Episodes

  • Was Cardozo a traitor?

    Was Cardozo a traitor?
    Sep 21 2026
    Cardozo: When a Common Right Became Taxable as an ExciseIt is September 21st, 2026. Welcome to YesToHellWith.com.We have now reached 1937.And here the constitutional story takes a major turn.The case is Steward Machine Company v. Davis. Justice Benjamin Cardozo wrote the opinion for the Supreme Court.The case arose from the Social Security Act of 1935.Congress imposed a federal tax upon certain employers, calculated as a percentage of wages paid to their employees. The statute described that tax as an excise upon the employment relationship.The constitutional objection was straightforward.An excise had traditionally been associated with commodities, transactions, privileges, businesses, occupations, and particular activities.But employing another person?That was argued to be different.Employment for lawful gain was described by the challengers as a natural, inherent right—not a government-created privilege.And therefore, they argued, it could not constitutionally become the subject of an excise.Cardozo rejected that proposition.And listen carefully, because this is the critical moment.The Court said:“Natural rights, so called, are as much subject to taxation as rights of less importance.”Then Cardozo went further.He said an excise was not limited to privileges created by government.It was not limited to activities government could prohibit.According to the Court:“It extends to vocations or activities pursued as of common right.”That is an extraordinary statement.Not because the Court concealed what it was doing.Quite the opposite.The Court confronted the distinction directly and rejected it.A right did not have to become a privilege before Congress could tax its exercise.A lawful activity pursued as a matter of common right could itself become the subject of a federal excise.Now compare that with Flint, which we examined in the previous video.In Flint, the corporation tax was sustained as an excise upon doing business in a corporate capacity.There was an identifiable corporate franchise and legal structure involved.But Steward Machine went further.Cardozo said Congress’s excise power was not confined to activities arising from a franchise or governmental privilege.The employment relationship itself could be taxed.And the Court stated the proposition broadly: what a person does in operating a business can be subjected to taxation just as what that person owns can be subjected to taxation.Stop and appreciate what has happened.We are no longer asking whether Congress may tax the privilege of operating through a government-created corporate form.We are being told that Congress may impose an excise upon an activity pursued as of common right.That is a substantial doctrinal development.And Cardozo supported it partly through history.The Court examined taxes imposed in England and colonial America, including eighteenth-century taxes connected with servants and employment.From those examples, the Court concluded that excises historically were not confined to commodities or government-created privileges.Whether you accept that reasoning is not the point of this investigation.The point is to identify exactly what the Court did.Because now the constitutional vocabulary has changed dramatically.An excise no longer requires a government-created privilege.The exercise of a common right can provide the taxable activity.And once that proposition enters constitutional doctrine, consider how large the potential field becomes.Working.Hiring.Operating a business.Entering economic relationships.Activities that exist because free people interact with one another—not because the federal government created them.That does not mean Steward Machine itself held that every person’s wages were subject to the modern federal income tax.It did not.The case involved an employer tax under the Social Security Act, and we should not pretend otherwise.But the constitutional proposition it announced was much broader than that particular tax.Activities pursued as of common right may be subjected to an excise.That proposition matters enormously.Because remember what we are tracing.Not merely statutes.Not merely whether a tax was upheld.We are tracing the evolution of the constitutional reasoning that allowed federal taxation to reach progressively deeper into ordinary economic life.And in 1937, Cardozo supplied an important doctrinal step.The boundary between privilege and common right no longer protected an activity from being classified as the subject of an excise.The Court had crossed that line openly.And history was about to provide the federal government with an opportunity to build upon an expanding tax structure on a scale previously unimaginable.World War II was coming.The federal government would need staggering amounts of revenue.Exemptions would fall.Millions of Americans who had never paid federal income tax would enter the system.And then came the mechanism that would permanently transform the relationship between...
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    8 mins
  • Do not fear the IRS

    Do not fear the IRS
    Sep 20 2026

    Defend yourself the correct way!



