Nope,just the hardcore facts.
The federal government and its tax agencies, supported by our congressmen, would like for us to believe that the power of the government to tax was greatly changed by the ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment in February 1913. Having been denied the right to tax incomes by a Supreme Court decision in 1895, Uncle Sam claims that, once this Amendment was ratified, a constitutional deficiency was corrected by the Amendment and that after 1913, it had a legal right to claim a portion of income of every American in taxes.
Ever since the ratification of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments after the Civil War, arguments were made that these amendments were not legally ratified, but nobody ever did enough research to conclusively prove this contention in court. When the Sixteenth Amendment came along, popular support for the amendment and the very light taxes imposed as a consequence of the amendment were sufficient to prevent similar arguments that this amendment was not ratified. It was only when the income tax burden became almost unbearable and tax enforcement and collection turned ruthless that for the first time in American history someone decided to actually research and investigate the question of whether a federal amendment had legally and really been ratified.
In 1984, Bill Benson, a former investigator for the Illinois Department of Revenue, made the historical decision to research the question of whether the Sixteenth Amendment was legally ratified. Taking the government’s list of States which purportedly adopted the amendment, Bill traveled to all 48 states in the Continental United States for the purpose of perusing Archives records to discover the story as to how each state acted upon the amendment.
In January and February 1984, Bill reviewed records in the New England states and discovered that, contrary to popular belief, these states had committed errors of such magnitude that they could not be counted as ratifying states. Buttressed by these amazing findings, he pushed onward through the remainder of the states, copying all official state documents that related to the ratification of the Amendment. By July 1984, Bill knew from the documents he possessed that the states had not legally ratified the amendment and that gross misconduct and fraud was involved.
In August 1984, Bill went to the National Archives in Washington, DC to find the federal government’s records of how this amendment allegedly was ratified. Once discovered in a dusty bin in a hidden place in the National Archives, he opened a book made, probably in 1913, that contained all these documents. In a few minutes of reading, Bill learned that not only was there documented evidence disclosing fraudulent ratification, but there was conclusive proof that government officials knew of the fraud in 1913.
When Bill completed the research of the last state necessary in December 1984, he knew that the tax structure of the United States was built upon a fraud. He knew that the second state which supposedly ratified the amendment, Kentucky, truly voted against the amendment, 9 votes for the ratification and 22 against. He knew that California both changed the wording of the amendment (an unlawful act) and failed to vote on the amendment. He knew that the government was aware that 11 states had unlawfully changed the wording of the amendment. Under these circumstances, these facts made the Sixteenth Amendment a fraud. Thus, Bill was compelled to tell this story to the American people through the publication of two books, The Law That Never Was, Volumes I & II.
Volume 1 contains a very detailed state by state analysis, complete with page references to official documents of how this amendment failed to be ratified. Volume II contains lengthy chapters explaining the law regarding ratification of amendments, and the story of various cases heard in federal court where concerned Americans presented this issue. These two books have become so important that copies of them have been presented to every U.S. Congressman and federal judge.
While today courts here in America hold that this issue is one which cannot be resolved in court (they obviously do not want to see the facts), it must be remembered that other important issues in the past, such as the civil rights movement, took many years to be resolved. But, it is certain that if enough Americans become aware of the fact that the Sixteenth Amendment was fraudulently ratified, a change in the federal tax structure will surely result.
Actually it has been resolved in the courts, because every time Benson's contentions have been used in a tax evasion case, the courts have found them to be anywhere between legally frivolous and downright fraudulent. Benson himself has served time for tax evasion.
That didn't stop him, however, from selling his “16th Amendment Reliance Defense Package” for $3500, helping other people also end up prison.