Federal Reserve & Income Tax

THE LAW THAT NEVER WAS & THE COVER-UP THAT STILL IS

© 2000 by Tina Terry, Sierra Times Staff Writer
06.09.00

"A hand from Washington will be stretched out and placed upon everyman's business; the eye of the federal inspector will be in every man's counting house....The law will of necessity have inquisical features, it will provide penalties, it will create complicated machinery. Under it, men will be hauled into courts distant from their homes. Heavy fines imposed by distant and unfamiliar tribunals will constantly menace the taxpayer. An army of federal inspectors, spies, and detectives will descend upon the state." --- Virginia House Speaker Richard E. Byrd, 1910, predicting what would happen if a federal income tax became law.

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Chapter 1 – The Law That Never Was

What if the 16^th Amendment to the Constitution had never properly been ratified? Due to the almost superhuman, dogged diligence and persistence of one man, there exists today a body of evidence that indicates that proper ratification of the 16^th Amendment never actually happened. Furthermore, considerable evidence exists that there has been for years – and even to this day - a massive effort on the part of many officials of the federal government to do everything possible to cover up and refuse to deal with this body of evidence.

On February 25^th, 1913, an attorney named Philander Chase Knox, who at the time held the position of lame-duck Secretary of State under President William Howard Taft, signed a proclamation that the 16^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution had been ratified.

The actual wording that Secretary Knox used in his proclamation was this:

Knox also went on in his proclamation to cite the legislatures of New Jersey and New Mexico as having "passed Resolutions ratifying the said proposed amendment."

The official ratification date of the 16^th Amendment is listed in many copies of the Constitution and in IRS Publication 2105, which is entitled "Why Do I Have to Pay Taxes?" as February 3^rd, 1913.

However, the date of Secretary Knox’s public proclamation of the Amendment’s ratification is February 25^th, 1913 – a full 22 days after this alleged ratification date. This unexplained 22-day gap between the "official" ratification date of the Amendment and Secretary Knox’s proclamation of ratification is one of the many mysteries surrounding this issue, since as there also exists a memorandum dated February 15^th, 1913, written to Knox by famed attorney William Jennings Bryan, Knox’s Solicitor, recommending that the Knox issue his declaration announcing the adoption of the 16^th Amendment.

The 16th Amendment’s full text as found in today’s issues of the Constitution reads as follows:

For over 75 years, the ratification of the 16^th Amendment was generally accepted to be valid by the American public. The Internal Revenue Service, the agency charged with the enforcement of the laws regarding the federal income tax, repeatedly states in many of its responses to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests:

Thus the IRS itself acknowledges that it derives its authority from the 16^th Amendment. In its Publication 2105, the IRS also asserts positively what it calls "The Truth" - that the 16^th Amendment was ratified on February 3^rd, 1913.

In January, 1984, a man named William J.("Bill") Benson began a massive one-man project to personally examine the actual ratification process of the 16^th Amendment. His goal was to determine if indeed the Amendment had been lawfully ratified.

Bill Benson had been a criminal investigator for the Department of Revenue of the State of Illinois for about 10 years, during which time he had investigated citizens for tax crimes against the State of Illinois. Ironically, his background and training in painstaking criminal investigation procedures proved invaluable when he turned his investigation attention away from private citizens and focused it upon the government itself.

Mr. Benson started first with the New England states; upon delving into the journals of the various state legislative bodies to find out how each of these states had acted upon the proposal by Congress to amend the U.S. Constitution to permit a federal income tax law, he made a startling discovery: There were multiple and serious problems which existed in the state records regarding the ratification of the 16^th Amendment. These problems indicated that bonafide ratification of the Amendment was gravely in doubt.

For example, in Rhode Island, the records showed that the Amendment had not actually been ratified by the state legislature, but had only been reported as having been ratified. In Vermont and New Hampshire, there were missing and incomplete records of ratification, even though the Amendment had been officially reported by Secretary Knox as having been properly ratified by these states.

Mr. Benson found similar discrepancies in the records of other states.

