Ballot Issues Test Anti-Tax Mood

From USAToday.com:

The nation's fervor against taxing and spending will be tested beginning Tuesday in a series of state and local ballot measures seeking major tax hikes to preserve government services.

The ballot issues are making for odd alliances and potential election surprises. Some places friendly to the anti-tax "Tea Party" movement appear ready to raise taxes while opposition to public employee labor contracts is gaining strength in traditional union strongholds.

On May 18, Arizona will decide the biggest and most important measure: a 1-cent sales tax hike for three years that will lift the state's rate to 6.6% and the rate for Phoenix to 9.3%, one of the nation's highest.

The tax increase has no significant organized opposition and is leading in polls. The pro-tax sentiment comes in a state known for conservative politics, including a tough new crackdown on illegal immigration.

Tea-Party Activists Stage Tax-Day Rallies

While some taxpayers were rushing to get their returns filed last Thursday, others attended tea-party rallies across the country to show their dissatisfaction with the American tax system. According to the Wall Street Journal, the organizers chose the tax deadline to hold rallies in order to highlight “onerous taxes and a bloated federal government.”

The activists protested Democratic policies and displayed varying attitudes toward prominent Republicans. Some groups invited marquee conservatives, such as former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who addressed around 500 people in Austin, Texas.

Other organizers refused to invite politicians of any stripe, reflecting the deep distrust many in the movement feel toward elected officials.

In Wisconsin, several tea-party groups protested a decision to let former Republican Gov. Tommy Thompson address a rally in Madison. Saying it was "time for new voices and new faces," Mr. Thompson used his speech to announce that he would not challenge Wisconsin Democratic Sen. Russ Feingold in his bid for re-election.

The rallies in town squares and hotel ballrooms from Philadelphia to San Diego came a year after a similar spate of April 15 protests put the small-government, anti-tax movement on the national map.

Continue reading at WJS.com…

T.E.A. Parties

The Fourth of July usually means backyard barbecues, a trip to the lake, and watching the night sky explode with fireworks. This year will be a little different. This Independence Day, thousands of protesters will gather across the nation to act out against taxes. These protests deemed TEA Parties, which stands for “Taxed Enough Already,” began on April 15 this year. Over the last few months the movement has gained momentum, now boasting almost 1,700 registered “Tea Parties.”

Several groups claim to be the originators of the “Official TEA Party”, each with a different slant to their protests. Much like the first round of TEA Parties, what is actually being protested is up for debate. The common thread is that people do not like to pay taxes, especially when those taxes increase while government spending is growing. However, many groups have expanded the scope of the TEA parties using these protests for some unrelated purposes.

One Tea Party site states:

Are you fed up with a Congress and a president who:

• vote for a $500 billion tax bill without even reading it?
• are spending trillions of borrowed dollars, leaving a debt our great-grandchildren will be paying?
• consistently give special interest groups billions of dollars in earmarks to help get themselves re-elected?
• want to take your wealth and redistribute it to others?
• punish those who practice responsible financial behavior and reward those who do not?
• admit to using the financial hurt of millions as an opportunity to push their political agenda?
• run up trillions of dollars of debt and then sell that debt to countries such as China?
• want government controlled health care?
• want to take away the right to vote with a secret ballot in union elections?
• refuse to stop the flow of millions of illegal immigrants into our country?
• appoint a defender of child pornography to the Number 2 position in the Justice Department?
• want to force doctors and other medical workers to perform abortions against their will?
• want to impose a carbon tax on your electricity, gas and home heating fuels?
• want to reduce your tax deductibility for charitable gifts?
• take money from your family budget to pay for their federal budget?

If so, help organize and/or participate in a Taxed Enough Already (TEA) party in your community on July 4. You choose the time and the location. Use the registration form to the right.

The Re Tea Party Website states:

The Boston Tea Party was an act of direct protest by American Colonists demanding representation in the British Government. They became known as the original patriots.

America’s Tea Party of 2009 will reinvigorate that American and Patriotic spirit; one that demands respect for individual rights and property. As the bailouts spiral out of control, we are forced to fund failed banks. With foreclosures on the rise, we are made the collateral of reckless spending. And, when the bills come due, the IRS knocks on the door of “self-responsibility”.

ENOUGH!

No matter your take on the current administration and economic situation, I think we can agree that these protests celebrate what has made our country so great. Every one of us has the legally protected right to be ticked off, and to voice our anger in a significant way. And that is a beautiful thing.

4th of July Tea Parties Planned

According to the official TeaPartyDay.com website, there will be tea party protests in over 1,271 cities on the 4^th of July. The group—whose name stands for “taxed enough already”—gained National attention when thousands attended their April 15^th protests.

Now, the organization is ready for their next event with thousands of additional participants and hundreds of new locations. One of the tea party leaders is even planning on running for a seat in the Senate, according to Politico.

