple of civil disobedience likes it or not.
The attack on the Rev.
Maurice F. McCrackin by Judge John H. Druffel came between the time a jury
convicted the minister and the judge sentenced him to six months in a federal
prison and fined him $250.
Rev. McCrackin was
convicted of refusing to answer an
Internal Revenue Service summons to discuss his refusal to pay federal income
taxes.
Judge Druffel told the 53-year-old bachelor minister — still gaunt from a
15-day jail-cell fast:
“Your pious attitude is more or less of a false face.”
Claims Red Sympathies
Then, after accusing Rev.
McCrackin of being a “pacifist agitator” and of associating “with those of
overwhelming Soviet sympathies.” the judge added:
“I don’t know of any more pious traitor than that.”
Although he was a court-appointed attorney who has served without pay,
co-counsel Theodore M. Berry leaped to his feet in protest.
“As an officer of this court,” he shouted, “the court is guilty of a grievous
error. There is not one iota of proof that
Rev. McCrackin is a
Communist.”
Berry and his co-counsel,
Prof. Fred O. Dewey of the
University of Cincinnati, were asked immediately after court adjourned if
they planned to appeal. Berry shot back heatedly:
“You’re damned right. What else can we do?”
One-Sided Presentations
Internal Revenue Service officials presented all the testimony for the
prosecution; only a handful of character witnesses appeared for the defense.
The entire trial was an off-beat affair. Through it all,
Rev.
McCrackin remained serene — and silent. He refused to stand in court, plead
to the indictment, defend himself or help his attorneys. While he awaited the
verdict, he read calmly from a book by Albert Schweitzer.
Only after the jury’s verdict — reached in only 19 minutes of
deliberation — did he break his silence. Even then, he said only:
“There is one thing I’d like to say. It is my earnest prayer that the
government will stop its war preparations and honor the consciences of those
who would stop these evils.”
Judge Makes Offer
Before sentencing. Judge Druffel disclosed that only a week ago, at a
pretrial hearing, he offered probation to the minister in return for a plea,
of nolo contendre (no contest).
But the minister of Cincinnati’s
St. Barnabas Presbyterian and
Episcopal church refused to have anything to do with the legal fight.
Faced with complete lack of cooperation by their client. Berry and Dewey
based almost their entire case on a contention the summons which
Rev. McCrackin refused
to honor was invalid, that it was issued by a person without authority to
issue it.
While Rev. McCrackin has
failed even to file income tax returns for on grounds much of the money would have been used for
armaments, the trial did not strike at the heart of this issue. It was
concerned solely with his refusal to answer the summons to discuss his tax
troubles.
the papers printed a
more thorough, bylined recap of McCrackin’s activism:
Tax-Resisting Cleric Viewed As Crusader — or Crackpot
by Harold Harrison Associated Press Writer
Cincinnati — (AP) –
Some persons call him a “crackpot.” Some call him a “publicity seeker.” Others — more charitable — refer to him as an “idealist” or a “zealot.” And his close followers look upon him as a beleaguered crusader for universal peace and brotherhood.
Rev. Maurice McCrackin
That is the Rev. Maurice
McCrackin, Cincinnati’s controversial Presbyterian minister whose passive
resistance to income taxes for military purposes and in behalf of rights of
Negroes three times have led him to jail.
The 56-year-old minister is a bland-appearing, mild-mannered man who has
become somewhat of a headache, not only to law enforcement officers but his
own Presbyterian church.
He is gray-haired, stands 5-feet 10½-inches tall and speaks in a
well-modulated tone with none of the histrionics that usually are associated
with persons who carry on such “crusades.”
A Bachelor
He is a bachelor and lives with a sister in the parsonage of the West
Cincinnati St. Barnabas
Church — a combined Episcopalian and Presbyterian church with both white and
Negro members.
As of now, however, he is only a member of the choir of the church. The
Cincinnati Presbytery several months ago forbade McCrackin from carrying on
the regular duties of a pastor and an appeal is pending. That stemmed from
his violation of civil law — refusal to pay income taxes.
“I sing in the choir and I attend church meetings” McCrackin said of his
present status. He also visits the sick but only as an individual.
He explained his status this week after he returned from Brownsville,
Tenn., where he served out
a fine for loitering in connection with an appearance, in behalf of Negro
sharecroppers who have been removed from their farms.