After examining the records of about 20 states, in which he saw that the true information regarding the action taken by these states involving ratification – or the lack thereof - had been sent to Secretary of State Knox, Mr. Benson decided to go to Washington, D.C. and see if he could find any corroborating evidence to support his findings.

In the National Archives, he finally found a book that contained within it all federal records that had been prepared during the process of amending the Constitution by the 16th Amendment. The existence of this book and the nature of its contents clearly revealed that Secretary of State Knox had full knowledge that the 16^th Amendment had not been lawfully ratified, even when he publicly proclaimed that it had been.

Mr. Benson also located a memorandum headed "DEPARTMENT OF STATE – OFFICE OF THE SOLICITOR" and dated February 15^th, 1913, from William Jennings Bryan to Philander Chase Knox . In his memorandum, Bryan informs Knox that only 4 states had ratified the 16^th Amendment according to the wishes of Congress. The same memorandum goes on to state that all of the other states that had allegedly ratified the Amendment contained errors of capitalization, punctuation, or wording, about which Bryan has this to say:

Then Bryan states:

Bryan’s memorandum is curious for the following reasons: first he provides Knox with several strong legal reasons why the 16^th Amendment should not be ratified: the fact that only 4 states have ratified the original language; that legislators are not permitted to alter in any way an amendment as proposed by Congress; and that the ratification resolution from the state of Minnesota hasn’t actually been received, but that the Secretary of Minnesota’s governor has simply "notified" him of that state’s "ratification."

Given the large number of states which changed wording, punctuation and capitalization of the original Congressional amendment proposal, thus, according to Bryan, committing an act that should have nullified their ratification of the amendment, Bryan nevertheless accepts this "notification" as sufficient evidence that Minnesota hasn’t changed any wording, punctuation or otherwise altered the original amendment, and that a valid ratification by Minnesota exists.

Mr. Benson also pointed out to this reporter that Bryan had no lawful authority to simply accept what was essentially a heresay reassurance from Minnesota’s governor’s secretary that the Amendment had been properly ratified, with no documentation whatsoever.

In the voluminous documents provided by Bill Benson to this reporter is a news article from the Chicago Tribune, dated January 10^th, 1985, entitled "The letter of the law mistyped; case dismissed," which chronicles the case of a San Bernadino, California, man who was accused of selling hallucinogenic PCP to undercover agents. The man’s case was dismissed because of a one-letter typographical error in the California state narcotics law. This error consisted of a misplaced "f" substituted for an "e" in the code naming a revised section dealing with PCP, repealing the entire law. As Mr. Benson points out, the judge who dismissed the case did so properly because he was abiding by the law exactly as it was written, mistake or no. After all, anyone who is attempting to understand and abide by any law needs to be able to count on the way in which that law is written as reflecting precisely what that law says and means. A change in a law’s wording is a change in the law.

Bill Benson understandably insists that this same exacting standard must be applied to all written laws, including the law regarding the ratification of the 16^th Amendment. And William Jennings Bryan, Philander Knox’s Solicitor, obviously agreed with Bill Benson, since Bryan stated in his February 15^th, 1913, memo the very same thing to Knox at the time of the Amendment’s alleged ratification. Then, in that same memo, Bryan inscrutably recommended essentially that Knox ignore his (Bryan’s) own notice of the prohibitions against legislators to "alter in any way" a proposed amendment.

Realizing that he needed to complete his investigative research project to corroborate that what William Jennings Bryan had told Philander Knox was correct about various states’ alterations of the Amendment, and limits on legislators to alter an amendment, by the end of 1984 Bill Benson had traveled to each of the 48 states that had been part of the Union in 1913, and had reviewed the records that were archived by each state relevant to the alleged ratification of the 16^th Amendment.

What he found was this: not even one of the states of the reported 36 had properly completed the ratification process. In the records of all of the states that had been reported as having ratified the Amendment, there existed such serious defects as: Not ratified by the legislature, but so approved; failure of the governor or other official to sign the ratification, although such signature was required by the state constitution; approval but with change in wording, capitalization, punctuation or spelling, thus rendering such ratification null and void.

