Biography
Maurice McCrackin was a Cincinnati minister who for ten years refused to pay federal income taxes because he would not 'buy guns or bombs.' In 1958 federal agents carried him bodily before a commissioner; indicted in November, he was jailed for an indefinite contempt term, went on a hunger strike, and on Dec. 12 was convicted of refusing an IRS summons and sentenced to six months and a $250 fine.
The Rev.
Separate ten-day Williams International confinement in 1983
The December 16, 1983 report individually identifies Maurice McCrackin as held for ten days during the late-November/early-December Williams International protests in Michigan because he refused to cooperate with the court. A not-guilty plea was entered for him and he was then released. Exact arrest, jail-admission and discharge days are not printed, so the action-week dates are not assigned as his endpoints. This is distinct from the existing 1958 tax-resistance and 1984 GE cases.
The Nuclear Resister No22, December 16, 1983, original page 1.
National Guardian's December 15, 1958 report identifies Judge John H. Druffel and says McCrackin refused to enter either a guilty or not-guilty plea. It describes county-jail custody beginning November 24. The June 15, 1959 retrospective distinguishes the six-month sentence and $250 fine from actual federal confinement described as five months and four days. It says an anticipated April 29 release was extended by 30 days after he refused to pay the fine, and confirms actual parole on May 29. The federal-prison description is not treated as the entire county-plus-federal custody total; the nominal six-month served-time override is removed without inventing a new aggregate.
The retrospective report distinguishes federal confinement, the nominal sentence, fine-related extension and actual parole.
A transcription of the May 29, 1959 Milwaukee Journal/AP release report states that Maurice F. McCrackin served five months and four days at the Allenwood prison farm and was released that day. The accompanying Sarasota Herald-Tribune account distinguishes an imposed six-month sentence and $250 fine from his actual service, explaining that refusal to pay the fine added thirty days beyond an earlier expected release. This reported service at the farm is not used to recalculate the entire earlier contempt-and-prison interval; existing dates and totals remain unchanged. Source.
NWTRCC’s court history reports that Maurice McCrackin’s IRS-summons conviction was later overturned. The table does not give the appellate decision date or replace the separately documented actual jail and prison dates. Reversal of the conviction does not mean the historical confinement did not occur. NWTRCC court history.
