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2) The second $100,000 reward states: “Show how Americans can file an income tax “CONFESSION” (return) without giving up their 5th Amendment right to not give any information to the government that may be used to prosecute them.” Your claim fails for the following reasons:
a) The U.S. Supreme Court decision Sullivan v. United States, 274 U.S. 259, 263-264 (1927) that you cite states that a person WHO IS REQUIRED TO FILE A RETURN may not fail to file on the ground of the 5th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Sullivan, Supra, did not address the issue that the Government may not use the information on the 1040 Income Tax Confession form (misnamed “return”) at a subsequent criminal prosecution. United States v. MacLeod, 436 F.2d 947, 951 (8th Cir. 1971), cert. denied, 402 U.S. 907 (1971) simply follows Sullivan, Supra and Betz v. United States, 753 F.2d 834, 835 (10th Cir. 1985) states the same, without citing Sullivan, Supra.
b) The following sections of Title 26, namely, Sections 7204 , 7205, 7206 and 7207 state that anyone who makes a fraudulent tax document is guilty of a crime. The very wording of these statutes requires the use of the tax confession form (return) or other tax document signed under penalty of perjury to prosecute the individual to prison.
To prosecute a person under these code sections, the Government MUST present to the court and the jury the tax return or other tax document that the Government is claiming to be erroneous or fraudulent. Therefore the income tax “CONFESSION” (return) WILL be used to prosecute the targeted person with a tax crime that upon conviction will land the person in prison.
c) You have failed to show how an American can file an income tax “CONFESSION” (return) without giving up their 5th Amendment right to not give any information to the government that may be used to prosecute them.
The sad fact that the Government can use one’s forced statement on a so-called “required” tax return and then prosecute them to prison and the courts claim that they have not given up their 5th Amendment rights (even though they ARE used to prosecute people at a later date) is of no moment here, but a sad commentary on the “pro-government bias” that the American judges have allowed themselves to fall into.
Therefore your claim for this $100,000 reward fails.3) The third proposition states: “Prove that the 16th amendment to the United States Constitution, which, according to the IRS and modern American courts permitted the income tax to exist was lawfully added to the United States Constitution.” Your claim fails for the following reasons
:In your response below you recognize that “errors in reciting the text of the Amendment in some state instruments”. However on your website at http://docs.law.gwu.edu/facweb/jsiegel/Personal/taxes/16th.htm you state: “Some of them neglected to capitalize the word “States,” one had “income” in place of “incomes,” one said “remuneration” instead of “enumeration,” one said “levy” instead of “lay,” and so on.”
However, the statement of the Solicitor’s Office that you referred to at http://www.constitution.org/tax/us-ic/ratif/memo_130215.htm list many more problems with the ratification of the 16th Amendment. However, the defects with the ratification process are far more numerous and egregious than what your website states, as listed below:
At the moment of this writing, the website www.TheLawThatNeverWas.Com is not up due to technical errors. However, at the Way back time machine you can find a not very old version of the www.TheLawThatNeverWas.Com at https://web.archive.org/web/20160311004217/http://thelawthatneverwas.com/defects.aspx , which shows the numerous, multiple ratification problems that took place. The category of these problems are:
Not ratified by state legislature and so reported
Not ratified by state legislature, but reported as ratified
Missing or incomplete evidence of ratification, but reported as ratified
Failure of Governor or other official to sign, although required by State Constitution
Other violation of State Constitution in ratification process
Other procedural irregularity making ratification doubtful
Approval, but with change in wording, accepted as ratification of original version
Approval, but with change in spelling, accepted as ratification of original version
Approval, but with change in capitalization, accepted as ratification of original version
Approval, but with change in punctuation, accepted as ratification of original version”
Of these 10 categories of defects in the ratification process, many states had 4 or 5 of each of the categories of defects listed above. Since 36 states were required to ratify, the failure of 13 to ratify was fatal to the Amendment, and this occurs within the first three defects, arguably the most serious. Even if we were to ignore defects of spelling, capitalization, and punctuation, we would still have only two states which successfully ratified.
The authority usually cited for the criticality of ratification without errors of spelling, capitalization, or punctuation, is from DOCUMENT NO. 97-120, of the 97TH CONGRESS, 1st Session, entitled How Our Laws Are Made, written by Edward F. Willett, Jr. Esq., Law Revision Counsel of the United States House of Representatives, in which the comparable exactitude in which bills must be concurred under federal legislative rules is detailed:
“…Each Amendment must be inserted in precisely the proper place in the bill, with the spelling and punctuation exactly the same as it was adopted by the House. Obviously, it is extremely important that the Senate receive a copy of the bill in the precise form in which it passed the House. The preparation of such a copy is the function of the enrolling clerk. (at 34).“When the bill has been agreed to in identical form by both bodies (either without amendment by the Senate, or by House concurrence in the Senate Amendments, or by agreement in both bodies to the conference report) a copy of the bill is enrolled for presentation to the President.