If you are interested in participating in a protest then you should definitely read up on the organization by checking out their website. Alternatively, you can find out if any tea party protests are scheduled in your hometown by visiting their locations page.

While I was looking up stories on the TEA protests, I came across this article from Olympian.com on a local chapter’s plans for their Independence Day protest.

More big protests against the Obama administration are planned at the state Capitol on the next two weekends, but a top state Democrat says he’s not yet worried about the effort to build a backlash movement against the new president.

The protests include a June 27 “TEA party” rally at Heritage Park with popular right-of-center motivational speaker Bob Basso, who dresses up as patriot Tom Paine, and longtime Republican political operative Floyd Brown.

The specific targets for both events include efforts by President Barack Obama’s administration to bail out automakers, rescue banks from insolvency, create a cap-and-trade proposal to deal with greenhouse-gas emissions, and establish universal health care coverage.

“This is definitely aimed at Washington, D.C., and reining in the uncontrolled spending. … We’re concerned about how the Constitution is simply being shredded. Laws are being broken. People who run the government don’t seem to understand what the Constitution says,” said Ken Morse, organizer of Saturday’s rally.

If you are interested in learning more about other tax protests, check the blog entry I posted a few weeks ago on the 5 biggest tax protests in US history.

What's Coming Up For Future 'Tea Party' Protests?

From the LA Times.com:

Last month's "tea party" protests have come and gone but are not forgotten. New protests are already brewing, some maybe this holiday weekend, others probably for July 4, with text messages and tweets flying back and forth.

The phenomenon in many ways is familiar in American political history -- a kind of eruption, an incoherent lashing out by people angry over taxes and spending and big government and bigger spending. And the uncertainty of their current lives.

Contrary to some cable news channels, we found "tea party" protesters often to be just as angry at Republicans in general and George W. Bush in particular as at the awe-inspiring size of the Obama Democratic administration's spending plans.

Historically, these protests have fizzled without some political personality to coalesce around -- a Gene McCarthy, a John Anderson, a George Wallace. A Ron Paul even.

Our Times colleague Richard Fausset spent a good deal of time recently with "tea party" participants. And we asked him to go through his notes and thoughts and share the experiences with us. Here's what he told us:

The people I talked with had a variety of targets. This doesn’t mean they went easy on Obama, however. One fake campaign sign showed a picture of the president and a certain hirsute German philosopher: It said: “Obama Marx ’08 – BFF.”

Another sign featured a picture of Obama in a Soviet officers’ uniform and the words: “JUST SAY NYET.”

“Hey, is that available as a T-shirt?” a guy asked the sign holder. “It will be soon,” came the reply.

It was somewhat surprising to hear from numerous folks that their beef wasn’t just with Obama’s economic policies. Time and again, people said they'd been just as upset with what they saw as profligate spending under Bush.

Tim Lee was typical. A councilman from suburban Atlanta's Cobb County. “The Republicans,” he said, “were doing just as bad for eight years.”

Lee’s home county, like many municipalities around the country, has been facing its own economic crisis, forced to cut millions from budgets to match anemic tax revenue. As for the national economy, he said the federal government should have “let it crash” instead of offering bailouts to troubled industries and a big stimulus package.

We would have picked ourselves up and moved on,” Lee added. “The pain would have been short-term. Now we’re taking the long- term pain of having to pay all that money back.”

John Pettit, a 48-year-old contractor, hoisted a sign that read “Chains – we can count on.” Pettit said the nation was “headed for bondage” with its reliance on government borrowing. Pettit’s concerns about government policy didn’t start with Obama or the current Congress, he said.

It went all the way back to the New Deal. Although he said the new guys were part of that long, sorry history by spending money that they simply didn’t have. “Hey," Pettit said, "good habits are learned in bad times. And bad habits are learned in good times. Right now, Congress isn’t learning.”

The rallies typically have a temporary stage, a parade of local officials speaking, radio DJs and minor celebrities rallying the crowd.

What emerges in thought later is the lack of a unifying figure around whom the "tea party" folks can rally.

It will be interesting to see if someone emerges as organizers roll out plans for the next round of protests. If it is to be effective in the long term, it seems the movement will need a decider: not just a public figurehead, but someone who can focus and modulate the multifarious blob of themes and emotions that seem to drive this fascinating middle-class revolt.

Someone, in short, who can tap both the thoughtfulness and anger behind the movement, the patriotism and Americans’ natural skepticism of government power … plus the anti-Obamaism, the call for a fair tax, the fear of new controls on carbon emissions. All that and more.

GOP Govs Plan Tea Party Sequel

From Politico.com:

Hoping to recapture the grassroots energy of last month’s “tea parties,” Republican Govs. Mark Sanford of South Carolina and Rick Perry of Texas will host a tele-town hall Thursday that’s being dubbed “Tea Party 2.0.”

The Republican Governors

Association said it is expecting 30,000 people to participate in the town hall, which will take place roughly one month after the much-publicized anti-tax tea party rallies held in hundreds of locations across the country on April 15, the tax filing deadline.