The Negroes claim they were evicted because they registered to vote in the
election. Landowners claim contracts to
farm the land were not renewed because of mechanization of farms and
reductions in cotton crop acreage.
Refused to Eat
Many of the Negroes have been living in a “tent city.”
During 25 days of his stay in jail in Brownsville, Mr. McCrackin refused to
eat in a passive resistance fast.
That was the third time McCrackin has been in jail.
However, a group of fellow-pastors reported
their investigation indicated the
Rev. Maurice McCrackin’s
conviction in Brownsville,
Tenn., was chiefly his own
fault.
In a report to the Presbytery of Cincinnati, the group’s Church and Community
Committee said:
“Mr. McCrackin’s refusal to testify on his own behalf and his refusal to
accept legal counsel left the court little choice but to find him guilty in
light of the evidence which was presented by the prosecution.
“Had Mr. McCrackin chosen to cooperate with authorities at any one of several
points and certainly during his trial, there is reason to believe that since
he did have a satisfactory explanation for his activities on the night of his
arrest, he might not have been found guilty.”
Feels War a Sin
He first began to attract widespread attention in
as a result of his long time refusal to pay
income taxes because part ot the money goes for military purposes and he
believes war to be a sin.
The Internal Revenue Service finally issued a summons for him to appear to
discuss his income tax problems. He refused to honor it and was haled into
Federal Court.
On that and subsequent appearances in court he refused to walk and had to be
carried into the courtroom.
He refused to make any plea or statement and the then
U.S. District
Judge John H. Druffel sent him to jail for contempt of court. He refused to
eat at that time.
Subsequently, he was carried into court again and Judge Druffel entered a
plea of innocent for him. Smiling blandly, the minister refused to stand in
court or cooperate with court-appointed attorneys and in
, he was convicted and
sentenced to six months in prison and fined $250.
He served his time in a correctional institution in Pennsylvania.
Later, the government sought unsuccessfully to collect back income taxes from
McCrackin’s share of his mother’s estate which he said he had renounced.
Tax Philosophy
It’s easy to arrive at either “crackpot,” “zealot”, or “crusader” description
from McCrackin’s philosophy on income taxes.
“I believe if we would withdraw support from something we think is wrong, we
couldn’t have wars,” he said. “If we begin to act unilaterally, we wouldn’t
have them. If the people would withdraw funds we would change the policy of
governments.
“It has been proven that the basis of keeping peace by terrorism never works.
There always will be an explosion and this time it will be an explosion of
extinction.”
McCrackin was asked what he felt would happen in other countries if the
United States should abandon all military preparations.
“We hope there would be enough individuals that would say the same thing and
that it would become part of a movement,” he replied.
Nat Hentoff, in his book about A.J. Muste — Peace Agitator () — naturally included some comments about his tax refusal.
Here is an excerpt:
[In Muste wrote The New York Times, saying in part:] “…[S]ince , I have refused to pay Federal income taxes because I felt I had to find every possible means to divorce myself from any voluntary support of the crowning irrationality and atrocity of atomic and bacterial war… I am by no means eager to go to prison; and I bear no ill will to any Federal officials or any one else.
But adolescent and growing youth should not be conscripted for atomic and bacterial war.
Young men like [imprisoned Quaker draft registration resister] Larry Gara ought not to be jailed for expressing their deepest religious convictions… Whether at liberty or in prison, where Larry Gara and these young men are, I belong.”
Muste’s decision to act on his beliefs concerning tax refusal was set off by a disagreement within the Fellowship of Reconciliation when Muste’s secretary decided she could not conscientiously pay Federal income tax and asked that the F.O.R. not withhold taxes from her pay.
After several months of debate within the organization, which led to a referendum of the membership, the majority declared, as John Nevin Sayre has explained, that “the F.O.R. should not break the law except on an issue, such as the refusal to fight in a war, on which all its members agree.
We in the majority felt that a person’s right not to pay taxes was a matter of individual conscience.
We would support that individual, but not to the point of refusing to withhold his or her taxes.”
Muste was on the losing side.
As an ordained minister, Muste did not have the problem of asking the Fellowship to stop withholding his taxes.
Accordingly, in and , he has simply informed Federal authorities that he is not paying taxes or filling out his return.
He was not questioned by Internal Revenue agents until , and he was not brought into court until .
He was then charged with owing $1,165 in taxes from as well as additional penalties for “non-filing of returns, for fraud, for non-payment, and for substantially underestimating his tax.”
