IRS AGENTS NOT ABOVE DUE PROCESS OF THE LAW.Byline: Michael D. Savage CONGRESS has made a commendable com·mend tr.v. com·mend·ed, com·mend·ing, com·mends 1. To represent as worthy, qualified, or desirable; recommend. 2. To express approval of; praise. See Synonyms at praise. 3. start to reform the Internal Revenue Service, but it hasn't addressed one of the real problems: the fact that IRS An abbreviation for the Internal Revenue Service, a federal agency charged with the responsibility of administering and enforcing internal revenue laws. agents have the power to seize property without due process. No courts, no judges, no lawyers. In the hands of the wrong person (and, to be fair, not all IRS agents are the wrong persons), such power is devastating dev·as·tate tr.v. dev·as·tat·ed, dev·as·tat·ing, dev·as·tates 1. To lay waste; destroy. 2. To overwhelm; confound; stun: was devastated by the rude remark. . It can be used to terrify ter·ri·fy tr.v. ter·ri·fied, ter·ri·fy·ing, ter·ri·fies 1. To fill with terror; make deeply afraid. See Synonyms at frighten. 2. To menace or threaten; intimidate. people into paying taxes they don't owe, or to ruin them financially if they can't or won't pay. The IRS Restructuring restructuring - The transformation from one representation form to another at the same relative abstraction level, while preserving the subject system's external behaviour (functionality and semantics). and Reform Bill, which is pending in Congress, would shift the burden of proof from the taxpayer to the agency, so that the agency would have to prove in court that someone hasn't paid the taxes he owes. But changing the burden of proof doesn't change how the IRS collects taxes. In many instances, people face IRS agents before they get a court hearing. A rogue Rogue, river, c.200 mi (320 km) long, rising in SW Oreg., in the Cascade Range N of Crater Lake. It flows southwest and west through a fertile valley (noted for its orchard fruits) and then across the Coast Range to the Pacific Ocean at Gold Beach. agent may collect first and worry about burden of proof later. Under the proposed law, a taxpayer would be able to sue an IRS agent who abuses his power, but there may not be much money left to pay the lawyers after the agent has improperly auctioned off the person's home or business. And it can take years to win a lawsuit, so there is no guarantee a taxpayer will recover the property anytime soon. The perfect solution is to get rid of all the bad agents, but that would be an impossible task. Yet taking away the power to seize assets may not be much easier because the government would lose revenue. The proceeds from the sale of seized property help pay for school lunches and congressional salaries. Also, more people might duck their taxes if there were no fear of immediate punishment. Then again, practically everybody pays voluntarily, anyway. When people don't, they usually have a reason. Congress must decide what's worse: Running the risk of losing some revenue, or continuing the status quo [Latin, The existing state of things at any given date.] Status quo ante bellum means the state of things before the war. The status quo to be preserved by a preliminary injunction is the last actual, peaceable, uncontested status which preceded the pending controversy. knowing that some people will be unjustly ruined. But Congress should know that a shift in the burden of proof or the threat of a lawsuit is not going to stop abuses of power by IRS agents. To prevent these abuses, the IRS must be subject to due process of law - just like everybody else. |
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