Joseph Thorndike, “When Congress Reformed the IRS Without Starving It” (Tax Notes, May 11, 2026):

On a hot summer day in late July 1953, employees of the IRS began walking the streets of Boston, ringing doorbells and putting two simple questions to anyone who answered: Have you filed your 1952 return? Can you prove it? A yes to both brought an end to the interview. Anything else guaranteed a harder look from agency officials.

The doorbell campaign was not a new idea (prior analysis: Tax Notes, Sept. 3, 2007, p. 891). Since 1864, the law had required every federal tax assessor to periodically “cause his deputies to proceed through every part of his district and inquire after and concerning all persons therein who are liable to pay any internal-revenue tax.” The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR, as it was known until July 9, 1953) had conducted some door-to-door surveys in the many decades since. But efforts were haphazard and intermittent; the agency had never developed a regular program of systematic canvassing.

Until 1953, that is, when newly installed officials in the Eisenhower administration began “rummaging around in the tax laws,” looking for ways to boost compliance and raise new revenue. A well-publicized canvass seemed like just the ticket.