Bryan T Camp
George H. Mahon Professor of Law, Texas Tech University School of Law
The Never-Ending Battle
In every era and area of law you find a never-ending battle between two groups of legal thinkers: formalists and functionalists. Each is connected to long-standing and honorable traditions in Anglo-American jurisprudence. The formalists tend toward the law side of those traditions the search for order and certainty and the functionalists tend toward the equity [...]
Tax Return Preparer Fraud and the Assessment Limitation Period
I have a confession: I can’t spell. Not that you can tell from my columns, where I successfully hide behind the spell-check function and the good efforts of Tax Analysts’ editors. How bad am I? Well, in sixth grade I won the English prize, but instead of the usual plaque, they gave me a dictionary. [...]
What Good Is The National Taxpayer Advocate?
Bryan Camp and George H. Mahon Have you read the National Taxpayer Advocate’s 2009 Annual Report? You know, the yearly 800-page compendium listing the 20 most serious taxpayer problems, recommending legislative changes, and reporting the most litigated tax issues? I thought not. Frankly, neither have I. But I will: it’s on my New Year’s resolutions [...]
A Brief Analysis of Governor Palin’s Tax Returns for 2006 and 2007
The release of an opinion letter by attorney Roger M. Olsen dated September 30, 2008, has stirred up the pot once again about the accuracy of Sarah and Todd Palin’s 2006 and 2007 tax returns. Not only that, but Mr. Olsen’s letter raises a couple of new issues. This paper focuses on five problems: three [...]
Between a Rock and a Hard Place
Today’s column discusses the Tax Court’s jurisdiction to hear stand-alone petitions from taxpayers who have been denied equitable relief under section 6015(f), one of the three spousal relief provisions contained in section 6015. Congress enacted section 6015 in the Internal Revenue Service Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998 (RRA 98) to replace the old “innocent [...]
The Mysteries of Erroneous Refunds
I love my yearly tax refund. I know I’m not supposed to, but I do. Theorists argue that my refund represents an interest-free loan to the government and I am supposed to resent that for reasons grounded in the obsessive individualism of our culture. But even accepting the argument’s premise, the value to me of [...]
