RALEIGH – It’s almost Tax Day. Do you have your tea bags at the ready?

For those who actually pay net income taxes to Raleigh or Washington, April 15th isn’t just a day of double-checking, photocopying, and hurrying to the post office. It’s a day of frustration and fury. It’s a day when a few sheets of paper focus the mind on the painful consequences of political and personal irresponsibility.

Informed taxpayers know that it doesn’t really matter which way the payments flow on April 15. If we “get” a “refund,” we understand that it only signifies the government’s power to compel us to lend it our money at zero interest. If we send in a check, we understand that it is only on top of a much-larger sum we’ve already paid. It represent just more tribute surrendered to an arrogrant sovereign with an aim to plunder, a habit of squalor, and a talent for bluster.

It’s not that we believe there should be no taxes. Government is a necessary institution for the preservation of our liberty. By its very nature, government is compulsory and will tax us. But the taxing power should be used only according to constitutional principles, to fund the limited, constitutional functions that private individuals and voluntary associations cannot do for themselves.

The thousands of North Carolinians who have already participated in Tea Party protests in Raleigh, Charlotte, and Wilmington – and the many thousands more who will participate in the dozens of Tea Party rallies scheduled for Wednesday and beyond – recognize that our federal, state, and local governments have exceeded the bounds of the constitution and of common sense.

Any group this size, organized at the community level by volunteers who often have never been politically active before, will encompass diverse beliefs and interests. Tax Day protestors won’t agree on everything. But here are the broad outlines of what this new Tea Party movement stands for:

• No More Bailouts. Many business leaders like to talk a big game when it comes to “free enterprise.” But when it comes right down to it, they want the freedom to pursue profit without having to bear the responsibility when their pursuit falls short. You can’t have freedom without responsibility. We can have a free-market economy in America without the continued existence of certain bankrupt firms. Indeed, non-bankrupt firms should be free to buy them, or at least the still-valuable pieces of them.

The same rule applies to leaders of state and local governments, who don’t want to shoulder the responsibility when their tendency to increase budgets and fiscal obligations during good times yields deficits during recessions. Because we are all taxpayers, it is meaningless to say that the federal government is “bailing out” state and localities. What’s really happening is that the politicians authorized to run deficits and print money – the ones in Washington – are bailing out the other politicians.

• No More Fake “Stimulus”. Robbing Peter to pay Paul isn’t a stimulus. Borrowing money from Mary to pay Paul and robbing Peter later to pay Mary isn’t a stimulus. (Paying Peter, Paul, and Mary to do a concert may well be a stimulus, but not so much macroeconomic as gastrointestinal.) Our economy will recover when entrepreneurs and investors are ready to take on new risks with the prospect of return, thus creative value for consumers and jobs for workers as a result. Real stimulus removes the obstacles currently blocking this necessary process from restarting.

• No More Taxes. Sure, America’s tax burden isn’t yet high by international standards. And while North Carolina’s tax burden is now higher than the national average, we haven’t yet reached New Jersey levels of fiscal imprudence. But our taxes are still too high – they take too much of our incomes and fund too much government with too few measurable results.

• No More Debts. Over the past decade, North Carolina’s debt-service costs have soared and state politicians have done nothing to address tens of billions of dollars in unfunded liabilities. In Washington, the federal politicians have done nothing to address tens of trillions of dollars in unfunded liabilities, for Social Security, Medicare, and other entitlements.

Previous Congresses and presidents, Democratic and Republican, have spent and borrowed too much. We’ve been properly critical of them in the past. But compared with what President Obama and today’s Congress have in mind, their predecessors were models of fiscal restraint. If Obama’s budget plan is implemented, government debt as a share of the economy will reach mind-boggling levels — up to 67 percent by 2019. The inevitable result will be rampant inflation, future tax increases on everyone, and economic stagnation.

It’s time to say No More. Or, well, it will officially be time come Wednesday, Tax Day. Check the schedule for local times and sites. And bring your family and friends. The more who say No More, the better.

Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation