Christopher Hughes is the founder of Freedom Law Group, PMA, and the No.1 best-selling author of Legal Non-Taxpayer: How to Never File or Pay Federal Income Taxes Ever Again.
If I offered you $50,000 to produce the specific law that requires the people of the 50 states of the Union to pay a federal income tax, could you do it? In the early 2000s, an organization called We the People Foundation for Constitutional Education ran full-page advertisements in major U.S. newspapers making this same offer. To date, no one has claimed the money — not for lack of effort, but because the law does not exist. It never has, and it never will, because the people of the 50 states of the Union are protected by Article I, Section 9, Clause 4 of the Constitution.
Our Founding Fathers, who had suffered under the weight of tax tyranny, deliberately made it difficult for the federal government to impose direct taxes upon the sovereign states and their sovereign people. The Constitution prohibits direct taxes unless they are apportioned according to population and the census.
The first permanent federal income tax was enacted in 1894. Less than a year later, the Supreme Court of the United States struck it down as unconstitutional, holding that it was an unapportioned direct tax and therefore prohibited. Neither that decision nor Article I of the Constitution has been repealed or overturned.
During that period, the United States Treasury was flush with revenue. Special committees were even formed to decide how to spend and invest the surplus. As has been true throughout history, whenever a large source of money or power appears, certain parties will conspire to seize it, consequences be damned.
The year 1913 proved devastating for “we the people.” It brought the Sixteenth Amendment — never properly ratified — the Federal Reserve — neither federal nor a reserve — and the modern federal income tax system. That year, the federal government shifted the burden of funding itself from tariffs on foreign goods and companies onto the backs of hardworking Americans.
Whether the federal income tax law is constitutional is largely a moot point. The entirety of the tax code was written for the statutory United States, which the code itself defines as including the District of Columbia. The District of Columbia is a federal district, not a U.S. territory. That distinction is important: federal districts and U.S. territories are separate constitutional and legal classifications, even though Congress exercises substantial legislative authority over both. Under Article I, Section 8, Clause 17 of the Constitution, Congress has the power to “exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever” over the District of Columbia.
If the tax code applies only to the District of Columbia, why was the Sixteenth Amendment needed? It was because a tax limited to District residents and federal employees would never generate sufficient revenue. The statutes were carefully drafted to lead ordinary Americans to believe the tax applied to them, while the Sixteenth Amendment served as a smokescreen to convince them their Article I protections had been amended. They had not.
Two United States
Most Americans do not realize there are two United States. One is the United States of America, or the 50 states of the Union. The other is the corporate entity of the United States, or what I call “UNITED STATES INC.,” together with the territories and federal zones it controls.
The 50 sovereign nation-states, under the name United States of America, cannot purchase or acquire Guam, the Virgin Islands or Puerto Rico. Only a person or an organized legal entity can do that. That practical necessity is one reason the federal government was incorporated. It was this organized legal entity — “UNITED STATES INC.” — that acquired the territories.
In Hooven & Allison Co. v. Evatt, 324 U.S. 652, 671 (1945), the Supreme Court recognized three possible senses of the term “United States” in law:
- One sovereign among many in the family of nations, as compared with the governments of England, Egypt, Japan and so on;
- The territory over which the sovereignty of the United States extends — the District of Columbia, military bases and similar federal enclaves;
- The collective name of the states united by and under the Constitution or the 50 sovereign states — Georgia, Texas, Idaho and the rest.
Can you see how confusing life becomes when the government uses the phrase “United States citizen” and may not even be referring to you, or how dangerous it is when a statute declares all United States citizens must perform an act that violates personal principle or the Constitution itself?
Imagine Congress enacted a law providing, “All residents and citizens of the United States must pay a direct tax without apportionment.” Suppose that law, or an amendment, violated the original Constitution — specifically, Article I, Section 9, Clause 4. Then, suppose 99 percent of the American public remained ignorant, miseducated or deliberately kept in the dark. The result would be an entire nation voluntarily surrendering a large portion of its hard-earned income to the federal government in the form of federal income taxes.
Sound familiar? That is exactly what happened.
The term “United States” is defined, in 31 U.S.C. § 321(d)(2) and 26 U.S.C. § 7701, as referring to the federal government in the District of Columbia. It is not defined as the 50 states of the Union. The importance of this distinction cannot be overstated — it is the proverbial smoking gun.
Multiple special definitions of “United States” appear in Title 26. The definition for federal income tax purposes in 26 U.S.C. § 7701(a)(9) states the term “includes only the States and the District of Columbia.” One might assume “the States” refers to the 50 states of the Union, but that assumption is incorrect. A special definition of “State” follows in (a)(10): “The term ‘State’ shall be construed to include the District of Columbia.”
That special definition includes only the District of Columbia — which is not even a state — and mentions no others. Under established rules of statutory construction, a definition means only what it expressly includes. Therefore, the official legal definition of “United States,” for federal income tax purposes in 26 U.S.C. § 7701, is, in substance, the District of Columbia and the District of Columbia.
Recently, while searching for a video from a well-known voice in the tax-truth movement, I encountered a channel whose host mocked those of us who have taken the time to examine these definitions carefully. He insisted, “We don’t need to invent wonky definitions. We know the United States means the 50 states, and we know ‘State’ means a geographical area like Texas or Mississippi. Obviously, the definition of State includes the 50 states, even if it doesn’t say so. It’s assumed.”