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    2 mins
  • What are you doing?

    What are you doing?
    Sep 20 2026

    www.thelibertydialogues.com



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    4 mins
  • The deception continues...

    The deception continues...
    Sep 20 2026
    Flint, Macomber, and What Is Actually Being Taxed?It is September 20th, 2026. Welcome to YesToHellWith.com.We have reached a point where one distinction becomes absolutely essential:The subject of a tax is not necessarily the same thing as the measure used to calculate that tax.That may sound technical.It isn’t.It is one of the keys to understanding what happened to federal taxation.Let’s begin with Flint v. Stone Tracy Company, decided by the Supreme Court in 1911—two years before ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment.Congress had enacted the Corporation Tax Act of 1909.The government imposed a tax calculated according to the net income of certain corporations.So was this simply an income tax?No.The Supreme Court identified the tax as an excise upon the privilege of doing business in a corporate capacity.Income was used to determine the amount of that tax.That distinction is enormous.The subject being taxed was corporate activity conducted in a particular legal form.Net income supplied the measure.Those are two different things.Think of it simply.Government may calculate a tax by reference to dollars without the dollars themselves necessarily being the constitutional subject of the tax.Flint therefore gives us an analytical tool that we cannot afford to lose:Identify the subject first. Then identify the measure.Nine years later, the Supreme Court gave us another critical piece of the puzzle.The case was Eisner v. Macomber, decided in 1920.A corporation had issued a stock dividend to a shareholder, essentially representing accumulated corporate earnings through additional shares.Congress attempted to treat that stock dividend as income.The Supreme Court said no.And the Court did something critically important.It refused to accept the government’s characterization merely because Congress had placed something within an income-tax statute.The Court said whether something is actually income must be determined according to “truth and substance”, not merely its form.Then it addressed the meaning of income.The Court described income as gain derived from capital, from labor, or from both combined, including profit obtained through the sale or conversion of capital assets.But the Court went further.A mere increase in the value of property or capital was not itself income. The owner had to actually receive or realize something from that property—a gain or profit that became separate from the underlying capital and available for the owner’s use.There had to be something actually derived from the capital—a gain or profit capable of becoming the taxpayer’s separate property.In Macomber, the shareholder had received additional shares, but the Court concluded that she had received nothing from the corporation’s assets for her separate use and benefit.Her proportional ownership had not changed.Her capital interest remained invested.Congress had called the stock dividend income.The Supreme Court examined the substance and said it wasn’t.That should command our attention.Because Macomber demonstrates something fundamental about constitutional analysis.Congress can define terms in legislation.Congress can create classifications.Congress can establish methods of calculation.But a statutory definition cannot, by itself, determine the constitutional meaning of the power being exercised.There are limits outside the statute.And now put Flint and Macomber beside one another.Flint tells us to distinguish the subject of the tax from its measure.Macomber tells us to distinguish income from the capital or source from which income may arise.These are not minor distinctions.They force us to ask better questions.When government calculates a tax according to income, what exactly is being taxed?Is income itself the subject?Is some activity the subject?Is a privilege the subject?Is property the subject?Or is income merely being used to measure a tax imposed upon something else?And when government calls something income, has an actual gain been derived—or has government simply assigned the word “income” to something it wants to reach?Those questions cannot be answered by pointing to the Internal Revenue Code and saying, “Congress defined it.”That begins the inquiry.It does not necessarily end it.And there is another reason Macomber matters.The Supreme Court expressly recognized that the Constitution itself limits how far the Sixteenth Amendment may be expanded merely through interpretation.That is constitutional discipline.Words have boundaries.Categories have boundaries.Governmental powers have boundaries.Once those boundaries become blurred, the analysis changes.A tax measured by income begins to be spoken of as though income must always be the taxable subject.A gain derived from labor becomes blurred with labor itself.A constitutional category becomes a statutory definition.And eventually people stop asking what is actually being taxed.We do not stop asking.Subject.Measure.Source.Gain.Those ...
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    8 mins
  • Yes to hell with the legal profession!

