Time: Mon Mar 10 13:21:54 1997
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	Mon, 10 Mar 1997 11:10:21 -0700 (MST)
Date: Mon, 10 Mar 1997 12:22:22 -0800
To: (Recipient list suppressed)
From: Paul Andrew Mitchell [address in tool bar]
Subject: SLS: IRS Historian speaks (fwd)

<snip>
>Returns vandalized, ex-historian's book says
>
>Washington -- The Internal Revenue Service's former historian says the
>agency mishandles, even destroys, important historical records.  She
>alleges that law violations include the vandalizing of presidential tax
>returns by IRS employees seeking souvenirs.
>
>A new book by Shelley L. Davis, who resigned in 1995 after seven years as
>IRS historian, hits the stands as the tax-collecting agency faces, in the
>words of Commissioner Margaret Milner Richardson, "unprecedented attacks
>on the tax system."
>
>More came Sunday.  Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La, a longtime critic of the
>agency, described the IRS as "the most un-American agency we have in the
>country, where you walk in guilty and you stay guilty unless you prove
>you're innocent."
>
> Appearing on   Fox News Sunday   Tauzin recommended the agency's
>dissolution and a "great tea party" of Americans to toss out the income
>tax in favor of a national sales tax.
>
> In a passage of Davis' book,   Unbridled Power: Inside the Secret
>Culture of the IRS    she describes reviewing tax returns of presidents
>back to Woodrow Wilson, who was in office when the income tax was
>imposed.
>
>Davis writes that IRS privacy laws prevent her from detailing contents of
>the tax returns.  But, she wrote, "I can note, to my dismay, that the
>signature blocks on nearly all the returns had been torn off -- where the
>president had set down his autograph."
>
> Davis said she brought this vandalism to the attention of an IRS
>secretary, who "mumbled something about 'souvenir hunting' by former
>members of the commissioner's office."
>
> IRS spokesman Frank Keith said he couldn't respond to the allegation
>because the tax code forbids disclosing information about any taxpayer's
>return.  Presidents since Gerald Ford have voluntarily made public
>portions of their tax returns.
>
>Keith denied charges that the agency violates the Federal Records Act in
>its handling of old IRS files and taxpayer returns.
>
>Davis' allegations formed the basis for a lawsuit filed last month by two
>groups of historians and a newsletter publisher, seeking to force the IRS
>to obey the Federal Records Act.
>
>------------------In Monday's Arizona Republic Newspaper---------3/10/97.


========================================================================
Paul Andrew, Mitchell, B.A., M.S.    : Counselor at Law, federal witness
email:       [address in tool bar]   : Eudora Pro 3.0.1 on Intel 586 CPU
web site:  http://www.supremelaw.com : library & law school registration
ship to: c/o 2509 N. Campbell, #1776 : this is free speech,  at its best
             Tucson, Arizona state   : state zone,  not the federal zone
             Postal Zone 85719/tdc   : USPS delays first class  w/o this
========================================================================


      


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