WASHINGTON -- Recently I mused about people who demand reparations for slavery that ended 140 years ago while remaining silent about the fact that, according to many experts, involuntary servitude is more widespread worldwide today than ever before.

But some readers pointed out that you don't need to look to China or Africa or India or some other foreign locale to see, or at least taste, modern-day slavery.

Involuntary servitude is alive and well in the United States today. It's called the income tax -- and it forces many of us to work for the government for as much as four and a half months of every year.

True, we do have options in America. We can cast aside our God-given instincts and responsibilities to provide for our families and go on the dole. We can move out of the country and seek a more hospitable environment -- a climate more conducive to productivity and personal initiative. We can become politicians and become eligible for those tax-free per diems. We can go to work for the government, then maybe we won't mind so much about taxation because it pays for our salaries. We can cheat. We can try to drop out of the system, as more and more Americans are doing. Or, we can take the only other inevitable course besides taxation -- death.

There are probably 101 ways to avoid taxation -- though none without cost or risks.

But, for most us, we can't escape the feeling of being abused, exploited and trapped by this system. In other words, it feels like slavery.

Of course, this is the month, more than any other in the calendar, in which our thoughts turn to taxes and the IRS. And that's why WorldNetDaily devotes the entire April issue of WorldNet magazine to the subject of the IRS -- its legality, its impact and the movement to abolish it.

Think about it. Does the government really give you any choice with regard to the income tax? Then why is it called "voluntary"? If it is not "voluntary," then how can we be required to provide the government with voluminous self-incriminating evidence against us without compromising our Fifth Amendment rights and without so much as a Miranda warning? And was there, as many activists contend, an active government conspiracy to subvert the constitutional process in approving the 16th Amendment?

These are just a few of the big questions dealt with in an exhaustive series of stories in the April issue of WorldNet. You won't want to miss it. (Nor will you want to miss upcoming issues on big topics like this. In May, for instance, our Anne Williamson, an expert on the subject, tackles the International Monetary Fund.)

All this brings me back to where I began -- the issue of slavery. The Honorable Alan Keyes says in the April issue of WorldNet: "The income tax is a slave tax -- inherently incompatible with freedom."

I think he's exactly right. But what are we going to do about it? I will be devoting several columns this month to exploring strategies and options to the income tax. WorldNetDaily will likewise focus news coverage this month on some of the groups battling the slave tax.

Think about it. There are groups out there today lobbying intensely to redistribute more of your wealth to others who are, in some cases, descendants of U.S. slaves. How ironic! Here we are in the year 2001 working as glorified indentured servants for the government, which takes our money and, among many other bad, unconstitutional ideas, considers handing it out as reparations for slavery to people who have never experienced slavery.

Are we about to exchange one form of chains for another? Or have we already done it? Have the masters simply become more sophisticated in the 20th and 21st centuries -- effectively brainwashing and manipulating a majority into believing they are free?

President George W. Bush said recently he doesn't think any American should pay more than 33 percent of his or her income to the federal government. As much as a tax cut to 33 percent would be welcome for many of us, where on earth does he come up with such a figure? Why and how have Americans become convinced that the government deserves such a huge portion of their wealth?

Tax cuts are not enough. It's time for a tax revolt.