Mary Lou Seymour is a long-time libertarian activist and author. She lives in South Carolina. CLICK HERE FOR RATIONAL REVIEW NEWS DIGEST SUPPORT OUR
SPONSORS WHY AREN'T YOU A SPONSOR?
Would you like to help support Liberty Action of the
week? Donate by credit card or direct donations via PayPal ALTERNATE ACTIONS For even more actions, or to discuss this column, visit LibertyForum's Take Action Forum! Report Government Waste Control CAAPS II Media Guide Soapbox Alert |
Liberty Action
of the Week
Last week we discussed activism around the wars on freedom on several fronts. This week, let's visit the government's War on Taxpayers as it nears its annual culmination on April 15 ... yes, it's Tax Time again. When Americans get ready to pony up and pay the piper. Of course, many have already filed their forms, or hired someone to do it, and many have already gotten back their refund (and probably spent it). And if you just can't make it by the April 15 deadline, our benevolent government allows you to ask for an extension, just file form yada yada and of course send in your "estimated tax." But bottom line,if you made ANY money last year, if you don't file SOMETHING by April 15, you can be thrown in prison, fined, all your assets taken and, if you resist, you can be killed. If that's not a war, I don't know what it is.
Most folks nowadays are incapable of grasping the possibility of living in a society without an income tax to fund the "benefits" of government. Yet prior to 1913 .... we had no income tax in America. Now, of course, we have a 20-30% federal income tax, most states have state income tax, cities & counties have sales taxes, property taxes, there are extra "sin taxes" on cigarettes & booze, other taxes on everything from gas to telecommunications. We are told over and over that without all these taxes, the poor would starve, the elderly die in the streets, there'd be no schools, no roads, no mail, why apparently our entire civilization would founder to a dead stop. The tax issue has become just about as tangled and confusing to figure out as the Federal tax code itself (surely one of the most mind numbing documents ever produced by any society), and it's often difficult to decide which aspect of the issue to use as an outreach tool. Taxes are the lifeblood of the state, of course; without taxes, the state would cease to exist. Most folks can't envision a civilized society without a state to "serve and protect" the citizens. So, except for those who advocate paying no taxes as a means to "bring down the state," most tax protest groups concentrate on cutting taxes back to a "bare minimum," or making taxes "fairer" in some fashion. The problem with those approaches is that your idea of a "minimum" level of government may include health care for the poor, while the guy down the block may insist that the "only Constitutional service that should be provided is a military for defense" (and then we get into the debate of what constitutes "defense" that we're in right now); and "fair" to you might mean a flat sales tax, while "fair" to someone else might mean "tax only the rich." Another approach is to take the hard core libertarian position of "taxation is theft" and thus a violation of the Non Aggression principle and anathema to a free society. This approach circumvents all the debate about what's a "fair tax" and what services a state "should" fund; individuals would pay for those services they wanted, at the level they wanted, and the "market would rule" (ie, those services that weren't "bought" would cease to exist). From a statist politico's standpoint, of course, this would be a disaster, as very few citizens would willingly fund, oh, thousand dollar office chairs for Senators; and congresscritters wouldn't be able to buy votes to stay in power by using "pork projects" for their constituents. Politicos and their statist cronies argue strenuously against a "tax free" society, using the "but all the elderly will die" meme instead of the "but I won't get any bribes" meme. The clever propagandists in government have figured out that many taxpayers would LIKE a choice in where their tax money goes, and "income tax check off" boxes have proliferated on state and federal tax forms; you can "check off" to donate some of your tax money to numerous causes, from "election funds" to programs to feed the elderly, preserve the environment, help Alzheimers research etc. etc. etc. The amount you are "allowed" to donate to causes of your "choice" is, of course, miniscule compared to your full tax burden, the "choice" is not a "free choice" (the money has been stolen from you already, and you are only allowed to choose from an approved list). Another approach is to concentrate on removing as many government funded services as possible from the tax rolls, thus teaching people the value of self reliance while reducing the tax burden. The idea behind this approach is, once services are removed and funded privately (or disappear for lack of funding), people would gradually realize that they don't NEED the remaining services (or even the state itself), and, we'd have arrived at the "tax free" society. This is easier to "sell" to the general public, which has been conditioned over the years to a dependence on government services, than the pure "taxation is theft" meme, and is often used as a "stepping stone" approach by more pragmatic anti-tax activists. For discussions of the numerous different methods to