    Yes to hell with the legal profession!
    Sep 19 2026

    Go to www.thelibertydialogues.com now!



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    1 min
  • Pollock

    Pollock
    Sep 19 2026
    Pollock and the Sixteenth Amendment: What Actually Changed?It is September 19th, 2026. Welcome to YesToHellWith.com.We have reached 1895.And the case is Pollock v. Farmers’ Loan & Trust Company.This case is important because it produced one of the most significant constitutional confrontations over federal income taxation in American history.Congress had enacted the Income Tax Act of 1894.The law imposed a federal tax upon income above a specified threshold.But when the law reached the Supreme Court, the Court confronted a fundamental constitutional problem.The Constitution divided federal taxes into different constitutional categories.Duties, imposts, and excises were required to be uniform throughout the United States.Direct taxes were subject to a different rule.They had to be apportioned among the states according to population.That distinction became decisive in Pollock.The Court examined taxes imposed upon income derived from property, including rents from real estate.And it asked a critical question:Could Congress avoid the constitutional requirement of apportionment simply by taxing the income produced by property rather than taxing the property itself?The Court said no.It reasoned that a tax upon the income derived from real property was, constitutionally, equivalent to a tax upon the property itself.And because a tax upon real property was a direct tax, the tax upon its income was also subject to apportionment.The Court extended that reasoning to income derived from personal property as well.That created a serious constitutional obstacle for the income-tax system Congress had attempted to establish.Why?Because apportionment works according to population.Suppose two states had identical populations.Under an apportioned direct tax, each state would generally have to bear the same share of the total tax assigned according to population—even if the amount of taxable income or property within those states differed dramatically.That is fundamentally different from the way an income tax normally operates.An income tax ordinarily follows the amount of taxable income.Apportionment follows population.The two principles do not fit comfortably together.And that was the constitutional problem exposed by Pollock.Congress wanted the ability to impose a national tax upon income without having to apportion that tax among the states according to population.Fourteen years later, the political response began.In 1909, Congress proposed the Sixteenth Amendment.It was ratified in 1913.And its language deserves to be read carefully:“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.”Notice what the Amendment specifically addresses.Taxes on incomes.From whatever source derived.Without apportionment.Those words directly addressed the constitutional problem that had become so important in Pollock.But they also raise an important historical question.Did the Sixteenth Amendment create an entirely new federal taxing power?Or did it change the constitutional rule governing apportionment of taxes on income?The Supreme Court addressed that question shortly after ratification.In 1916, in Stanton v. Baltic Mining Company, the Court described the effect of the Sixteenth Amendment in unmistakable language.It said the Amendment:“conferred no new power of taxation.”That statement deserves attention.The Supreme Court was not saying that the Sixteenth Amendment accomplished nothing.Obviously, it accomplished something enormously important.Congress could now impose taxes upon income without apportioning those taxes among the states according to population because of the source from which the income arose.What the Court said was that the Amendment did not confer a new power of taxation.That distinction is essential to understanding the constitutional history.Before the Sixteenth Amendment, Pollock had treated certain taxes upon income from property as direct taxes because of the source of that income.If the tax was direct, apportionment was required.The Sixteenth Amendment removed that obstacle for taxes on income.The source of the income could no longer trigger the apportionment requirement in the manner Pollock had imposed.That was a major constitutional change.But it is not the same thing as saying that the Amendment created an unlimited federal taxing power that had never existed before.And that is the point we need to preserve.Pollock identified the constitutional obstacle.The Sixteenth Amendment removed that obstacle.And the Supreme Court subsequently stated that the Amendment “conferred no new power of taxation.”Those three propositions should be kept together.Because the Sixteenth Amendment is frequently treated as though the words “taxes on incomes” ended every constitutional inquiry concerning federal income taxation.But historically, that is not what happened.The ...
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    8 mins
  • Springer

