A copy of my letter sent to Illinois Representatives in the Federal Government

copy shared to both Tammy Duckworth (Senate) and Mary E. Miller (Congress)

Dear Senator/Congresswoman,

I hope this letter finds you and your family well.

I’m a citizen of Edgar County, Illinois, and I’m writing to you with a matter of great importance.

I ask to no longer be taxed by the American Federal and State governments to support activities which are harmful to human well-being.

I implore you to create a motion to eliminate the Federal Reserve, and repeal all legal tender laws in America.  Our government must not be allowed to steal from us through inflating the money supply any longer. 

Free human beings get to choose what they want to use as money.  I am a free human being, and I demand to be treated like one.  Being free of other taxes but not of inflation is the same as being free of the fire in a burning building, yet still engulfed in the suffocating smoke.

Our government is stealing my money, time, and life energy to use it for things that I would never use it for.  You became responsible the moment you accepted the political office you now hold.  By being in a position to take action and not taking it, you are a participant in all the damage caused by our government.

The American government has killed hundreds of thousands of human beings in other countries and its own, and the total is rising. Thousands of children will never grow up because of our government’s warmongering, war funding, empire building, subtle sabotaging, and world-dominating.

The American government restricts trade within its own borders, and with all countries around the world.  In the name of political power, common and decent people are restricted from the most basic and dignifying social activity – free trade to mutual benefit.  Instead of exchanging peacefully and learning to cooperate with different people and cultures, the American perspective is warped around the incentive for easy political favors obtained by violent intervention, and an “us versus them” mentality toward other cultures and peoples. 

The American government has become a dishonest system.  Our government foists financial obligations onto babies, proclaiming them as debt-slaves before they even learn to walk. The system we have incentivizes politicians to create and prolong an endless series of crises and fear-based stories about the world around us. 

The political establishment restricts and distorts information coming from other countries, and teaches us to fear and hate the people there.  Keeping average citizens in a fog of fear, uncertainty, obfuscation, and division has become an essential part of the system.  The simple truth has become something to be avoided at all costs, because it’s bad for political business. 

The American government today is a front for illicit activity, with an entertainment division comprised of one group of politically connected people pretending to be divided into different parties, acting out a theatre routine.

The incentive structure driving the people benefiting from this system has a momentum of its own.  No one knows who the most central stakeholders of this system are.  Most likely, yourself and most other politicians do not even know the names of the people financing government debt and pulling the strings at a deeper level.  Yet we are all subject to their whims, thanks to the reckless use of violence by the American government.  Human well-being, peace, and simple truth are being sacrificed on the altar of political expediency and power for a tiny minority of people.

Coercion and cooperation cannot coexist.  The American government is systematically killing the goodwill, heroism, love, and growth that accompany free choice, and forcing us to live in a world of fear, endless crises, and division.

If the government continues to perpetrate and facilitate these acts, I demand it do so without my property.  You are treating me like a slave.  You are treating my friends and family as slaves, and every other American citizen.  As long as nothing remains changed, we are living the lives of slaves in a country that brags about being the freest place on Earth.

I cannot voluntarily participate in this sickness without speaking out.

There is a way to make this world better.  I will take responsibility for the community around me.  I will live productively and peacefully, and help the people around me that I can.  Treat me like a responsible, adult human being, and I will live like one. 

Regarding the services of the government that provide real value – the police, the courts, and the military for defense only - I will gladly pay for my portion of these services voluntarily.  Please, stop taxing me.  I refuse to participate in the lying, killing, and stealing of the American government.

If our government cannot allow a conscientious objector to murder, theft, dishonesty, subjugation, and fear-based life, what value can it possibly provide?

I know you are good person with good intentions, and I do not blame you or any other person singularly for the challenges we face.  However, though no one person is to blame, we’re all responsible for making things better, and you are in a position to make a relatively big difference.  To be clear, I will continue obeying all laws.  I am simply requesting an exemption from being forced to fund things that are wrong and bad for humanity.

Thank you for your time and consideration. 

Respectfully,

Jeffrey Gardner