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From: cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: net.consumers,net.legal,net.taxes
Subject: Re: IRS (was: bad signatures on checks)
Message-ID: <927@kontron.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 18-Jul-86 12:37:25 EDT
Article-I.D.: kontron.927
Posted: Fri Jul 18 12:37:25 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 19-Jul-86 03:38:35 EDT
References: <1344@felix.UUCP> <5774@alice.uUCp> <1287@lsuc.UUCP> <918@kontron.UUCP> <1294@lsuc.UUCP>
Organization: Kontron Electronics, Mt. View, CA
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Xref: watmath net.consumers:5727 net.legal:4053 net.taxes:1239

> In article <918@kontron.UUCP> cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes:
> >> >The IRS has also been known to fine people $500 (for a frivolous return)
> >> >for doing things like writing checks to "internal ripoff service."
> >> >Watch your step.
> >> 
> >> I would be interested in further details on this, since I find
> >> it difficult to justify from a legal point of view.  In Canada,
> >
> >Most everything IRS does is difficult to justify from a legal point of
> >view.
> 
> I've heard this view expressed before, in net.taxes (which group
> I've now added to this discussion).  I admit I don't know that much
> about the U.S. tax system, but I still find it hard to believe.
> Americans are the most litigious people on earth, and you have
> a solid constitutional framework which can be, and is, used to
> attack laws and procedures which are unjust.  Now maybe the IRS
> really is so powerful that no-one can risk attacking it, but I
> still have my doubts.
> 

There's a long history of IRS "leaking" tax returns of Congressmen
who start investigations into their practices -- they usually lose
the next election.  If you are truly interested, mail to me, and
I will send you the text of a newspaper article reporting how IRS
obtained a prior restraint order prohibiting a legal publishing
house from publishing a judge's opinion which criticized the conduct
of Justice Department Tax Division lawyers in a tax fraud case.
No more articles have appeared anywhere I look about it, and law
students I no who have tried to locate the citation can't find it.
1984?  Maybe.

> >> the filing of the return is independent of the payment, although
> >> of course they're usually done together.  But a return filed with
> >> no cheque is just as valid as one with a cheque, and although
> >> interest will run on unpaid balances, penalties for not filing
> >> don't apply once the return is filed.  How could writing an
> >> invalid cheque have any effect on this process?
> >> 
> >> I could understand a charge of attempted fraud, perhaps.
> >> But filing a frivolous return?
> >> 
> >> Dave Sherman
> >
> >About three years ago, IRS had Congress pass a law making it illegal 
> >to file a "frivolous" return.  I'm not sure exactly how Congress defined
> >"frivolous", but the way IRS has enforced this law is to discourage any
> >political comments that question their validity.
> 
> Again, what does the payment have to do with the return?
> Where is this legislation - part of the Internal Revenue Code?
> Section number?
> 
> Dave Sherman

I've never seen anyone charged with a "frivolous" return for making out
the check wrong, but I've seen newspaper accounts of people charged by
IRS with this for sending in a tax return which contained no numbers 
but said, "TAXATION IS THEFT".  Note that no one could possibly be
confused into thinking this was a filled in tax return.

Newspaper articles NEVER tell you the section number under which someone
is charged.

Clayton E. Cramer