Dear Paul:

I am not sure what you mean by Income Taxes as "merely penal law". If you mean that Income Taxes are merely a law that can be repealed by Congress whenever they wish, and as long as it is on the books, violations of that law brings penalties, then the answer is no.

Income Tax is not a mere law enacted by Congress like any other law. Congress has been given the power by the Constitution to excise and collect Income Taxes.

The Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States 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.

The amount of the tax, the details of the tax code, the penalties that apply for not paying Income Tax that is due is determined by law and regulation. But, the power to "lay and collect taxes on incomes" comes from the Constitution's Sixteenth Amendment.

The only legal and moral way to avoid paying Income Taxes is to not make enough money to where the taxes kick in.

Those tax protestors who decide to not pay taxes because they do not like the way the taxes are spent, must be willing to accept the consequences of their action without complaint or grumbling. But, as I mentioned in the previous post on this:

Taxes serve the common good even though a portion of the tax money is spent on things we do not support. The proper redress of that grievance is to write our Legislators, lobby the legislature, promote or even write new legislation to propose to our Legislators, file law suits to challenge constitutionality, and, of course, "vote the bums out" of office and elect those who represent our virtues, or run for office ourselves. All that is the proper way to redress the grievance that our government is spending tax money on things that we do not support.

To refuse to pay taxes altogether because the government spends it on some things we do not like would, for example, be to deprive starving children of food that is paid for by tax money in various social programs, as well as money to help the homeless, to support research on a cure of cancer, to provide funds to ensure that our food chain is safe, and the drugs we buy are safe, that auto companies conform to safety standards in the making of vehicles, that we have a military apparatus to protect our country from invaders and terrorists, a police force to help prevent crime and to capture criminals, etc.

Some of our tax money goes for abortions and other immoral things. Some tax money goes for nonsense and is just plain wasted. But without the tax revenue, babies will die from starvation, rapists will be allowed to rape with impunity, and poor pregnant women, infants, and children will not have the proper diet they need and can receive on programs like W.I.C.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary?