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The presence of an admission, express or implied,
serves as direct proof that the taxpayer was not
contesting liability. But absence of an admission,
while not conclusive proof of a contest, certainly
leaves a gap in petitioner’s proof * * * [Id. at 654.]
There are a number of court opinions involving a variety of
factual situations and the question of whether accrual basis
taxpayers' liabilities with regard to tax adjustments and the
related statutory interest should be regarded as sufficiently
settled, as fixed and definite, and whether the amounts thereof
were determinable with reasonable accuracy, or whether the
taxpayers' liabilities therefor should be regarded as contingent
and contested.
A number of courts have defined a contest narrowly and have
suggested that affirmative acts by taxpayers which establish
clearly the existence of the contest should be present in order
for the asserted tax liabilities to be regarded as contested. In
Hollingsworth v. United States, 215 Ct. Cl. 328, 568 F.2d 192,
202-203 (1977), a dispute with a State agency, not with
respondent, over a change in method of accounting and what was
regarded merely as a “naked suggestion” (not as an objection) by
the taxpayer to respondent that a proposed adjustment not be made
until a following year were treated as not rising to the level of
a contest with respondent over the related income tax deficiency
and interest.
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