Snipes 'victory' doesn't let tax filers off the hook

John W. Schoen Senior Producer • Profile • E-mail

The recent acquittal of actor Wesley Snipes on tax fraud charges is being taken as a victory by a vocal band of tax “protesters” who have assembled all manner of arguments that income taxes are illegal.

Their reaction is not surprising. The wide variety of stunningly fanciful arguments against the legal validity of the U.S. tax code have one thing in common. They all selectively ignore one important point: No court has ever held in their favor.

I heard that there is no law that requires you to pay your tax return(s), as stated in the movie "Zeitgeist," by numerous former IRS agents. Is this true?
— Robert H., Hanalei, Hawaii

The breadth and depth of delusional nonsense offered up in this popular YouTube video — and others like it — is simply too vast to cover in this column. Suffice to say that "Zeitgeist" is the "Gone With the Wind" of its genre. It's a comical collection of conspiracy theories that ties together Christianity, the attacks of 9/11, and the Federal Reserve Bank. If there were an Oscar for Best Picture to Connect Completely Unrelated Dots with a Straight Face, this one would get my vote.

While the “taxes are illegal” myth plays only a minor role in this video non sequitur posing as truth, the Snipes case seems to have revived this piece of misinformation with readers. The reaction to the case also confirms for us how seriously out of touch tax “deniers”  are with the real world that the vast majority of hard-working Americans lives in.

As they do in all of their arguments, the tax crazies celebrating Snipes “acquittal” have once again conveniently overlooked an important detail. While the jury let him off the hook for fraud, it found no basis whatsoever for Snipes’ novel legal arguments that he didn’t owe taxes. His own lawyers called the idea “crazy” and “kooky.”  But the jury bought his defense lawyers’ arguments that Snipes committed no fraud because he actually believed the ridiculous legal interpretations advanced by promoters of these absurd fairy tales. (One of those promoters told the court it has no authority over him and he'd rather sit in jail than argue his case.)  In the end, Snipes was convicted of not paying his fair share, ordered to cough up $17 millions in back taxes, and still faces three years in jail. Some “victory.”

Ever since the British tried to lead a little too heavily on American colonists with taxes on tea and whiskey, the United States has had a long and colorful history of tax protests. Modern tax “deniers” have come up with an impressive collection of twisted arguments to support the idea that Uncle Sam has no right to ask American citizens to pay for the services their government provides them.

As with many of these theories, there is often a seed of truth upon which a giant oak of nonsense is grown. One of the more popular notions is that taxes are unconstitutional. It’s true that the history of the U.S. income tax is not without some serious legal twists and setbacks. Congress botched one attempt with an amendment to an 1894 bill on tariffs calling for a 2 percent income tax; it was struck down by the Supreme Court the following year. The high court’s legal objections were then overcome with the enactment and subsequent ratification of the 16th Amendment in 1913.

Not so fast, say the tax nut jobs: the 16th Amendment wasn’t properly ratified. Others argue that freedom of speech or religion shields them from owing taxes. Many claim that the term “income” is not properly defined in the tax code. Because failure to pay taxes comes with a threat of jail time, some argue that tax collection is a form of illegal extortion.

All of these inanely creative theories make for fun reading and might actually be amusing if they didn’t clog up the courts with frivolous drivel that wastes everyone’s time. For all the effort devoted to trying to thwart the tax code through “legal” arguments, not one court has upheld a single case based on any of these theories.

Until that happens, we plan to keep filing our annual return. No doubt the Internet will continue to offer a valuable forum for believers of these schemes. We can only hope that those who act on them will find another appropriate setting to discuss the rightness of their cause with other like-minded lunatics: federal prison.

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