Talk:Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution/Archive 1

message: The citation of the court decision in the body of this article actually misses the real conclusion of the Court. What is stated are actually the arguments of Union Pacific against the tax, not the decision of the court itself. To wit:
Aside from averments as to citizenship and residence, recitals as to the provisions of the statute, and statements as to the business of the corporation, contained in the first ten paragraphs of the bill, advanced to sustain jurisdiction, the bill alleged twenty-one constitutional objections specified in that number of paragraphs or subdivisions. As all the grounds assert a violation of the Constitution, it follows that, in a wide sense, they all charge a repugnancy of the statute to the 16th Amendment, under the more immediate sanction of which the statute was adopted.
The various propositions are so intermingled as to cause it to be difficult to classify them. We are of opinion, however, that the confusion is not inherent, but rather arises from the conclusion that the 16th Amendment provides for a hitherto unknown power of taxation; that is, a power to levy an income tax which, although direct, should not be subject to the regulation of apportionment applicable to   all other direct taxes. And the far-reaching effect of this erroneous assumption will be made clear by generalizing the many contentions advanced in argument to support it, as follows:
(Summary of arguments, as quoted in main article body)
But it clearly results that the proposition and the contentions under it, if acceded to, would cause one provision of the Constitution to destroy another; that is, they would result in bringing the provisions of the Amendment exempting a direct tax from apportionment into irreconcilable conflict with the general requirement that all direct taxes be apportioned. Moreover, the tax authorized by the Amendment, being direct, would not come under the rule of uniformity applicable under the Constitution to other than direct taxes, and thus it would come to pass that the result of the Amendment would be to authorize a particular direct tax not subject either to apportionment or to the rule of geographical uniformity, thus giving power to impose a different tax in one state or states than was levied in another state or states. This result, instead of simplifying the situation and making clear the limitations on the taxing power, which obviously the Amendment must have been intended to accomplish, would create radical and destructive changes in our constitutional system and multiply confusion.
Seen in context, then, the court was clearly deciding in favor of the 16th Amendment, not against it.--Eric 22:24, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mis-citation 

message: I have moved the following text from User:68.200.41.196 here from the main article page. The first few paragraphs certainly seem to me to be unsubstantiated assertion, and the last is blatant anti-tax activist POV. —Stormie 00:54, Oct 8, 2004 (UTC)
:Some analysts mistakenly think that the 16th amendment created the income tax, or that it created an exception to the apportionment rule for direct taxes.  There is no question that the Internal Revenue Commissioner's agents, the IRS, collects taxes directly from the people, and since income is personal property, such a collection appears to be a direct taxation.  Regardless of appearances, such analysts are wrong.
:The 16th amendment did not confer any new power of taxation.  Article 1 Section 8 specifically grants Congress the power to tax the people, and an income tax falls within that power.
:The 16th amendment did not create an exception to the apportionment rule for direct taxes.  Instead, by declaring that the income tax does not follow the rule of apportionment prescribed in Article 1 Section 3, it categorically classified income tax as an "indirect" tax.  Since a tax on one's person, money, income, or property is, by definition, a direct tax, an indirect tax (such as an impost, duty, excise, or tariff) must therefore be a tax on an activity, event, happening, or occurrence.
:The income itself is not the subject of the income tax (or the tax on income).  It is merely the means of measuring the amount of tax owed.
:The question all citizens should ask (and demand answers of their legislators) is:  what is the subject of the income tax?  The tax code (Title 26 USC) stipulates only the manufacture or import of alcohol, tobacco, or firearms, as activities that are taxable for revenue purposes.  Why, then, do so many Americans think they magically "owe" a tax on wages?
Commentary by Famspear:
The above deleted language is partly correct and partly incorrect, but is overall misleading. It is correct to say that the 16th Amendment did not "create" the power to impose an income tax, as Congress always had that power. It is incorrect to say that the Amendment did not create an exception to the apportionment rule for direct taxes. The Amendment certainly did; it created an exception in the case of direct taxes if they happened to be income taxes (especially income taxes on income from property, which taxes had been declared in the Pollock case to be, in substance, direct taxes). Some income taxes are direct taxes; other income taxes are indirect taxes. Read Brushaber again.
The statement that the Amendment "categorically classified income tax as an 'indirect' tax" is somewhat misleading. The language in Brushaber has been confusing to many, but in substance the Court in Brushaber was saying that income taxes on property were the only income taxes that had been treated as direct taxes -- and that this treatment did not begin until the Pollock decision. That "direct" treatment became irrelevant after the 16th Amendment, as direct taxes on incomes were no longer required to be apportioned. The clause "Since a tax on one's person, money, income, or property is, by definition, a direct tax" is therefore incorrect (i.e, too broad).
The statement that "an indirect tax (such as an impost, duty, excise, or tariff) must therefore be a tax on an activity, event, happening, or occurrence" is actually correct -- and the problem is that this actually damages the writer's argument! An income tax is, fundamentally, an "event" tax. Income is not property; income is an event. The money etc., received in the income event is the "property." This is a fine but important legal and economic distinction. For example, a tax on "property on account of its ownership" -- the classic example of a "direct tax" -- is based on the ownership of (i.e., the state of title of) the property as of a certain date (often January 1st of the applicable tax year), not on the happening of an "event." On the other hand, income taxes, sales taxes, etc., are "event" taxes. If you earn income and receive it the form of money, for example, and then hide the money under your pillow for years and years, the income tax law does not keep "re-taxing" the "money" year after year. Only one event was taxed: the income event, in the year it occurred. By contrast, a real estate property tax is imposed every year on that property, even though there has been no event (no change in title to the property).
The statement that the "income itself is not the subject of the income tax (or the tax on income)"  and the statement that income is "merely the means of measuring the amount of tax owed" are sophistries. By law, the income tax is specifically imposed on "taxable income" (e.g., sections 1 and 11 of the Code), so income is generically both the subject of the tax and part of the means of measuring the tax. In this limited sense, the tax is not paid with "income" of course; it's paid with money. It would be correct to say that the "money" itself (assuming the usual case that receipt of money was the income event) is not the subject of the income tax. (Of course, the tax is usually paid with "money," but that's a separate consideration.) Again, these are hair-splitting but important distinctions.
The statement that the Code "stipulates only the manufacture or import of alcohol, tobacco, or firearms, as activities that are taxable for revenue purposes" is incorrect, and legally frivolous. Again, the income tax is an "event tax." To the extent that the income event is an activity, the statement is legally incorrect. See Code sections 1 and 11, etc. Famspear 21:33, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Moved text 

