Detroit evening times. (Detroit, Mich) 1921-1958, 1943-01-21

one thing and the treasury says
il must be interpreted IN the
light of some other law. ruling
or regulation, and by this pro-
cess 10 contradict itself, they
bow to the greater wisdom and
enforce il so.
Under the treasury's inteN
u probation, if your pay re. \
period runs from the tenth 10
the twenty-fifth OF the month.
and your payday thus fell on
January 10, you had TO pay the
) per cent tax on wages or other
income earned on six days, or
one whole working week. Of
1892.
Even II. as an extreme eX-
ample, the pay roll period ran
for one year. from Jan. ]. 1912.
TO Jan. !, l943, you would have
10 pay the tax on an entire
years income, minus one days
pay. although the law says the
tax shall be levied for each tax
able year beginning after Dec.
81, 1912"
An official OF the treasury de-
partment has written me in n
kind spirit Of appeal 10 my bet
ter nature. touched no doubt but
not visibly outraged by my use
of the words larceny" and
theft" in this connection.
HKNOWING that you do not
IN wish TO misinterpret the
rulings OF the treasury" he
writes, 81 am inclosing a copy of
the press release of December
81. I would call your attention
TO Example 2 Of this release"
But Example 2 says that the
tax shall not he collected on
1912 income if the pay roll Pc
Rod ended on the last day of the
year. which seems 10 me 10
make no change in my interpre-
tation.
On the other hand. Examples
] and 3 of this release plainly
reserve for the treasury a right
10 tax income earned in 1912,
contrary to the language of the
tax law, and in my home-brewed
logic that means that the treas
Jury has decided 20 take a lot n
money from millions OF citize y
TO which IL has no legal right.
A CCORDING 10 the same logic
"A and the morality behind il,
taking something that belongs
10 some one else. or some mil
lions of others, is stealing. and
in violation OF a well-known
Commandment, and IL done by
the treasury department of the
United States of America is a
bad example TO the people who
might reasonably decide TO take
up stealing as regular line OF
work and get into serious trou-
bic, in all innocence.
Yet these scholars who have
STEPPED themselves in the mys-
tcries of such writs for years
and years as tax accountants
have undertaken TO say that
when you place this page over
some other page of the tax
laws, its meaning fades out and
another meaning shows through,
quite to the contrary.
THEIR arguments are remlniS-
cent of the wild debates on
the town green at Dayton,
Tenn, during the monkey trial,
when kiver-kiver scholars came
down out of the mountains and
in from all over the country 10
insist on their many and con-
trary interpretations of the
Holy Bible.
Tax laws should be subject TO
no doubts and speculations, nor
should they require the services
OF a priesthood or experts.
The Bible scholars Of Dayton.
exhorting, threatening and
sweating in the dusk, each held
that all who rejected their re-
spective meanings stood in dan
ger of hell fire eternal, and il
was a terrifying experience bAs
cause they were all so positi \
and so far apart, and a wrons
guess might be fatal though
utterly sincere.
But it should not be that the
common citizen of this little re-
public stand in danger Of fine
and or imprisonment for obey
ing the plain language of a tax
law which 10 the wise men Of
the treasury means the oppo-
site of what IL says.