brandon

I heard a saying once (I cannot remember the provenance) that could be paraphrased like: “The liberal is someone who is for all movements except the current movement; against all wars except the current war.”

There are two important points:

1. Every major movement in history has incorporated elements of violence;
2. Which movements we retroactively consider as violent is determined by sociological consensus.

For example, the American civil rights movement is today considered by people to have been largely non-violent. However at the time the movement’s opponents definitely thought of, and portrayed it as a violent enterprise.

Opponents of a movement will always portray that movement as violent. The status-quo consensus perspective on historical protests is written by the victors. Therefore, the hypothesis that “non-violent” protests are more likely to succeed than “violent” ones is self-fulfilling. When protest movements succeed we are less likely to consider them “violent”.

They are referring to some fringe “tax protester” conspiracy theories which dispute that the 16th amendment was properly ratified. You can read about them here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_protester_Sixteenth_Amendment_arguments#Sixteenth_Amendment_ratification

Suffice it to say, these ‘theories’ have been largely rejected, including by the states themselves, and by the SCOTUS.