Imagine there was never an Irwin
(Imagine that if you can)

A few years ago one of us wrote a novel entitled "The Constitutionalists" which is a fictional “who done it” that was inspired by everything the author learned about the income tax from Mr. Irwin Schiff. Before it was written the author investigated the history of the “Truth in Taxation” movement only to find the core of virtually everything being written today, which others have elaborated on, was discovered and revealed by Mr. Schiff.That fact led us to this article which will trace the history of what Mr. Schiff painstakingly learned and informed all of us about from the taxing clauses of the Constitution thru Mr. Schiff’s trial.The first thing Mr. Schiff taught us was we must understand the limitations of the taxing powers and our rights contained in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights (the first ten amendments to the Constitution.) In Article 1 section 2, 8 and 9 of the Constitution are the taxing powers authorized by the Constitution to the federal government. Those areas clearly state the federal government only has the power to lay and collect taxes on excise goods or by apportionment. An excise tax is a tax on goods i.e. liquor, gasoline, tobacco, firearms, import and export duties. Could congress use its excise taxing powers to tax wages? No! The apportionment clause means the federal government can tax the various states. But must first decide how much money it needs to fund the legal functions it is empowered to by the Constitution and then tax the individual states based on the population of that state. (that is one of the primary reasons the founders of the Constitution called for a census to be taken periodically.) It is a very complicated process, but basically the individual states must then decides who will pay what and then collect and forward the money to the federal government. Could congress bypass the states responsibilities and use its apportionment taxing powers in a non apportioned way to tax the wages and salaries of its citizens? No!The federal government through its many agencies has convinced the citizens of The United States that the Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution gave the right to the federal government to charge a tax on citizen’s wages, dividends, inheritance etc. However, because of the previously discussed Article 1 sections 2, 8 and 9 which limit the taxing powers of the federal government to excise and apportioned taxes that is not true now nor can it ever be.As an example, lets examine the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution where, in pertinent part it says, “nor shall (a citizen) be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” Could congress now pass a law or amend the Constitution which would allow the government to force a citizen to testify against himself? No, it cannot, because that would be repugnant to the Constitution therein making it void! If there was never an Irwin would we know that?

This fact is confirmed by the fact on at least six different occasions the United States Supreme Court has ruled, "The Sixteenth Amendment gave the federal government no new taxing powers." Even though those Supreme Court rulings were made a long time ago those rulings have NEVER BEEN OVERTURNED so they are still as binding on the courts as the women’s right to vote and slavery being forbidden. Even if it had given the federal government new taxing powers, the right to compel its citizen to pay a tax on their wages could not be one of those powers because in addition to Article 1 sections 2, 8 and 9 that would also violate the 5th, 6th and 9th amendments to the Constitution. If there was never an Irwin would we know that?

Although Mr. Schiff believes it is essentially immaterial, there are those that because of a book entitled “The Law That Never Was,” believe the sixteenth amendment was never ratified by the states. To further confirm Mr. Schiff’s position the United States Supreme Court in those previous never overturned rulings did define the word "income." In conjunction with the Sixteenth Amendment those rulings describe "income" as the profit on the income of corporations. However, the tax codebook tries to deceive the citizens by not defining income but defining “gross income” as “all income from whatever source derived!” But this does not fly because you cannot define a word by using the same word to define it. Mr. Schiff’s response to that malarkey is, "If you were from Mars and had never seen a horse and someone described a big horse to you as a regular horse but bigger would you then know what a horse looks like?” If there was never an Irwin would we know that?

Mr. Schiff was the first citizen to undertake the gigantic task of reading and understanding the tax codebook. After he became the absolute authority on the tax codebook it became crystal clear to him that the tax codebook is the most deceitfully written work of art the world has ever seen. After you have read it three times, you would still think it said citizens had to pay an "income tax," It is that one word which changes the meaning of every thing in the tax code. If you understand the statutory meaning of that word and whenever you see it insert the words "a corporate profit" and cross out the word "income" then every thing becomes clear. If there was never an Irwin would we know that?

Mr. Schiff began what ultimately became his calling in life and career in 1968 when he and a few other people filed what they called “Fifth Amendment Tax Returns” which relied on the Fifth Amendment protecting them from being forced to give the government the personal information required on a 1040 form which could be used against them and be forced to sign it under the penalty of perjury. There were also those that filed “Gold Standard” (worthless treasury notes) Tax Returns which Mr. Schiff explained in his book “The Biggest Con.” By 1975, because the validity of the income tax had never been seriously threatened, the freewheeling, “we can spend anything we want” congress and presidency had begun to heavily rely on the income tax. However, without the Supreme Court’s help the days of wine and roses for all federal employees, including those Justices on the Supreme Court, would have been over. In our opinion, it was at that point in time the “Federal Mafia,” a term coined by Mr. Schiff, became a real organized criminal enterprise. Ironically in order for the Supreme Court to be able to rule a Fifth Amendment return violates the filing requirements of the so called income tax it also had to rule a 1040 does, contrary to the Fifth Amendment, legally force that filer to testify under oath against him or her self! However, after years of contemplation as the various lower court rulings on the Fifth Amendment returns worked their way up the ladder to the Supreme Court those justices sold out and violated their oaths to uphold the Constitution. As they attempted to hide their complicity under all the typical legally confusing words they had to know they were the worst of the worst because the Supreme Court must protect the citizens from government abuse or everything the United States of America stands for is lost. If there was never an Irwin would we know that?

