[Some years ago, while surfing the Internet, I found a website which seemed important enough at the time that I copied it. The page was old news even then. I did not, and do not, know either George Mercier or Armand Condo. At the time, I did not necessarily understand or agree with everything Mr.Mercier posited in his letter, but I made me think.
[If Mr. Mercier is correct, the signature card on "my" bank account may be that 'hidden' contractual nexus we have been looking for in trying to figure out Federal taxation and what make you a 'taxpayer'.
Here is the letter excerpted from that page:
August, 1984 |
If you are interested, the website with the complete text of the "Armand Condo letter" is: http://www.lawresearch-registry.org/incon000.htm
So, a couple years later, I found the website again and I understood more by then. [By this time, I have read parts of the UNIFORM COMMERCIAL CODE (Anderson's U.C.C. is the clearest explanation I have found) and parts of RESTATEMENT OF THE LAW, 2d Ed.] and I figured, "Hey, what the heck, I may as well go look at my signature card at my bank." [At this point, it had been somewhere between 11 and 12 1/2 years since I originally signed the signature card. After all, who normally has any reason to look at their own signature card after they sign it?]
So I went to my bank and said [This is not a transcript, but it covers the essentials.] to the bank receptionist, "Hi, I need to see my signature card."
So she said, "Sure, No problem.", went in the back, and, about five minutes later, came out with my signature card.
I looked at the card.
On the face of it, at some time after I had originally signed it and left the bank and without my knowledge, someone had stamped "COMMERCIAL" in black block letters (with what appeared to be a rubber stamp) on the face of the signature card.
So I said, "What's this? Can you explain to me how my signature card got stamped COMMERCIAL?" [I had thought and intended when I originally opened the account and signed the signature card that I was opening the account for my own private banking needs to take care of my own private affairs and could not imagine how my "private/personal" account had gotten transformed into a COMMERCIAL account, which I understood as being the account of a business. I believe the bank breached its obligation of good faith and fair dealing at the point someone [acting as/for the bank?] stamped that card without my knowledge or permission.]
Well, the bank receptionist hemmed and hawed and mumbled and finally said, "Well..., uh, we do that."
[I'm thinking, "We do that, do we?! ... I think 'we' just stopped! ... I wonder if this is a standard banking practice?"] So I sat down and cancelled the card on its face, by hand-printing CANCELLED in ink diagonally across the card, initialing and dating it, and said, "Give me a new blank signature card and make me a copy of this one, please."
She did.
I filled out the new signature card with exactly the same information [including account number] as on the original card and endorsed the new card "without prejudice" above or below my signature (I don't remember).
[It did not even occur to me to get a copy of the new signature card.]
So I went home with a copy of the cancelled original signature card and the belief that I had legitimately, even if a bit tardily, made a valid reservation of rights under the Uniform Commercial Code, Section 1-207 [California Commercial Code, Section 1207]. The bank did not give me a copy of the bank rules.
Several weeks later, I decided, "Well, I guess I better go see what the bank has done with/to my new signature card."
So, on a Friday when I was in the area, I went to the bank and told the receptionist, "Hi, I need to see my signature card.
She says, "Sure, No problem.", and goes in the back.
Twenty minutes later, she comes out and tells me, "We can't find your signature card."
"Huh?!"
[The signature card appears to be the legal basis for my "relationship"/contract with the bank. No signature card should mean no valid contract.] So I thank her and go on to enjoy my weekend.
Monday morning, I wrote a letter to the president [by title, not by name (maybe a mistake)] of that particular branch explaining that I had been at his bank the prior Friday and had wanted to see my signature card and that they "could not find it". I asked that he find the signature card and mail me a copy. Then I mailed it [postage paid, Certified Mail, Return Receipt requested] and waited for a response.
Five or six weeks later, I get a letter from a [related/affiliated/who knows?!] "Customer Service Bank" in Southern California or Arizona [I don't remeber exactly which and am too lazy to drag out the letter], telling me that they couldn't find my signature card either and suggesting that, for my convenience, I should stop by a convenient branch and fill out another signature card.
"Yeah, you bet; I'll do that first thing in the morning...."
From that point, "my" bank supposedly cannot account for, or "does not have", a signature card on file for "my" account, but I do have a paper trail that says that I:
(1) upon inspection [motivated by the Mercier letter above], discovered a possible problem [unilaterally created by the bank] with "my" account;
(2) after discovery, acted in a timely manner to correct the problem;
(3) checked to see whether my correction had solved the problem; and
(4) protested when I discovered that the correction had not worked.
What more an average reasonable man can do, I do not know.
From that point, odd things started happening to "my" account [At that time, the bank was going through acquisition/take-over blues, so maybe the following events were reasonable. "... Nah."]:
One month, the bank closed my account at the end of a billing cycle [I was probably overdrawn by $1-2, which was about usual at that time.]
When I questioned it ["OK folks, what's up with this?"], they reopened the account immediately.
A month or so later, the bank closed the account and cancelled the associated ATM card in the middle of a billing cycle without any notice or warning whatsoever [and apparantly without any cause, either].
When I discovered and questioned that, the bank reopened the account and refunded 2 months' service charges without my having asked for them [I believe that to be an admission of its knowledge of wrongdoing of some sort, but I do not know the exact nature of the wrongdoing.].
And that has been my state of affairs with 'my' [now 'the'] bank account for about 3 years now. [At one time, I had a second account at a different branch of the same bank and endorsed the signature card for that account "without prejudice" when I originally opened the account. Never had a problem with that branch.]
The bank [and anyone claiming by, or through, it] apparently has no valid signed signature card; I have use of the account; and the bank takes service charges every billing cycle [even though it has no valid signature card and probably no valid contract]. Is there a problem? I do not know.
If somebody from 'the government' should come along and say, "What are you doing with this signature card thing?", I have to say, "Nothing. I believe I discovered and remedied my private problem with the bank and here is the paper trail. What is your interest in my private business?"
If somebody from 'the government' should say, "Where is the signature card for this account?"; I have to say, "I have no idea; here is my paper trail; you should probably talk to the bank. If there is a problem, it is probably the bank's fault. I don't really have a problem with filing a complaint against the bank for their continuing pattern of bank fraud, if you want me to."
And if Mr. Mercier was correct in his letter above, the Secretary of the Treasury and/or the Internal Revenue Service probably has/have a major no-taxable-nexus problem.
So ... do I recommend that you do the same?
No. It's your life; do whatever you want.
However, if odd things are happening with your bank account, you cannot do anything about them until you discover that there is/may be a problem....
I just think the whole chain of events is pretty odd and requires inquiry.
Thomas Murrell Thornhill III
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