    Springer
    Sep 18 2026
    Springer: When Classification Became the AnswerIt is September 18th, 2026. Welcome to YesToHellWith.com.We have reached 1881 and Springer v. United States.And this case presents a question that goes directly to the heart of the missing constitutional bridge.William Springer was an Illinois attorney and former member of Congress. The federal government had assessed taxes against his income, gains, and profits under the Civil War revenue laws. Springer challenged the tax as a direct tax that had not been apportioned as required by the Constitution.The Supreme Court rejected his argument.After examining the historical treatment of taxation, the Court concluded that direct taxes within the constitutional meaning were essentially capitation taxes and taxes upon real estate.It then placed the tax upon gains, profits, and income within the category of an excise or duty.That classification defeated Springer’s particular constitutional objection.But Victory asks the next question:An excise upon what?That question becomes especially important when we remember something that is easily overlooked.At the time Springer was decided, the word income did not appear anywhere in the United States Constitution.Read Article I.Congress was given the power to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises.The Constitution established rules concerning direct taxation.But there was no constitutional category called income.“Income” had entered the federal tax system through legislation.That distinction is critical.Congress created a statutory tax category.The Constitution supplied the governmental power.Those are not the same thing.So when the Civil War Congress imposed taxes upon gains, profits, and income, the constitutional question necessarily became:Where does this new statutory tax concept fit within the taxing powers actually granted by the Constitution?That is the question Springer confronted.And the Court’s answer was classification.The tax was not direct.It was an excise or duty.But classification presents another question that cannot simply disappear:What was the constitutionally excisable subject?Springer’s income included compensation earned through his profession.Was practicing law the taxable subject?Was practicing law a federally granted privilege?Was the taxable event Springer’s performance of professional services?Was it his exchange of those services for compensation?Was it the receipt of money?Was the resulting gain itself the subject?Or did placing the statutory word income around the economic result somehow make that result constitutionally excisable?That is the problem.The statutory word cannot answer the constitutional question.Congress possesses enormous legislative authority within the powers delegated to it.But Congress cannot enlarge those powers merely by creating a new statutory category.Suppose Congress creates a term tomorrow and places ten different forms of property, activity, and transactions inside it.Giving those things a common statutory name does not determine their constitutional character.The Constitution still governs.And that is why the distinction between statutory language and constitutional language matters so much in Springer.The Court had every right—and indeed the responsibility—to determine the constitutional classification of the tax before it.But Victory asks whether the resulting classification fully explains the connection between the constitutional excise power and Springer’s ordinary professional earnings.Because these are two different propositions:This tax is not a direct tax requiring apportionment.And:These particular earnings are constitutionally reachable through the federal excise power.The first does not automatically demonstrate the reasoning necessary for the second.Or stated even more simply:“Not direct” does not, by itself, prove “constitutionally excisable.”Something still has to connect the constitutional power to the subject upon which that power operates.That something is the bridge.And once Springer became precedent, another problem emerged.The classification could begin to substitute for the analysis.A later court could cite Springer.Then another court could cite that decision.Lawyers could cite the cases.Treatises could repeat the proposition.Eventually the reasoning becomes remarkably simple:Income tax?Excise.Authority?Springer.Question answered.Except Victory does not allow precedent to become a substitute for examining what the precedent actually established.So now return to 1861 and 1862.This is where the sequence becomes extremely powerful.Congress introduced income into federal taxation as a statutory concept.That was step one.Congress then imposed a tax upon gains, profits, and income.That was step two.Then, in 1881, the Supreme Court confronted that tax and placed it within an existing constitutional category—an excise or duty.That was step three.Look carefully at what happened.First came the statutory ...
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    8 mins
  • The Missing Constitutional Bridge

    The Missing Constitutional Bridge
    Sep 17 2026



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    5 mins