“The preparation of the enrolled bill is a painstaking and important task since it must reflect precisely the effect of all Amendments, either by deletion, substitution, or addition, agreed to by both bodies. The enrolling clerk… must prepare meticulously the final form of the bill, as it was agreed to by both Houses, for presentation to the President… each (Amendment) must be set out in the enrollment exactly as agreed to, and all punctuation must be in accord with the action taken. (at 45) (emphasis added)”It should be noted that in his report on ratifications of the Income Tax Amendment to then Secretary of State Philander Knox, the Solicitor of the Department of State, recognized many of the defects of wording, spelling, capitalization, and punctuation, although he seemed ignorant of the constitutional and procedural defects at the state level. He also pointed out similar defects in the ratifications of the 14th and 15th Amendments. Therefore, Knox had plenty of clues to the problems in the ratifications, sufficient to justify that he inquire into the matter further and demand corrective action by the states.
The fact that the 14th and 15th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution may have been improperly declared as ratified and Secretary of State Philander Knox knew about them, does not mean that he had to follow the errors or the ratification of the 14th and 15th Amendment. After all, following the wrong precedent only leads to more error, not less. Repeating our known errors only leads to more errors and breakdown of the law; something that will lead to chaos and unhappiness throughout our Republic.
If we must be very careful and exact that a single law must be ratified with utmost scrutiny and accuracy (otherwise the law is invalid as stated above), it only makes sense that the U.S. Constitution that is the supreme law of the land, that affects the entire organization and operation of all 50 states of the Union in major ways, MUST be changed or modified with an even MORE level of scrutiny AND accuracy than a simple law.
Therefore your claim for this $100,000 reward fails. Yours in freedom and justice,
Peymon Mottahedeh,
Founder and President
Freedom Law School
LiveFreeNow.Org
(813)444-4800
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Post $300,000 Income Tax Reward Claim Counter offer:
Dear Professor Siegel,
I appreciate your taking your time, as an attorney in law, who has taken an oath to support the U.S. constitution, a former Appellate Staff of the Civil Division of the U.S. Department of Justice and a F. Elwood and Eleanor Davis Research professor of tax law at the George Washington University Law School (which is ranked 20th in the 2014 Law School Rankings of U.S. News & World Report) to write about the subject of taxation on your website and to claim Freedom Law School (FLS) about FLS’ $300,000 Income Tax Reward.
I hope that this can be a start of a healthy dialogue, an exchange of ideas and research about one of the most profound and important areas of law in the United States of America, the taxation authority of the U.S. Constitution and the application to the current Federal Income Tax as currently imposed on the American People by the Federal Government.
After all, civilized men prefer to argue with facts, law and logic instead of the use of blunt force to discover who is correct or in error. As a professor of law, you train the most skilled and trained civilized men to argue their point of view based on fact, law and logic. If we are to have a society based on law, facts and logic, we must do all we can to promote logical, fact and law based reasoning, instead of the raw force of political power to rule our society and our lives.
An example of raw, blunt force of politics currently running the income tax system instead of law, I can offer you two links:
1) On June 2, 2000, Jason Furman, the Senior Director and Senior Economic Advisor of the National Economic Council of Clinton White House, told Robert Schulz, the Chairman of We the People for Constitutional Education, who was working to set up a public forum for representatives of the U.S. Government and the Tax Honesty Movement to debate the legal and Constitutional basis of the Federal Income Tax: “The legality of the income tax is not a high priority item at the White House, and we will not participate in any conference on the subject.” Scroll down 1/3 of the first column to read this statement. Robert Schulz’ email is on the cc line of this email: Bob@GiveMeLiberty.Org. He will be happy to answer your questions on this issue.
2) On September 16, 2003, the IRS held a press conference announcing a new program to battle income tax Scams and evasion. David Cay Johnston, the lead reporter for the New York Times, directly questioned IRS Commissioner Mark Everson what law requires Americans to file or pay income taxes. Commissioner Everson could NOT show the the law, however an IRS manager on this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pu0iSxAKxT0 and after the conference, IRS senior spokesman Terry L. Lemons told the New York Times that IRS and DOJ were answering the People’s questions about U.S. tax law with “enforcement actions.”
Therefore, I am offering two ways which we can together bring about civil education and discourse on the subject of the legality of the Income Tax:
1) Freedom Law School will DOUBLE the $300,000 Income Tax Reward offer, if you bring another Law School professor, or a lawyer with the United States Department of Justice to claim this reward. If he is successful in claiming the reward, the reward money will be split half and half between the two of you.
2) Freedom Law School will offer you $100,000 if you can show a statute passed by Congress of United States made the wages and salaries of Americans working and living in the 50 United States of America, Gross Income and therefore, taxable Income and therefore subject to the American citizen the legal duty to file a 1040 Confession form (misnamed “Return”) for and pay the Federal Income Tax. Please note that Title 26, Section 61 is not a statute and does not list wages and salaries as specifically required under Gould, Supra.
Yours in freedom and justice,
Peymon Mottahedeh,
Founder and President
Freedom Law School
LiveFreeNow.Org
(813)444-4800