message: Instead of just trying to make people who claim the 16th Amendment was never ratified sound ridiculous, why don't we just get a strong source that shows the contrary.  Facts are more effective Superm401 23:30, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ratification of Sixteenth Amendment 

message: :Whereas most amendments protect the freedoms of citizens (Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Religion, right to vote, etc.), income tax takes away the natural right of a citizen to keep the all the fruits of his or her labor.
This statement is blatantly anti-tax POV.  Also, the 16th Amendment is not the first provision of the Constitution to authorize taxation. -- Beland 21:32, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV text removed 

message: I note that Pollock v. Farmer's was repudiated in SOUTH CAROLINA v. BAKER, 485 U.S. 505 (1988), which overturned one of its findings that was not affected by the 16th amendment (on intergovernmental immunity from all taxation).  IIRC, there is also dicta as well as scholarship that the ruling would probably have been overturned if the 16th had failed.  In addition, the case did not (contrary to most tax protesters' claims) invalidate taxes on earned income, but left them in the indirect class.
This creates an interesting legal anomaly: even if the 16th amendment vanished:
#Pollock would probably be overturned, leaving the Internal Revenue Code in place without significant change.
#Even if Pollock were upheld, taxes on labor (the least popular with most tax protesters) would remain.
If, as I believe, this can be impeccably sourced, I plan to include a paragraph to this effect, as it is very likely of interest to readers. Robert A West 23:52, 30 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  What if there were no 16th Amendment 

message: "Some lower courts have ruled that the Amendment authorized unapportioned direct taxes on income. However, the Supreme Court has always said that all income taxes are indirect."
I'm not sure this is accurate. What lower courts, and what cases? -- WikiAce 17:13, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lower courts and direct income taxes 

message: I have extensively edited the description of the Court's decision in Brushaber. Also, I removed the statement that the Supreme court has always said that all income taxes are indirect taxes, as that statement is clearly incorrect. The Court in Pollock viewed an income tax on income from property as, in substance, a direct tax -- that was the whole reason the tax was declared unconstitutional (as a direct tax, it had not been "apportioned"). The Court in Brushaber gave a very enlightening history of the treatment of the "direct" income tax (taxes on income from property) and the "indirect" income tax (essentially, all other income taxes). The language of the Court in Brushaber is archaic and for that reason sometimes difficult to follow. The result of Brushaber, however, is that the import of the Sixteenth Amendment has not changed from the time of its ratification in 1913 down to the present day (late 2005, as of this writing): the requirement of apportionment (with the regard for a census or enumeration) no longer applies with respect to any Federal income tax, regardless of whether that tax is deemed to be an excise (an indirect tax, such as a tax on wages) or a direct tax (such as a tax on income from property). Famspear 18:05, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Edits on 22 December 2005 by Famspear