Shortchanging the armed service

The plan to underfund the troops and the IRS

By Gordon Li
From the May 2005 Print Edition

For many years, anti-war citizens have been trying to advance their cause without actually doing any work. War tax resisters are a group of people going back to the ’70s who feel that they should not pay any or part of their taxes because they feel it would go to a “system that supports the military.”

They are not alone in their fight. Congressman John Lewis, D-Ga., over the past three years sponsored the “Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund.” This bill allows “designated conscientious objectors” who are opposed to military expenditures such as national defense, equipment for the troops, and veterans’ benefits because of “deeply held moral, ethical, or religious beliefs, certified by Secretary of the Treasury” to have their tax dollars put into a tax trust fund that would be spent only for non-military purposes.

There are currently more than 43 co-sponsors of the bill, all of whom are liberal Democrats including local Congressmembers Barbara Lee, Anna Eshoo, Sam Farr, Diane Watson, Lynn Woolsey and Mike Honda.

“Congressman Lewis does not see this either-or proposition between supporting the troops and supporting this bill,” Brenda Jones, press secretary for John Lewis, said. “One bill or one vote cannot be used fairly to represent any congressperson’s stand for or against military action.”

Lewis said he sees this as a way for people who don’t agree with war to have their voices heard and plans to reintroduce the bill again this year as soon as possible. Jones explains, “This bill simply allows these individuals to contribute to the tax base of the U.S. government in a way that is in keeping with their moral, ethical, and religious beliefs.”

The bill may send a message to our troops that the United States does not support them. Ironically, Congressman Ted Strickland, D-Ohio, who is also co-sponsoring the bill, criticized Donald Rumsfeld in an open letter for under-equipping our troops.

“The bottom line is that you sent our troops into war without adequate supplies of body armor and without a sufficient number of uparmored Humvees and other vehicles. Despite conventional military thinking, you tried to fight this war on the quick and on the cheap,” Strickland wrote in his open letter.

About 15 war tax resisters gathered in a nondescript building in Berkeley on April 3 to attend a workshop hosted by the Northern California War Resistance. They were given a presentation of the history of war tax resistance and options available for those who did not want to pay their taxes in opposition to the war.

Because some of the options that workshop leader Jay Sordean suggested were illegal, Sordean specifically pointed out that the Northern California War Resistance was presenting actions available and the risks associated with them, and “not advocating for them to take any of the options necessarily.”

One of the illicit options the workshop presented was to not file their taxes at all and to instead give their money to the “People’s Life Fund,” which “then is given away by its members for a broad range of positive, life-affirming purposes.” According to Sordean, the People’s Life Fund donated approximately $7,000 of “resisted war taxes” to local community groups.

One such organization that gets money is the “Food Not Bombs” program that “cooks and provides food to people in the People’s Park in Berkeley every day from 1–3 p.m.,” Sordean said.

Alternatively, rather than paying none of their taxes, other tax resisters have chosen to pay only the part of their taxes that they believe will not go to “war efforts.” Furthermore, Sordean said people could claim more allowances than are legitimately legal on their W-4 forms to have the IRS withhold less of their income. He points out that the forms are not sent off to the IRS “unless they claim more than ten allowances and usually people can stay below the radar by claiming ten allowances.” If caught, those who have fraudulently filled out forms for the IRS usually face a $500 fine.

Other forms of resistance, Sordean said, included not paying part of the phone tax. The IRS and the phone companies usually ignore this tax because of its small amount. Another participant who wanted to remain anonymous pointed out that changing one’s name hampers the IRS’s collection efforts.

Some more interesting measures include living below the taxable income level, which is $7,950 if you are filing as a single. A brochure the Northern California War Resistance offered for 50 cents, “Low Income/Simple Living as War Tax Resistance,” included several stories about people who lived below the taxable income level to resist the war effort. One such story is about Wally and Juanita Nelson, a couple from Deerfield, Massachusetts.

The Nelsons have not paid taxes since 1948, cook with wood, and use an outhouse. They grow and sell their own food and rely on aid to the indigent provided by the state for medical care. This aid comes out of the pockets of Massachusetts taxpayers.

Peacetaxpayer.org, one of the Web sites listed during the presentation, quotes several reasons people are unwilling to pay their taxes to support the troops. “I can’t imagine Jesus paying taxes to buy nuclear weapons. Can you?” one individual says while another concludes, “Paying money to help kill people is wrong.”

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