Brutus: I didn't have time to give your link the attention it deserves, but my observations from a quick scan of the first page or two are: 1. I agree with abolishing the Federal Income Tax, and have never said otherwise. But merely repealing the 16th Amendment won't accomplish that. 2. The 16th Amendment isn't what caused all this - it was the Wilson-Gorman Tax Act itself, which, other than the part about taxing income derived from personal property, was 100% constitutional. 3. Whoever wrote that piece needs to read the Wilson-Gorman Tax Act of 1894, the opinions in Pollock v FTLC, and the text of Amendment 16.

Even if you repealed the 16th Amendment, Congress could still tax wages, salaries, and business income. The only difference would be that it couldn't tax interest, dividends, and rent, unless it found a way to apportion those taxes between the States.

I find it disheartening that those on my side of the income tax debate are so ignorant of the circumstances surrounding its enactment. You folks need to READ the 16th Amendment, and the SC's majority opinion in Pollock, and perhaps the Wilson-Gorman Act itself. It is a FACT that, with or without the 16th Amendment, taxes on income, in general, would still be completely Constitutional. If the 16th Amendment were repealed tomorrow, the Federal Government could STILL tax wages, salaries, and most business income.

Sorry, I'm absolutely correct. However, you apparently missed the bulk of my explanation, as I had to break it up into 5-6 pieces to get around the maximum post size here. I've reposted my explanation in a way that I hope will keep the pieces together. Please read the ENTIRE explanation before passing judgement. Thanks.

And blue headlights - I seriously think they should be banned because they actually HURT the eyes of people who have to look into them. And the flashing, high-intensity strobe lights on top of school busses. And all those morons driving down the road with their thumpers blaring.

This is the end of my explanation. Please post any comments as a reply to THIS post. Thanks again. Regards, Trevor

But Wilson and Gorman didn’t exempt interest, dividends, and rent from their new tax law, either before or after the SC struck it down. Instead, proponents of the income tax set about to amend the Constitution to make even those small sources of revenue legal to tax. These efforts culminated in the ratification of the 16th Amendment. The key words to that Amendment are NOT “taxes on incomes”, but “from whatever source derived” and “without apportionment”. The only thing accomplished by the 16th Amendment was to make it legal to tax income derived from personal property. It had ALWAYS been legal to tax income from other sources.

Had Wilson and Gorman exempted interest, dividends, and rent from their bill, Pollock would have had no objection to it, and the suit would have never been filed. After the SC ruled the law unconstitutional, had they reintroduced the bill with those exemptions, and had it passed, then the SC would have left it untouched. Because no one considered the income tax, in general, to be a “direct tax”. Only the tax on income derived from personal property was considered to be a direct tax (and frankly, that’s a bit of a stretch).

The crucial point here is that Pollock did NOT challenge the constitutionality of the Income Tax IN GENERAL, only the constitutionality of the tax as applied to income derived from personal property. And it is exactly that specific type of income that the Supreme Court ruled constitutionally untaxable (unless, of course, it was apportioned). The authority of the government to tax wages and salaries was never questioned in this case, and if it was mentioned at all in the majority opinion, it was only to REAFFIRM that authority. And the dissenters wanted to throw out the “direct tax” criteria entirely.

Mr. Pollock took exception to this, on the basis that a tax against income (dividends) derived from personal property (his stock in FTLC) was essentially a tax on the personal property ITSELF, and therefore was a “direct tax”, which was clearly banned by the Constitution. Mr. Pollock lost in the lower courts but won, by the slimmest of margins (5-4) in the Supreme Court.