The Sixteenth Amendment
Federal income tax
Lets Congress tax income without dividing the tax among the states by population.
Ratified 1913 · 3 minute read
Published by Quasi-Legal Institute · Report an error
The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.
In plain language
Income taxes
This lets Congress tax what people and businesses earn, such as wages and profits. Congress already had broad power to tax under Article I; the amendment clears up a specific obstacle.
The problem it solved
Congress passed an income tax during the Civil War and let it expire afterward. In 1894, it passed another one. In Pollock v. Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co. (1895), the Supreme Court struck it down, holding that a tax on income from property was a direct tax that had to be apportioned among the states by population.
That ruling made a national income tax very difficult. Congress proposed the Sixteenth Amendment in 1909, and it was ratified in 1913. The same year, Congress passed the first modern federal income tax.
What it does and does not do
The Court explained in Brushaber v. Union Pacific Railroad Co. (1916) that the amendment does not give Congress a new power to tax. It removes the apportionment requirement for income taxes, and Congress’s existing taxing power does the rest.
Courts are still defining what counts as “income.” In Moore v. United States (2024), the Court upheld a one-time tax on the earnings of certain foreign corporations that Americans own shares in. The Court said its decision was narrow and did not decide whether Congress can tax wealth or gains that have not been realized.