The Supreme Court, however, has already settled the matter. In Stenberg v. Carhart, 530 U.S. 914, 942 (2000), the Court held, “When a statute includes an explicit definition, we must follow that definition, even if it varies from that term’s ordinary meaning.”
To drive the point further, the Court has repeatedly held that when Congress expressly defines what a statutory term means, meanings not contained within that definition are excluded. In Colautti v. Franklin, 439 U.S. 379, 392–93 n.10 (1979), the Supreme Court explained, “As a rule, ‘a definition which declares what a term ‘means’ … excludes any meaning that is not stated.’” Likewise, in Meese v. Keene, 481 U.S. 465, 484–85 (1987), the Court stated, “It is axiomatic that the statutory definition of the term excludes unstated meanings of that term.”
Indeed, Stenberg itself relied upon both Colautti and Meese for precisely this principle. Thus, where Congress supplies an explicit and exclusive statutory definition, courts ordinarily apply that definition rather than substitute the word’s broader, everyday meaning.
One may ordinarily define the United States as the country lying south of Canada and north of Mexico, comprising 50 states and various territories. Because Congress chose to include explicit definitions of “United States” and “State” in 26 U.S.C. § 7701, the Supreme Court requires us to follow those definitions, even when they diverge from ordinary meaning. By operation of law, the 50 states are therefore excluded.
Consider 26 U.S.C. § 4612(a)(4), which supplies a completely different definition of “United States” for the subchapter governing petroleum taxes: “For purposes of this subchapter, the term ‘United States’ means the 50 States, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, any possession of the United States, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands.”
Why would Congress employ a special definition for income tax purposes that omits the 50 states and a different, special definition for petroleum tax purposes that includes them? Congress understands that direct taxes violate the original Constitution and can be imposed only in the District of Columbia, which is not part of the constitutional Union of 50 states. Excise taxes, such as those on petroleum, are constitutional and may properly apply throughout the 50 states, territories and federal zones.
Should any doubts linger, the Supreme Court has instructed that “in case of doubt, tax laws are construed most strongly against the government and in favor of the citizen” (Gould v. Gould, 245 U.S. 151, 153 (1917)).
What This Means for You
At the top of Form 1040 appears the title, “U.S. Individual Income Tax Return.” That form is intended for U.S. individuals as defined in 26 U.S.C. § 7701 — residents of the District of Columbia. If you are not a resident of the District of Columbia, the form does not apply to you. As an American national, there is no law requiring you to file or pay federal income tax. Even the Sixteenth Amendment, properly understood in light of the statutory definitions, does not reach you.
The Sixteenth Amendment states, “The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.”
Read with the statutory definitions in mind, the amendment effectively authorizes Congress to lay and collect taxes on incomes, without apportionment, among the several Districts of Columbia. The language collapses into nonsense, which is fitting, because the amendment is irrelevant to approximately 99 percent of the population.
The Tax System Is Voluntary
For years, an intense debate has raged over whether the tax code is mandatory or voluntary. The answer is both. It depends on which United States you inhabit. For residents of the 50 states of the Union, it is voluntary. For residents of the District of Columbia, it is mandatory.
People often ask me, “If taxes are voluntary, why can the IRS place a lien on my home or levy my bank account?” The answer is straightforward. The system was voluntary until you volunteered. Once you volunteered, the obligation was attached, and it remains until you revoke the election.
The first time you signed a Form 1040 and checked a box electing single, married or head-of-household filing status, you made a dual election. That election is the moment you became a taxpayer and subjected yourself to the federal income tax laws. Prior to that moment, you were a legal non-taxpayer.
As the court explained in Long v. Rasmussen, 281 F. 236, 238 (D. Mont. 1922), “The revenue laws are a code or system in regulation of tax assessment and collection. They relate to taxpayers, and not to nontaxpayers. The latter are without their scope. No procedure is prescribed for nontaxpayers, and no attempt is made to annul any of their rights and remedies in due course of law. With them Congress does not assume to deal, and they are neither of the subject nor of the object of the revenue laws.”
If one can volunteer, one must also be able to un-volunteer. You volunteered by making an election. You un-volunteer by submitting a revocation of election to the Secretary of the Treasury. The process is set forth in federal law.
Many Americans surrender 20 or even 30 percent or more of their income to the federal government. Imagine how different your life would be if you retained that money for a single year. Now, imagine retaining it every year for the rest of your life. The average American will pay several hundred thousand dollars in federal income tax over a lifetime, and there is no law requiring you to do so. All that is required to keep it is to complete the revocation-of-election process correctly.
Freedom Law Group, PMA is the leader in the revocation-of-election field. We provide a personalized, iron-clad “Revocation of Election” affidavit that has never been challenged or rejected by the IRS, together with the education and ongoing support necessary to complete the process safely, legally and permanently.
The first step is a thorough understanding. That is why I wrote Legal Non-taxpayer: How to Never File or Pay Federal Income Taxes Ever Again. To read the governing statutes yourself, fully understand the subject, and learn the precise steps required, I invite you to download a free copy of my book or schedule a complimentary consultation with one of our tax-freedom consultants.
Freedom Law Group is a legal consultancy firm operating as a Private Member Association. FLG is not a law firm and is not affiliated with the American Bar Association. All materials and communications are for educational purposes only and should not be considered legal, financial or tax advice.
