I celebrated New Year’s this year at a residence I rented in Maine, not too far from where I was born. My “pure Canadian” wife and I were joined by our two daughters and their husbands, as well as other family members including my mother who continues to live on Campobello Island where I grew up. The reason for the celebration in Maine was that my older daughter, who now lives in Texas and is married to a Texan, has applied for a green card and could not leave the US. She and her husband had originally intended to come to Nova Scotia and spend Christmas with us, but when her green card did not get issued in time, we had to settle on “Plan B”, which allowed her to spend some time with her grandmother and other family members.
When I opened my Christmas gift from my Texas daughter and her husband, it was a T-shirt with a depiction on the front of a star above a cannon and the words “COME AND TAKE IT”. My son-in-law, who is from Cuero, explained that the shirt was from the neighbouring town of Gonzales. He explained that back in the 1800’s, Mexican authorities had given the people of Gonzales a cannon to help protect themselves from frequent Comanche raids. Over the next few years, the political situation in Mexico deteriorated and several states revolted. The Mexican commander thought it unwise to leave the cannon with the residents of Gonzales and asked them to return the cannon. The residents’ reply was a defiant “COME AND TAKE IT”. The Battle of Gonzales was the first military engagement of the Texas Revolution.
As I often rant about the US government as a result of FATCA, the slogan made my daughter and son-in-law think of me. This slogan basically sums up my position with regards to FATCA. Regarding my paltry life’s savings, my message to Barack Obama, his henchmen in the US government and his minions in the Canadian government, is “COME AND TAKE IT”! Instead of a star above a cannon, my flag has a maple leaf above a piggy bank. I have no intention of giving Barack Obama, Charlie Rangel, Timothy Geithner, Hilary Clinton, or anyone else in that crime syndicate known as the US government one cent of my hard earned money without a fight. The opening salvo in that fight starts with the ADCS Charter challenge.
According to Wikipedia, “Under President Antonio López de Santa Anna, the Mexican government began to shift away from a federalist model. The increasingly dictatorial policies, including the revocation of the Constitution of 1824 in early 1835, incited many federalists to revolt. The border region of Mexican Texas was largely populated by immigrants from the United States. These were accustomed to a federalist government and to extensive individual rights, and they were quite vocal in their displeasure at Mexico’s shift towards centralism.” In relation to the cannon, Wikipedia says, “The cannon’s fate is disputed. It may have been buried and rediscovered in 1936, or it may have been seized by Mexican troops after the Battle of the Alamo”.
Regarding the Alamo, Wikipedia says, “The Battle of the Alamo (February 23 – March 6, 1836) was a pivotal event in the Texas Revolution. Following a 13-day siege, Mexican troops under PresidentGeneral Antonio López de Santa Anna launched an assault on the Alamo Mission near San Antonio de Béxar (modern-day San Antonio, Texas, United States), killing all of the Texian defenders. Santa Anna’s cruelty during the battle inspired many Texians—both Texas settlers and adventurers from the United States—to join the Texian Army. Buoyed by a desire for revenge, the Texians defeated the Mexican Army at the Battle of San Jacinto, on April 21, 1836, ending the revolution.”
As I get older, I wish I had spent more of my life studying history. Someone said, “Those who fail to learn from history are destined to repeat it.” Though I have just scratched the surface in learning about the Texas Revolution, it was amazing how it seemed to describe what we are facing. The US government (both parties), in shifting from a federalist model, becoming increasingly dictatorial, ignoring the Constitution and removing individual rights are stoking the fires of revolt. There is a reason Donald Trump is so popular, and the unrest in the US is palpable as Obama continues to act as a monarch. I expect his next executive order will be to repeal the Magna Carta!
The Battle of Gonzales had little military significance, but it marked a clear break between the colonists and the dictatorial government and is considered to have been the start of the Texas Revolution. In the Battle of the Alamo, the vastly outgunned and outnumbered colonists eventually succumbed to the government firepower, but the cruelty of the government got the attention of and stoked the anger of the larger population. Once the slumbering masses were awakened to the cruelty of the government, the fight was over and the government lost. I have heard it said of our fight that we are in a marathon, not a sprint. I would like to add that we may have lost a battle, but we will win the war.
Any good “revolution” against oppressive dictators requires brave leadership. I am so thankful for (alphabetically) Gwen Deegan, Peter Dunn, Ginny Hillis, Stephen Kish, Tricia Moon, John Richardson, Lynne Swanson and Carol Tapanila (and others – please forgive me if I have overlooked you). Others, whose real names I do not know, are involved in other ways, for example supporting the Charter challenge or regularly commenting on news articles, changing hearts and minds one at a time. I am especially thankful for Ginny and Gwen, the public faces of our ragtag group of women and men. They are more concerned about the plights of people like me than they are about their own comfort and security. It is in large part from following their brave example, that I defiantly tell Obama that if he wants to plunder my totally Canadian earned life’s savings, “COME AND TAKE IT”!
Regardless of compliance or non-compliance, all I can think of is that, at some point, your number will come up & you will lose access to banking in your home country.
To me, that’s the biggie. Then what???
