AN APPEAL TO CONSCIENCE

Petition In Support of Those Refusing to Pay for War on Iraq

To all people of goodwill everywhere:

We stand in profound opposition to our government's determination to wage full-scale war against Iraq. The reasons for our opposition, in brief, include the following:

*Massive aerial bombardment puts millions of vulnerable Iraqi civilians at risk of death and disease. Such an attack follows over a decade of continued bombings and repressive sanctions that have already killed millions of innocent Iraqis.

*Full-scale war greatly increases the likelihood of terrorist attacks against the U.S., its citizens, and those of any allies who join us.

*All-out war on Iraq needlessly puts at risk the lives and health of young men and women in the U.S. military.

*The depleted uranium used in U.S. munitions is a cause of cancer for U.S. soldiers as well as Iraqis, and it poisons the soil and water with radioactivity for billions of years. *Full-scale war, followed by long-term military occupation of Iraq, will cost tens, if not hundreds, of billions of dollars, thus further diverting resources from addressing the hunger, homelessness, unemployment, and other economic problems facing millions of American families.

*Pre-emptive war against Iraq violates international laws, including the Charter of the United Nations, which the U.S. Constitution requires us to uphold.

Furthermore, there are other, more peaceful and effective approaches to dealing with real threats posed by weapons of mass destruction in the possession of Iraq or other nations, including our own. Examples include diplomatic initiatives; steps toward multilateral disarmament; and economic and security incentives to encourage disarmament.

We believe that every citizen of this country has a moral duty to speak out against, and avoid cooperation with, this escalated war against Iraq -- and to encourage others to do the same.  Refusal to pay taxes used to finance unjust wars, along with refusal by soldiers to fight in them, is a direct and potentially effective form of citizen noncooperation, and one that governments cannot ignore. War tax refusal has a long and honorable tradition among religious and secular opponents of war.

The U.S. government's ability to threaten and coerce other nations is a direct result of the unprecedented size of our military arsenal, which is far larger than that of all our allies and "enemies" combined. The maintenance of this arsenal depends upon the willingness of the American people, through their federal tax payments, to finance it.

Refusal to pay all or a portion of one's federal taxes as a form of conscientious objection to war may involve personal risks. For that reason, material and moral support for war tax refusers – including organizing support committees, raising support funds, and providing legal defense – is an important form of war resistance in itself.

Therefore, we, the undersigned individuals, believing that war tax refusal under the present circumstances is fully justified on moral and ethical grounds, publicly declare our encouragement of, and willingness to lend support to, those persons of conscience who choose to take this step.

NAMES OF INDIVIDUALS AND ORGANIZATIONAL SIGNATORIES:

Please include signature, printed name, postal and email addresses, and telephone number. Thank you.

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For information about war tax resistance, please contact the National War Tax Coordinating Committee, 1-800-269-7464