Robert D. Mueller - Page 4




                                                - 4 -                                                  
            determined that petitioner's proper filing status for income tax                           
            purposes for each year before the Court was single.  Accordingly,                          
            respondent calculated the deficiencies and additions to tax using                          
            the tax rates applicable to unmarried individuals pursuant to                              
            section 1(c).                                                                              
                                               OPINION                                                 
                  Petitioner does not challenge the facts on which                                     
            respondent’s determinations are based.1  Petitioner’s sole claim                           
            in this case is that he should be accorded married, rather than                            
            single, filing status on his tax returns for the years 1989 to                             
            1995.  Petitioner does not claim to have ever been married.                                
            Rather, petitioner argues that he had an "economic partnership"                            
            with his roommate and that he was unconstitutionally denied the                            
            opportunity to file a joint tax return with him in recognition of                          
            such partnership.  Petitioner references a number of                                       
            constitutional provisions, but we understand the crux of                                   
            petitioner’s constitutional claim to be that the tax code’s                                
            unequal or differential treatment between married taxpayers and                            
            unmarried persons in an economic partnership constitutes a                                 
            violation of the due process notions implicit in the Fifth                                 




                  1At trial petitioner alleged for the first time that he had                          
            suffered several theft losses during the years at issue.                                   
            However, petitioner failed to substantiate any such losses and                             
            abandoned the argument on brief.                                                           





Page:  Previous  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9  10  11  12  Next

Last modified: May 25, 2011