@Badger, among the wealth of references given, links to http://tax-expatriation.com/2015/12/26/u-s-citizens-uscs-and-lawful-permanent-residents-lprs-caution-when-making-gifts-us-tax-court-recently-ruled-a-1972-gift-by-sumner-redstone-still-open-to-irs-challenge/ which starts off discussing the Sumner Redstone case, T.C. Memo. 2015-237 (“Sumner did not file a Federal gift tax return reporting the 1972 transfer of stock to the children’s Trusts. The notice of deficiency, though issued 41 years after the transfer, was thus timely.”)
Of course the IRS examination occurred only because of an intra-family dispute and facts about an much earlier inter-generational transfer of assets came to light in litigation and news reporting. For most people, even in the absence of a statute of repose or a time bar, nothing like that happens. Still, the time will inevitably come when virtually every US citizen will be susceptible to IRS claims for the imprescriptible tax debts of some long-dead ancestor (“transferee liability”).
But in this era of outrageous, exorbitant civil forfeitures (“just because they can”: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/11/opinion/civil-forfeiture-and-accountability.html?_r=0 ), accusation of cash transaction avoidance by “structuring” smaller amounts, of IRS levies upon heirs for tax claims against ancestors that are difficult or impossible to defend for want of documentation and witnesses, it’s no wonder that those who a few years ago would be outliers — Donald Trump, the Militia Movement and the Bundy group’s occupation of Malheur — gain sympathy among the so-called silent majority.
All of the issues Badger mentions contribute to the obvious disappearance (obvious from the statistics of presumed Americans abroad and of reported tax returns filed from abroad) of millions of overseas Americans not just from the tax rolls but from any contact with the USA.
If there is an unadvertised network of professions — parallel to those with Web sites offering help in obtaining “economic citizenships” abroad — advising on disappearance from USG attention I wouldn’t know. But neither would I be surprised. It isn’t obvious how much further the USG can go in enlisting foreign governments to assist in pursuing those they consider their own nationals but from whom the USG claims primary and perpetual allegiance. And the self-righteous insistence by so many accountants and tax lawyers to “Get right with … the IRS” is cringe-worthy to anyone with legal or accounting qualifications remaining on the outside. Indeed, such exhortation seems to me to garner not much greater result among Americans abroad than similar but different exhortations on billboards in the Bible Belt do among the tourists passing by.
The USG may have looked at numbers of unrenewed passports last issued abroad but the State Department isn’t talking. Nor does it public numbers of passports issued to persons with foreign addresses, a number which might anyway not be meaningful. In genealogy research I do come up against names missing from the Social Security Death Index, but that may only mean that no death benefit was sought.
From one standpoint, each more egregious tax-and-penalty provision implemented by the USG is good for the overseas middle-class accidental and reluctant American: It further reduces compliance (often because of inability to pay or the implications for non-American family members) and at some point must engage the human-rights attention of other states, even the ECtHR. Two such cases (from 1997) I found some years ago are here (involving the heirs to a Swiss decedent’s succession), perhaps there are others more recent:
http://uniset.ca/css/ECHR_AP_Switz.pdf
http://uniset.ca/css/ECHR_EL_Switz.pdf
@Jane
It sort of depends where you are.
* The local credit union or other exempt financial institution (they are really rubbish in the U.K., but in a worst case scenario, they are my refuge). Can be great if you are in Canada.
* Accounts that are not reported under the IGA? Banks seem more willing to open these. They don’t even bother asking about nationality. Useful for savings.
* Getting money via foreign spouse?
@Jane worries that “at some point, your number will come up & you will lose access to banking in your home country.”
I know several unwilling American citizens who do all their banking via a non-American spouse’s account, either with a POA or with just a debit card and PIN. Even in the USA there are various facilities and workarounds available to unbanked persons: refillable debit cards, for example. And for those with something to hide or fear of a levy, LLCs, FLPs and an alphabet soup of entities, trusts and trust-like arrangements. The late Kirby James Hensley used his Universal Life Church to own his “parsonage” and collect freewill gifts and offerings. (The Church still exists. I was ordained by it, when Hensley still ran it, for 25¢ and still have the certificate “suitable for framing”.)
I know Americans in different countries with mortgages who are obliged by the terms of the mortgage to maintain a bank account and that’s the bank’s problem. .
In Switzerland Postfinance is said to be required by law to maintain an account for any Swiss citizen who wants one.
My impression is that the overwhelming majority of the “8 million” American citizens abroad follow the “Don’t ask don’t tell” rule, which works if they have another nationality and their documents don’t show birth in the USA.
Which still leaves outlier accounting firms: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/tax/11050777/British-families-billed-500-to-prevent-Americans-dodging-tax.html (Grant Thornton, a bill for £500 and a trust established by a British client with absolutely no US connection)
The USG, and particularly the IRS, use fear as a collection mechanism. Most people aren’t worried. That a few tens of thousands may be worried is shown by the existence of forums such as this. But the USG isn’t going to invade Canada, and even if a private bounty hunters does kidnap a tax debtors some day that is only going to happen once. Like the Ronald Anderson case, the Sidney Jaffe case. And, in Prohibition times, when G-Men strong-armed liquor smugglers across the border. (They didn’t repeat that in the Native American tax prosecutions.)
Par for the course:
http://dailycaller.com/2016/01/12/hillary-targets-cayman-tax-schemes-that-have-made-her-family-millions/