In addition to his research on the specific ratification of the Amendment by the individual states, Bill Benson also thoroughly researched the actual amendment ratification process itself.

The ratification process for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution is found in Article V of that document: it states that Congress, by a two thirds majority, can propose a Constitutional amendment, and that, to become law, such amendment must be ratified by three fourths of the legislatures of the states. Thus, if there are 48 states in the Union, a total of 36 must ratify an amendment in order for it to become law.

At the time of his proclamation on February 25^th of 1913 of the ratification of the 16^th Amendment, Secretary of State Knox claimed there to be 36 states that had properly ratified it.

In this count, Knox included the state of Kentucky; however, on February 8^th, 1910, on page 587 of the Senate Journal of the state of Kentucky is recorded a vote of 9 for the Amendment and 22 opposing the amendment resolution. As Bill Benson says repeatedly, and as he said in his July 2^nd, 1999, live appearance on C-SPAN: "When in your wildest dreams or comprehension will nine ever become greater than twenty-two? If you can convince a jury that it can, Bill Benson will file a tax return!"

The case of Kentucky is particularly interesting for another reason:

Before the proposed 16^th Amendment had actually been sent to the state, someone in the legislative body in Kentucky had gotten wind of the fact that the Congress was going to have them enact an income tax amendment; for some unknown reason, the legislature went ahead and ratified what they thought was the Amendment – but the version they ratified had two words which were different from Congress’ original text. The governor, upon being presented with this ratification, vetoed it, saying that to permit it to go through containing such errors in wording would be "an embarrassment to the Commonwealth of the State of Kentucky." Subsequently the legislature of Kentucky voted 9 for and 22 opposed to the Amendment when it was presented before that body with the proper wording. Nevertheless, Knox claimed Kentucky had properly ratified the Amendment, and cited Kentucky in his official count of 36 ratifying states.

The law for ratification of an Amendment called for the following: Secretary of State Knox was required to send to each and every state a certified copy of the final version of the amendment to the governor; when those documents were sent out, they were adorned with a red ribbon and red seal, signifying that the came from the federal government. The governor of the state would then call a special session of the legislature in which the legislature would be informed that the Congress of the US wanted to adopt an amendment to the Constitution, and the state legislature would vote on the amendment as presented, with a yea or nay; they could not deviate at all from that procedure, including changing any wording, capitalization or punctuation.

In his pronouncement Knox cited Illinois as having ratified the Amendment. However, after violating numerous procedural requirements in the Illinois legislature, the version that was ratified by Illinois and received by Secretary Knox reads as follows:

The word "enumeration" has been changed to "renumeration," and the word "States" in the original has been changed to "states."

Oklahoma is another state that had allegedly ratified the Amendment. However, Oklahoma actually altered the language of the resolution to cause it to say exactly the opposite of how it had been presented. Here’s what was allegedly ratified:

Besides several procedural violations too complex to describe in this article, the following serious problems exist with the above version of the Amendment: The Roman number "XIV" was changed to "16" and the meaning of the last phrase was completely reversed by changing the negative phrase "without regard to" to the positive word "from." This last causes the meaning of the Amendment to be completely altered.

Change the wording - change the law.

Knox also cited Minnesota in his proclamation, even though that state had sent no documents whatsoever to Washington regarding ratification. Other states which Knox claimed to have ratified the amendment included California, which records show never even voted on it, as well as many other states whose final versions of the resolution contained serious errors in punctuation, capitalization, spelling and wording.

The authority usually cited for the critical nature of ratification without any errors in spelling, capitalization or punctuation is from DOCUMENT NO. 97-120, of the 97^th Congress, 1^st Session. This document was written by Edward F. Willet, Jr., Esq., Law Revision Counsel of the United States House of Representatives, and states in part (emphasis added):

Since the time of Philander Chase Knox, the legal requirement that the ratifications of Constitutional amendments by the states be sent to the Secretary of State has been changed to a requirement that they be sent to the General Services Administration (GSA.)

