Good morning,

Since today is April 15, I close the week reflecting on taxes. Some say taxes are the price of civilized society. I disagree; the confiscatory tax burden is actually the cost of betraying our heritage of self-governance.

You’ll find that at the conclusion of today’s Texas Minute.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

UPFRONT: In yesterday’s ‘Today In History’ section, John Wilkes Booth’s middle name was misspelled. I apologize for the error!

Ag Commissioner Miller: Abbott Doesn’t Keep Me Informed

• In today’s edition of The Headline, Brandon Waltens talks with Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller about his pointed criticisms of Gov. Greg Abbott’s decisions regarding the border. Specifically, Miller criticized the traffic jam the governor created that has slowed goods important to the state’s agriculture industry.
   
• Earlier this week, Gov. Abbott called Miller “completely uninformed.” In an exclusive interview airing later today, Miller fires back.
   
• You can catch The Headline as it premieres at 5:30 p.m. each Friday, with the video archive and podcast available shortly after. 

Paxton: No Special Treatment For Vaxxed 

• While many of us have put the coronavirus madness in the rearview mirror, many government officials are still using it as an excuse to force new discriminatory rules. On Thursday, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced a formal legal opinion on one of those issues in the state. Jacob Asmussen has the details.
      

• Last year, State Sen. Paul Bettencourt (R-Houston) asked Paxton for a legal opinion regarding school district policies that would negatively affect employees who did not get the COVID vaccine. At issue were rules giving special benefits only to employees who had received a COVID jab.  
   

• Paxton finds “a court would likely conclude that, by offering additional paid leave only to those employees showing proof of COVID-19 vaccination or a medical exemption, the Houston Independent School District’s COVID-19 paid leave policy violates Executive Order GA-39.”
     

• Similarly, Paxton said school officials cannot force employees to show a “vaccine passport” for “any purpose other than for health care.”
   
• “No employer, public or private, should be manipulating the adoption of vaccinations by withholding benefits in violation of equal employment standards.” – Christine Welborn, executive director of Texans for Vaccine Choice

The Pro-Porn School Librarians

• A group of activist Texas public school librarians, calling themselves “FReadom Fighters”, are intent on keeping sexually inappropriate books in school libraries. (Yes, they do actually spell it that way.)
   
• The group is receiving an award from the American Library Association for making sure children can have access to any reading material they want – including pornography. Erin Anderson has the story.
       
• Both the American Library Association and the Texas-based FReadom Fighters specifically reject any age boundaries on access to reading materials.

      

• Meanwhile, the Texas Library Association is organizing an effort to protect librarians from being fired. “Librarians have extensive education and training which they rely on to meticulously develop a diverse set of learning materials for a diverse group of children. The government should not be making sweeping decisions that take that process of careful consideration away from the experts.”

      
• Oh, really?
      

• Texas school districts have recently acknowledged their librarians don’t always read books before making them available to students. Instead, they rely on reviews from third-party publications—a process district officials have blamed for several sexually explicit books “slipping through the cracks” and onto library shelves.

Inflation Struggles

• Katy Drollinger reports the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has this week released the Consumer Price Index for March 2022. Inflation rates leaped to 8.5 percent, the highest point in 40 years. 
      
• According to Texans for Fiscal Responsibility, food prices can be expected to continue rising in the coming months.
      
• Thanks, Joe Biden!

Residency Questions In HD 93

• Former Southlake Mayor Laura Hill maintains an apartment in House District 93 that her GOP primary runoff opponent, Nate Schatzline, alleges is not her residence. According to Schatzline, recent filings with the Texas Ethics Commission lists Hill’s residency as Southlake – which is not included in House District 93.
      
• As Sydnie Henry reports, the issue has been on a slow burn since late last year. Earlier this year, Schatzline campaign workers left campaign materials on the door to Hill’s apartment, which is in the confines of the district. The mailer was not removed from the door for several days, leading the campaign to conclude Hill is merely maintaining an address, not a residence, in the district in an attempt to meet election eligibility requirements.
        
• “Residency is a finicky concept, especially if it must be litigated,” Austin election law attorney Tony McDonald told Texas Scorecard.
      
• Texas Scorecard reached out to Laura Hill for comment. She did not respond prior to publication.

Friday Reflection: High Taxes Are The Cost Of Betraying Our Heritage

Those who impose taxes are quick to plead righteousness of the levy, as though it were a divine sacrament. We’re told we should feel some sort of patriotic zeal for bearing the burden of a bloated government that far exceeds its constitutional size.

When the ruling elite in Jerusalem tried to trip up Jesus and ask about the Roman tax burden, He famously deflected. “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.” Jesus knew they weren’t really curious about tax policy; they just wanted an excuse to turn Him into a criminal.

Rather than Pharisees trying to trip us up, we have the federal tax code. While the Bible has less than 800,000 words, the federal tax code has close to 10 million.

When Christians question the heavy burden of taxes, someone will misquote Jesus’ words as a divine order to shut up and pay up. Others will quote Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.’s dissent in the 1927 case of Compañía General de Tabacos de Filipinas v. Collector of Internal Revenue. “Taxes are what we pay for civilized society,” he wrote.

Except, they are not. Taxes are blunt instruments used by the ruling elite to harass and manipulate the people while enriching themselves and their cronies.

Is that harsh? Well, maybe… But it’s not a bad summary of what God told Samuel when the prophet relayed to the Almighty that His chosen people wanted a human king to lord over them. God, of course, wanted them to govern themselves under His law.

In 1 Samuel 8, we find God’s warning: The king, we are told,

“will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. Your male and female servants and the best of your cattle and donkeys he will take for his own use. He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves.”

Taxes are the “tithe” progressives impose on everyone in the name of their secular religion. This is why study after study shows progressives are not actually charitable with their own money; they conflate the imposition of taxes with actual charity.

Yes, yes, render unto Caesar… Except, in our republic the law is king and the citizens – not the politicians – are the sovereigns. As citizens, we have allowed a 10-million-word tax code to be imposed upon us for the same bad and sinful reasons the people of Israel chose a king over God three millennia ago.

Modern taxation is not the price of civilized society; it is the cost of betraying our heritage of self-governance. If we want to reduce our tax burden, we must increase our civic activism.