provide the services currently rendered by government by private and volunteer initiative instead; check out the Cato Institute, the Mackinac Center and other conservative-libertarian think tanks. There are also organizations which concentrate on "cutting government waste" as a method of reducing spending and therefore reducing taxes, such as Tax Payers for Common Sense, which has a weekly newsletter ("The Wastebasket") on different government waste issues, which provides an ongoing resource for ideas suitable for LTEs and Op Eds. Utilizing this meme also increases awareness of gov't corruption, which is helpful to building a desire for a stateless (or minimal state) society. One method used successfully by many liberty activists is to join one of the more mainstream tax protest groups such as the National Taxpayers Union (see their database of state groups), with the idea of prosyletizing from within to an audience already interested in tax issues. There are also numerous organizations with ideas on replacing the Federal income tax with a national sales tax on goods and services such as Americans for Fair Tax, other organizations which urge protest against a specific type of tax, like the War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee. These organizations would be fertile ground for planting the seeds of the taxation is theft meme. And then there's the "tax freedom" movement (the folks who believe that the income tax is illegal). If you're interested in that approach, Lost Horizons' "The truth about the income tax" is an excellent summary and the We the People site has a library of resources and "action events." Be warned ... the government doesn't take kindly to folks talking abut the income tax being illegal; even well known anti-tax guru Irvin Schiff has been jailed several times, and, most recently, in a stunning display of judicial arrogance and abrogation of the First Amendment, Schiff's book The Federal Mafia has been banned by a federal court. (see "The judge banned a book he never read" and "Ominous shadow over the First Amendment," two recent columns by Vin Suprynowicz on the banning of The Federal Mafia). Also, it may interest (or amuse) you to learn that the tax protest movement is featured on the ADL's infamous list of "extremist organizations" (considered a badge of honor by some.) None of the "Tax freedom" proponents or organizations seem to realize that IF the federal government admitted that the Federal income tax is illegal, it'd just replace it with another tax (and we're back to the "fair tax" folks again, with their national sales tax.) For Tax Day outreach efforts, the Libertarian Party traditionally leaflets last minute filers at post offices with their famous million $ bill Tax Day handout. (Front side: A faux $1,000,000 Federal Reserve note. The other side explains that the federal government spends $1 million every five seconds -- and only the LP is trying to change that). This is designed to appeal simply to the widespread belief that taxes are too high, without going into a debate on which tax is "fair" and which taxes are "necessary," with the premise that once the person is "hooked" and contacts the LP, they can then be educated about the different varieties of "tax reform and/or elimination." You can order the million $ bill flyer or a complete "Tax Day kit" from the LP website, or, print your own million $ bill from the CALP website. Other protest activities can include burning 1040 forms, protesters colorfully dressed in Revolutionary War garb or clad only in a barrel with a sign "the taxman took it all." If you're not an LP proponent, but simply want to spread the "anti-tax" meme, some Simon Jester cards saying "taxation is theft," "Fight organized crime: Stamp out the IRS!" or similar sentiments may be the avenue you wish to take. Our goal in liberty activism outreach is to change our culture to one which values freedom and responsibility, and operates under the Non-Aggression principle, and Tax Day is the perfect opportunity to focus attention on the increasing power of the state as epitomized by the increasing power of the taxman, and, you have a receptive audience, comprised of "Everyman". So order or print your million $ bills, hand out Simon Jester "taxation is theft" cards; write a LTE on Tax Day and what it means to you, call in to your favorite radio talk show and rant a bit about "taxation is theft", or put on your best "tax payer barrel" and picket the local post office at midnight. Lets not let April 15 pass without firing back a quick salvo in the War on Taxpayers to demonstrate that "our side" hasn't surrendered. Til next week Mary Lou PS: Here are a few "now that the war is started what do I do" individual action ideas from readers: Wear a black armband; go by your local Lowe's, which has a huge poster size "Send a message to the troops" card (purportedly to send to the troops in Iraq) and write "Support our troops, bring them home NOW" across the top. PPS: Thanks again for the donations and emails last week; I don't make much money from these columns, but it sure helps to know folks are reading and appreciating them. Your donation in the "virtual hat" (PayPal, e-gold) may make the difference in keeping LAotW on the Net. Donations are NOT "tax deductible," I am not and never will be approved by the governmentt as a "tax exempt educational institution" (and neither will the organization that publishes my column, Rational Review). |