However, those adverse rulings did not have the government’s desired effect on Mr. Schiff. In fact it only spurred him on and sent him into a frenzy of study that culminated in his writing the best selling book “How Anyone Can Stop Paying Income Tax” in 1982. It was in that book Mr. Schiff explained why the income tax is and has to be voluntary and disclosed the ramifications of the “Privacy Act Notice.” Then in 1985 Mr. Schiff’s efforts bore real verifiable fruit that the government could not dispute when he figured out and revealed in his book “The Great Income Tax Hoax” there is no law that requires the filing of or payment of the income tax! That book also exposed the flaws in the Sixteenth Amendment and the Supreme Court rulings previously discussed. Those revelations struck fear in the federal government and finally got the attention of millions of citizens. If there was never an Irwin would we know any of those critical things?

However, you just can’t keep a well organized criminal organization down, So, the federal government’s answer to everything Mr. Schiff exposed was not to admit wrong doing but instead put Mr. Schiff on trial and have their corrupt Federal Judge Peter C. Dorsey make sure Mr. Schiff was convicted. The fate of the draw or possibly something sinister was afloat regarding the jury. It was split, but we do not know how they were divided but if only one or two thought Mr. Schiff was guilty and intelligent people had been selected in their stead we would not be writing this article. Mr. Schiff would have been acquitted which would have forced the government to give up on the income tax scam. But Judge Dorsey made sure that did not happen when he virtually told that jury to find Mr. Schiff guilty whether the government proved he was or not. However, once again the government’s dirty work did not work out the way it wanted. All that did was give Mr. Schiff a lot of free time which he devoted to discovering even more about the tax codebook.If there was never an Irwin would we know for sure just how far the government will go to llegally take our money and prosecute us to keep us taciturn?

Then, after Mr. Schiff got out of prison one would think he would just give up but he is made of sterner stuff then the average bear. Even if Mr. Schiff wanted to quit he could not because of his additional concerns for what the government is doing to the Constitution and its assault of the manufacturing base of our country. So, in 1990 he published his most explosive expose to date which properly described the federal government as “The Federal Mafia.” Contained on those pages are so many things the government cannot defend against that in desperation it had another of its corrupt under bosses, Federal Judge Lloyd D. George ban it. However, that ban came too late because “The Federal Mafia” and Mr. Schiff’s audio and video tapes had already let the cat out of the bag. And, Mr. Schiff’s countless seminars held throughout the nation did not please the federal mafia either. Due to all of the above we now know we can claim exempt on a w-4 form which prevents our employer from withholding any of our hard earned money for the federal mafia. We also know the IRS agents do not have the pocket commissions (authority) required to jack with us. We know the IRS agents illegally remove the most important area of a “Notice of Levy” to fool our employers and banks into giving them our money. We know the Secretary of the Treasury is the only one authorized by congress to enforce anything in the tax codebook and he has never delegated that authority to the IRS, We know when an IRS agent wants us to show up at his office with our books and records we can ignore him. We know there are countless hoops the IRS has to go through, which ninety percent of the time they don’t, just to get us into tax court. And, in that regard we know the tax court has virtually no authority. We know the IRS agents do not sign any of the correspondence they send out because they do not want to be held accountable for their illegal activities. We know the income tax has to be voluntarily assessed by the citizen. And the list goes on and on.Do any of you really believe we would know even a small amount of the things in this article if there had never been an Irwin Allen Schiff?

However, when you are dealing with a criminal enterprise it does not matter if you know where the bodies are hidden. Their answer to being exposed is to add your body to the ones previously slain into silence. Which brings us to Mr. Schiff’s trial. How, in the United State of America can any judge get away with blatantly telling a defendant in a criminal prosecution that he cannot introduce or argue the laws? How can he also rule that whether the IRS agents had the authority to investigate or gather evidence or for that matter do anything to Mr. Schiff is immaterial? How can that same judge be an openly active member of the prosecution team and forbid the bringing forth of witnesses by the defendant? Well that is exactly what the government’s hit man, Judge Kent J. Dawson did. However, he went one step farther than Judge Dorsey when, during his jury instructions, he deliberately misquoted the tax codebook and told the jury that misquote was the law that requires citizens to file and pay income tax. Many of the citizens in this movement lost hope after Mr. Schiff was convicted but Mr. Schiff, the eternal optimist, once again, only looks at that miscarriage of justice as an opportunity to get the truth before the citizens and force the appellate court to finally realize the jig is up.

We, at The Constitutionalists know how little we would know about the federal mafia if there had never been an Irwin. That having been said we are proud to call Mr. Schiff our friend and mentor and will do anything necessary to help him prove his innocence and defend his honor because he is also our hero.