In a document dated April 18^th, 1980, entitled "AMENDING THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION – PROCEDURES OF THE GENERAL SERVICES ADMINISTRATION AND OF THE STATE LEGISLATURES," written by Michael V. Seitzinger, Legislative Attorney, American Law Division, and published by the Congressional Research Service (JK 140 C) is found the following regarding ratification (emphasis added):

Reading the above provisions, one can only conclude that, if the various state versions of the 16^th Amendment, with their word, punctuation and capitalization changes, had been sent to the GSA instead of to Secretary Knox, these discrepancies would have caused the GSA to reject them.

After completing a year of exhaustive research, Bill Benson began speaking about his findings around the country. One of the first places he spoke was at the Indianapolis Baptist Temple, at the invitation and urging of his longstanding friend, Pastor Greg Dixon. (Note: Sierra Times has reported extensively on Pastor Dixon’s refusal to obtain a 26 USC Section 501 (c)(3) designation for the Temple, and on IRS’s ongoing threats to seize the Temple’s property because of IRS’s claim that the church has not been withholding and paying federal taxes.)

On April 4^th, 1985, Mr. Benson published his findings in a book entitled "The Law that Never Was," Volume I (Volume II was published subsequently in 1986.)

In early 1985, shortly before the book’s publication, while Mr. Benson was in Birmingham, Alabama, lecturing on its contents, and announcing publicly that the book would be published shortly, his wife, Lorraine Benson, received a telephone call at their home from a man who identified himself as Warren Richardson. Mr. Richardson told Mrs. Benson that he was an attorney representing Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT.) He asked Mrs. Benson if she "knew Orrin Hatch," and she responded that she didn’t know Hatch, but that she knew of him. (Mr. Benson pointed out to this reporter that both he and his wife are very specific in their answers to all questions, as well as in their addressing all points of law.)

Mr. Richardson told Mrs. Benson that it was an "absolute emergency" that she have her husband call him immediately. He gave her two phone numbers: one was 317-786-9722, which was the number of the Indianapolis Baptist Temple; the other was a Washington D.C. number: 202-546-8808.

When Mr. Benson called his wife that same evening, she relayed Mr. Richardson’s message that it was an "emergency" that he call Washington, D.C. Mr. Benson responded that he "had no emergencies in D.C.," and that he would call when he was finished with his lecturing, which he subsequently did.

Mr. Benson describes his phone call to Warren Richardson as follows. (He says that Mrs. Benson was also on the line, listening to the conversation.) -

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NEXT: Bill Benson publishes "The Law That Never Was," and the federal government comes after him. In 1987 Bill Benson sends – at his own expense – a personalized copy of both Volumes of "The Law That Never Was" to every sitting Congressman and Senator, stamped with each Congressman and Senator’s name in gold leaf. He also, that same year, sends copies of both volumes to all U.S. Attorneys and federal judges – again, at his own expense.

Later, public meetings are held at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. at which Benson and various other Constitutional and legal scholars and researchers - including ex-IRS CID Special Agent Joseph Banister - discuss their findings, and challenge the Clinton White House and both houses of Congress to publicly debate the specifics of these findings.

Someone approaches Bill Benson and tells him that attorney Warren Richardson is concerned that someone will file a complaint about him with the attorney’s disciplinary committee.

And… Bill Benson gets a notarized letter from Warren Richardson himself stating,

Note: Tina Terry interviewed Bill Benson extensively by telephone for this article. Mrs. Terry first read Volume I of "The Law That Never Was" in 1986, and Volume 2 in 1987, and she has subsequently followed and studied this issue closely since that time. She has met and spoken personally with Bill Benson on several occasions, including at the November 1999 National Press Club meeting in Washington, D.C. sponsored by We The People.

Mrs. Terry recommends to everyone reading this article that they visit Bill Benson’s web site and that they purchase and read both Volume I and II of "The Law That Never Was" in order to do their own research on this issue.

(Hey, she’s our School Marm - and this is your homework assignment!)

Link:  http://sierratimes.com/txt/artt060900.htm#