John Nevin Sayre and Norman Thomas appeared as character witnesses for Muste, although Thomas disapproved of Muste’s position.
“I don’t think you do any good,” says Thomas, “by disrupting organized society.
Besides, I doubt if anyone has such complete control over what he does with his money that he can be sure none of it goes to support government activities of which he disapproves.
There are, after all, many hidden taxes in what you buy.”
Muste’s lawyer in his tax refusal campaign has been Harrop A. Freeman, Professor of Law at Cornell Law School.
A tax expert, Freeman has also served as attorney for several conscientious objectors.
In one of his briefs in the Muste case, Freeman noted: “Taxpayer has no funds.
Counsel is not being paid, even for his expenses.”
Among Freeman’s points for his client were that “It is proper to consider the ‘purpose’ of a tax in deciding its Constitutionality… A person who refuses to make returns or pay taxes solely because of his religious conscience, which he deems protected by the First Amendment, does not incur fraud or other penalties… Petitioner is excused from paying taxes used for war by the First Amendment to the Constitution… Petitioner cannot be compelled to file returns or pay taxes for war purposes under the Internal Revenue Code by virtue of the Nuremberg Principles of International Law.”
On that last issue, Freeman quotes the Nuremberg Tribunal’s reference to the Atlantic Charter in its statement of fundamental principles of law: “…the very essence of the Charter is that individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience imposed by the individual State.”
Muste finally both lost and won his case in the Tax Court.
In addition to the tax which the Internal Revenue Service had claimed was due as a result of its examination of F.O.R. payment records, it also pressed its claim that Muste owed further penalties for “fraud” since he had not made out any returns.
As Harrop Freeman explains, “Previous tax refusers had all lost their cases in the District Courts (criminal) and thus there seemed to be a rule that following one’s conscience was wrong or criminal.
I felt that by going into the Tax Court, which is not handling criminal cases, we would get better treatment and that if we won the fraud issue, this would indirectly help to show that following conscience was not fraud (and perhaps then not criminal).
The Tax Court held that A.J. was not guilty of fraud for following his conscience.
He did not owe any penalties.
It did hold that the tax itself was due.
We decided not to appeal this because the fraud decision was in our favor and we might have lost an appeal.”
The Internal Revenue Service has threatened Muste with collection of that tax once since the Tax Court decision.
There are only a couple of ways, however in which Muste’s funds can be attached.
He doesn’t have a bank account, nor does he have any property which can be seized.
Presumably, the Internal Revenue Service could try to collect the tax out of Social Security or out of a small pension Muste receives.
The latter course, some lawyers feel, would be of doubtful validity.
If Muste is ever confronted with the clear choice between paying the tax or going to jail, there is every likelihood that he would choose prison.
In a letter to the Collector of Internal Revenue, Muste wrote: “I do not recognize the right of any earthly government to inquire into my income — or that of other citizens — for the purpose of determining how much they or I ‘owe’ for the diabolical purpose of atomic and biological war.”
As usual, there is disagreement on tactics among pacifists who will not pay taxes.
Some will not cooperate with Federal authorities at all.
They do not come to court voluntarily, and when they are brought there, they stand mute.
Muste respects that kind of absolutism, but does not adopt it himself “because in the main I regard certain institutions of so-called democratic societies as useful and necessary, and because I have wanted to make an effort to secure a judicial determination on the specific issue of whether or not conscientious objection to paying war taxes should be recognized by a democratic government.”
Muste also refuses to use the technique of keeping his income down to a point where not taxes are owed.
“Keeping one’s income down to a subsistence level may be justified,” Muste observes, “on the grounds of self-discipline or asceticism, though it is not the pattern of life I have chosen or regard as superior to a less ascetic one.
Besides, I do not see how one can in effect recognize that a government may determine one’s standard of living or how one can think that permitting government to do so constitutes a significant protest against war taxation.”
Muste’s uncompromising stand on payment of taxes has encouraged several other pacifists throughout the country to take a similar position.
“It’s another example,” says one of them, “of how A.J. ‘leads’ the movement, and it also illustrates how he can draw attention to our point of view.
When a man as respected as A.J. refuses to pay taxes it’s like Jeremiah walking down the street naked.
People stop, look, and listen.”
Norman Thomas, by the way, went on to sign the Writers and Editors War Tax Protest in , so apparently Muste wore down his opposition to the tactic.
