Where it started....(and a helluvabook), The right of Congress to see tax records.
I did not know about sections 6103(f)(1) and (4)(A) under the Internal Revenue code that forces the Secretary of the Treasury to hand over the confidential tax records of any taxpayer without their consent. And then I did, and then learned the history of the code, and smiled.
The sections became law in 1924 when Congress was dealing with a scandal afflicting the very-Republican Harding administration. The issue was the alleged bribery of government officials for private gain at taxpayer expense. Sound familiar?
The scandal: Teapot Dome. The scandal you maybe have learned about in your history class in high school that lasted all of what....two-minutes? Then forgotten.
And the smile: Back in 2009, with my car radio tuned to NPR, I caught an interview between host Diane Rehm and author Laton McCartney. It was so fascinating I sat in my car in my driveway listening to the entire interview. Then I went out and bought the book.
McCartney's book: "Teapot Dome. How Big Oil bought the Harding White House and tried to Steal the Country". A book so detailed and so well-written it reads like a novel.
To give you an idea how fascinating the story is, early in the book McCartney describes Harding's benefactor and pick for Secretary of the Interior being murdered in an Oklahoma hotel three weeks after Hardin's election by his mistress who was the wife of his nephew!
Can't get any more Republican than that!!!
When I finished the book I thought - "That's where Republicans learned to steal elections and rob the country blind. Nixon was a piker compared to these Republicans." And like today's Republicans in Congress, the Republicans of 1921-1924 refused to investigate their leader.
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