Marion Bromley nee Coddington (October 10, 1912 – January 21, 1996) was a pioneer of the modern American tax resistance

Tax resistance

Tax resistance is the refusal to pay tax because of opposition to the government that is imposing the tax or to government policy.Tax resistance is a form of civil disobedience and direct action...

 movement and a civil rights activist. She married Ernest Bromley

Ernest Bromley

Ernest Bromley was an American minister and civil rights and peace activist. A founding member of the Freedom Riders, he played an active role in protests of racial segregation in the Southern United States...

 in 1948.

In 1948 Bromley left the staff of the Fellowship of Reconciliation

Fellowship of Reconciliation

The Fellowship of Reconciliation is the name used by a number of religious nonviolent organizations, particularly in English-speaking countries...

 (where she had been A.J. Muste's secretary) to avoid the withholding of taxes on her paycheck. Bromley helped found the group Peacemakers

Peacemakers

Peacemakers, was an American pacifist organization. The name of the group is taken from a section of the Beatitudes: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”...

 later that year, and concentrated her focus on the organization of war tax resistance by that group.

She participated in the campaign to desegregate the Coney Island

Coney Island

Coney Island is a peninsula and beach on the Atlantic Ocean in southern Brooklyn, New York, United States. The site was formerly an outer barrier island, but became partially connected to the mainland by landfill....

 amusement park in 1952. She was with a black couple in a car that attempted to gain access to the park but was attacked by an anti-desegregationist mob (the occupants of the car were charged with disorderly conduct).

The first war tax resistance "how to" guide, Handbook on Nonpayment of War Taxes, was published by Marion and Ernest Bromley in 1963.

Bromley participated in the first meeting of the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee

National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee

The National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee is an American activist coalition that promotes tax resistance as a way to protest against and/or disassociate from war and militarism....

 in 1982.

In the 1970s the Internal Revenue Service

Internal Revenue Service

The Internal Revenue Service is the revenue service of the United States federal government. The agency is a bureau of the Department of the Treasury, and is under the immediate direction of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue...

 tried and failed to seize their home for non-payment of taxes. In 1977 the War Resisters League

War Resisters League

The War Resisters League was formed in 1923 by men and women who had opposed World War I. It is a section of the London-based War Resisters' International.Many of the founders had been jailed during World War I for refusing military service...

gave the Bromleys its annual Peace Award.