The Ragged Edge Tax Revolt Protesters Say Federal Government Lacks Authority To Collect From Them

At issue: Taxes

Everyone complains about their taxes.

Ron Kurpuis doesn’t pay his.

Officially labeled an “illegal tax protester” by the IRS, Kurpuis is at the center of a federal income tax revolt in Washington’s Columbia Basin.

This isn’t some fringe group. Kurpuis is a 48-year-old electrician and president of the local Steelworkers union in Wenatchee.

Other people who say they aren’t paying federal income taxes include business owners and a Grant County deputy tax assessor.

“You’re talking about a lot of people,” says Kurpuis, who publishes a tax protest newsletter distributed in the basin.

Kurpuis says he first tangled with the taxman 25 years ago over $2.03 in excise taxes on his telephone bill.

Now he’s gone so far as to sue his employer, American Silicon Technologies, to stop withholding federal taxes from his paycheck.

The tax revolt isn’t confined to central Washington. A North Idaho contractor shields his property from the IRS by shifting title through corporations and family members.

A resort owner near St. Maries is promoting something called “land patents” that he claims protect property from being sold out from under an owner who doesn’t pay property taxes.

But some of the region’s boldest tax protesters are found in central Washington.

The IRS won’t talk about individual protesters or discuss how many people are involved. “The number is up, but not appreciably,” says IRS district director Paul Beene, in Seattle.

The agency did conduct a “sweep” of the basin last summer, Beene says. “It was a compliance check, and it’s not unusual for that to occur.”

Many of the protesters call themselves patriots. They claim to be sovereign citizens of the state and say the federal income tax is voluntary.

“We’ve been lied to, deceived, cheated, betrayed, coerced and threatened by our own government,” says Ephrata businessman Fred Adams, who says he isn’t paying his taxes. “This is our way of fighting back.”

The agency they target is one of the most vilified in government.

About 40 million Americans had an “adversarial confrontation” with the IRS this year, the conservative Cato Institute estimates.

The agency’s budget has doubled over the past 10 years. The IRS now fields more enforcement agents than the Environmental Protection Agency, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the Drug Enforcement Agency combined, the institute says.

IRS auditors uphold a tax code that has spun from 170 pages when adopted in 1913 to more than 17,000 pages today.

The agency’s overbearing reputation wasn’t helped by a policy this year that says auditors can go beyond tax records and learn what kind of car someone drives, the size of their home, whether they own a boat or travel trailer.

The IRS also has the power to confiscate property without a trial; and many people believe the agency presumes guilt from the start of an investigation.

The region’s tax protesters offer a complicated theory they say proves federal income taxes are at best voluntary and at worst, illegal.

Among their arguments:

The 16th Amendment authorizing income taxes in 1913 wasn’t properly ratified.

The entire monetary system - and therefore the tax system - is unconstitutional because it isn’t backed by gold and silver, as required by the Constitution.

Only federal employees and people living in federal territories, like Guam, are required to pay income taxes. Everyone else pays voluntarily.

The IRS dismisses these theories as invalid.

Many protesters cull their arguments from a book called “Vultures in Eagles Clothing” that explains how to avoid paying federal taxes.

It was written last year by Lynne Meredith, a California woman who drives a 1972 Corvette with vanity plates that say “Tax Rebel.”

Meredith conducted tax workshops in the past year in Coeur d’Alene, Portland, Wenatchee and Seattle. She says at least 400 people attended each meeting.

Adams says he paid federal income taxes for 1993, but didn’t file his 1994 return after reading Meredith’s book. So far he hasn’t heard from the IRS.

Some of the central Washington tax protesters also got advice from former certified public account Randy Glessner of Omak.

A self-described constitutionalist, Glessner was found in contempt of federal court and spent eight days in jail in October for refusing to answer the government’s questions about a client’s tax returns.

Glessner, 42, says he prepared federal tax returns for 40 clients who contend their wages are compensation for labor, not personal income. The money, therefore, can’t be taxed.

“These clients are seeking probably $300,000 to $400,000 worth of income tax refunds for the past three years,” Glessner says.

One of his clients works at the Grant County Courthouse in Ephrata.

Deputy Assessor Bonnie Rosco makes her living collecting state and county taxes. But she says she’s “sick and tired of the federal government garbage.”

She and her husband, Russell, a county computer employee, have told Grant County to stop withholding federal income taxes from their paychecks.

They also sought and got a $4,823 tax refund from the U.S. Treasury for taxes paid last year. The Roscos filed a 1994 return claiming their combined salaries of $47,165 were “non-taxable compensation,” not income.

She has no problem with personal property taxes, she explains, because that is legal taxation on behalf of the state.

Kurpuis, the Wenatchee Steelworker, also tried to get money back from the IRS. He says he and his wife filed amended returns for the 1991-93 tax years, seeking combined refunds of $39,000.

He says they now face $3,500 in civil fines levied by the agency. The IRS has collected $1,500 so far by garnishing his paycheck, he says.

The couple’s 1994 return listed their salaries as “non-taxable income.”

He says the tax fight already has cost him more than $10,000 in attorney fees, a computer and copying costs.

“If we win, we’ll put the IRS on the run,” Kurpuis says, “and that’s why they’re fighting me.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 Color Photos; picture of book

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