Frivolous Position
A “frivolous position” is, in federal tax practice, an argument that has been classified by statute, regulation, or case law as not warranting judicial engagement. The classification carries automatic consequences: §6702 imposes a $5,000 penalty for filing a return that takes a frivolous position, and §6673 authorizes Tax Court sanctions up to $25,000 for litigating one.
The IRS publishes an annual notice — currently “The Truth About Frivolous Tax Arguments” — that catalogs the recognized categories. The list is broad, covering most constitutional challenges to the income tax, most jurisdictional challenges, and most definitional challenges to “income,” “wages,” “person,” or “United States.”
The doctrinal foundation comes from Crain v. Commissioner, 737 F.2d 1417 (5th Cir. 1984), which held that courts have no obligation to “refute these arguments with somber reasoning and copious citation of precedent; to do so might suggest that these arguments have some colorable merit.” The Crain doctrine has metastasized over four decades into a near-blanket rule of judicial non-engagement with anything resembling an alternate-tax argument.
The category resolves a real institutional problem (judicial economy) and creates a different one (the courts have committed themselves to positions they will not defend on the merits). Both observations are true. The site treats “foreclosed” as a verdict precisely because the procedural reality of frivolous- position doctrine is itself a form of legal answer, even when the substantive question deserves better.