Can a collection place garnish your wages for a us dept. of education with out going to court?

A court judgment is usually required before a creditor can garnish wages or levy bank accounts. However, these rules are made by the government and the government has decided that these rules will not apply to debts owed to the government. Governmental agencies like the Internal Revenue Service (income taxes) and the Department of Education (student loans) can use an "administrative" procedure to garnish wages up to 15% without the normal "court" procedure of first obtaining a judgment. Governmental agencies can also administratively levy bank accounts with a similar non-judicial procedure.