Sanford and Perry will each speak for several minutes before opening up the town hall to up to an hour-long question and answer session.

RGA Executive Director Nick Ayers said that while the effort Thursday will be on a smaller scale than the April tea party rallies, it still represents “a great opportunity to mobilize that support.”

Both Perry and Sanford are favorites among the tax-averse tea party attendees.

Sanford, who attended a tea party in Charleston, gained national notice for his high-profile battle with the White House over his resistance to federal stimulus funds designated for his state. The fate of those funds remains undecided as Sanford continues to battle with state lawmakers over how much of the $350 million in funds allocated for South Carolina his state will accept.

Perry spoke at three tea parties across Texas and helped promote the rallies during numerous radio and television interviews prior to the events.

The Texas governor generated widespread publicity after endorsing a state House resolution reaffirming the state’s sovereignty, a veiled shot at the president’s stimulus package.

“I believe that our federal government has become oppressive in its size, its intrusion into the lives of our citizens, and its interference with the affairs of our state,” Perry said at the time.

Perry drew praise from the conservative media for the move, but was widely derided by the left for suggesting that Texas may consider seceding from the union in protest of the stimulus.

Ayers said both governors “heard the frustration” of the tea party attendees and “understand that our Republican governors are the best positioned to lead on these issues."

The RGA, Ayers said, is hoping to use the town hall as a springboard for organizing support and fundraising for key gubernatorial races this year in Virginia and New Jersey.

“We don’t have to wait until 2010 to send a message to Democrats in Washington that they are spending too much and borrowing too much,” he said. “We’ll have an opportunity to do that this year.”

The 5 Biggest Tax Protests in U.S. History

There have been many instances throughout United States history where citizens and taxpayers have stood up to revolt against taxes they felt were being unfairly imposed. Recently, we saw the libertarian and conservative inspired “Tea Party” rallies on tax day, but this was neither the first nor the last time we will hear about tax protests. As long as governments are levying taxes, there are always going to be people who do not want to pay them. To help my readers gain a better understanding of the history of tax protests, I have put together the following list of the 5 biggest tax protests in US history.

The Stamp Act of 1765

After the British victory in the Seven Years War, the British government felt the American colonies should pay off some of the war’s debt with a new tax. They chose to tax a wide selection of printed materials, such as stamps, to repay the debt. Since the English bill of rights – the Magna Carta – granted citizens the right to only be taxed with proper consent, the colonists felt the new tax was unfair and revolted. By 1766, the tax was repealed, but not before the British Parliament was given the power to legislate over the colonists in the future, which would lead to the American Revolution.

The Boston Tea Party

One of the most famous protests in history, the Boston Tea Party, has become a symbol of American independence. The historic event took place when hundreds of Boston residents dressed as Native Americans and threw hundreds of pounds of East India Trading Company tea bags in to the sea. There were several different reasons they did this, but the most common of which was the lack of colonial representation in the British government.

The Whiskey Rebellion

In 1791, during Washington’s presidency, taxes were raised in the U.S. on whiskey to pay off a national debt. The Secretary of Treasury at the time (Alexander Hamilton) said it was both a way to raise revenue and to enforce social policy. However, it upset the American public enough to start a tax rebellion that led to a series of violent protests.

Proposition 13

The people of California approved Proposition 13 in 1978, which resulted in a cap on property tax rates in the state, reducing them by an average of 57%. In addition to lowering property taxes, the initiative also contained language requiring a two-thirds majority in both legislative houses for future increases in all state tax rates or amounts of revenue collected, including income tax rates. It also requires two-thirds vote majority in local elections for local governments wishing to raise special taxes. The act of passing the legislation is claimed to be one of the most successful acts of tax protest in American history, and pre-saged the election of Ronald Reagan to the U.S. presidency in 1980. It was upheld as constitutional by the United States Supreme Court in the case of Nordlinger v. Hahn in 1992.

The Tea Party Protests of 2009

The recent “Tea Party” protests have been called the biggest protest in the country’s history. However, there has yet to be any official confirmation on the exact number of participants. Estimates say that roughly 650,000 decided to protest federal taxation on April 15, 2009. The people involved stated many reasons for their protests, including but not limited to out-of-control federal government spending and federal bailouts. The protesters also objected to alleged future tax increases, including those on capital gains and dividends, energy, death tax, and those earning more than $250,000 a year. As of late, there have been calls by party organizers to host another round of protests on July 4, 2009.

Tax Day Tea Party Celebrations

Here is a good round-up of Tax Day Tea Parties happening nationwide, via Instapundit. Also, check out:

• Pajamas TV Live Stream
• Via Twitter
• Via Google Maps
• Teabagging the Establishment
• Tax Day Tea Party Open Thread

Finally, here is a good entry by Michelle Malkin describing how the Tea Party phenomenon got started.