Before anyone can ask for either Liberty, Socialsim or something in between, we first need to define what each means. This is not easy due to they are both subjective in their defintions. Liberty for example, can range from anarchy(no government, we just inhabit the earth with no rules) to very limited freedoms such as those that may exist in a Communist country.
Socialism itself has a certain definition in the dictionary, but we have all come to use the term, for one reason or another, to define different aspects of government. Government itself is a form of socialism.
What we do know is that for a society to work efficiently, it must have an organized structure. This comes in the form of laws, regulations and infrastructure. This also requires the ability to enforce such laws and regulations while maintaining the sovoreignty of the country.
Our Founding Fathers went to great length to establish a national constitution that provided the necessary power to a central government, in order to provide sufficient national security and protect americans natural enalienable rights. Its duties are enumerated in our Constitution. The main focus was for the states and individuals to maintain as much self-governance as possible. This in my opinion included all personal needs such as: food, clothing, shelter, healthcare, retirement and education. The states were given leway to experiment in socialism, while recognizing that the individual, family, friends, churches and charities could provide most basic essentials.
So, we come to the question everyone has to ask themselves: How much liberty do you want and how much socialism do you want? There is a wide range to choose from which is why our politics are so divisive.
The more liberty one has comes with more responsibility. An example would be: If you do not want Social Security, you have to accept responsibility for your personal disability and retirement needs. This can be a blessing as well as a burden. On the one hand, you can take the 12.4% of your earnings that currently go to Social Security and apply them to your own investment portfolio, which can lead to a very nice nestegg. But, some will be irresponsible and fail to plan for their later years or possible disability.
What needs to be considered when social programs are promoted is, just how affective will they be and what are the possible unintended consequences. These consequences could include: how do they affect the self-reliance of the individual, how much fraud and abuse may be associated with them. We have to question the governments true ability to implement these programs. I think we can all testify to the fact that government management of social programs has had less than desirable results. Examples would be the constant growth in payroll taxes necessary to maintain SS/medicare, the mind boggling taxcode, the massive national debt and the heavy distortions caused by GSE's(Fannie, Freddie, FHA and Sallie Mae), which contribute to excessive costs in college tuitions, healthcare provision and the housing bubble that led to our current financial crisis.
I would ask that you give reasonable consideration as to just how much government we should have, while we attempt to pass liberty to future generations . That you would take an honest look at the current social programs and judge them by their practical viability and not just by their good intentions. I would also ask that you try to picture the future of this country considering its current path, and lastly, I ask you to be prepared to give up your vested stake into our failing pension/Social Security system that are leading to the serfdom of future americans.
Freedom
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Sunday, March 13, 2011
Sunday, August 8, 2010
General Welfare Defined by Madison
Many have taken the General Welfare clause as an excuse to promote unlimited government. This was not the intent of its inclusion into the Constitution. It was meant to refer to only applications that were a benefit to the whole of the country, like roads and infrastucture.
Here are some explinations from the Father of the Constitution:
James Madison: "If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare,and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare,they may take the care of religion into their own hands;they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads;in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislationdown to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress.... Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America."
James Madison: “The government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.”
James Madison: “If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions.”
James Madison: “With respect to the two words ‘general welfare,’ I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.”
James Madison: Federalist #41:
Some who have not denied the necessity of the power of taxation have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed that the power "to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,"amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare. No stronger proof could be given of the distress under which these writers labor for objections, than their stooping to such a misconstruction.Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution than the general expressions just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some color for it; though it would have been difficult to find a reason for so awkward a form of describing an authority to legislate in all possible cases. A power to destroy the freedom of the press, the trial by jury, or even to regulate the course of descents, or the forms of conveyances, must be very singularly expressed by the terms "to raise money for the general welfare."But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon? If the different parts of the same instrument ought to be so expounded as to give meaning to every part which will bear it, shall one part of the same sentence be excluded altogether from a share in the meaning; and shall the more doubtful and indefinite terms be retained in their full extent, and the clear and precise expressions be denied any signification whatsoever? For what purpose could the enumeration of particular powers be inserted, if these and all others were meant to be included in the preceding general power? Nothing is more natural nor common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars. But the idea of an enumeration of particulars which neither explain nor qualify the general meaning, and can have no other effect than to confound and mislead, is an absurdity, which, as we are reduced to the dilemma of charging either on the authors of the objection or on the authors of the Constitution, we must take the liberty of supposing had not its origin with the latter.The objection here is the more extraordinary, as it appears that the language used by the convention is a copy from the Articles of Confederation. The objects of the Union among the States, as described in article third, are "their common defense, security of their liberties, and mutual and general welfare," The terms of article eighth are still more identical: "All charges of war and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common defense or general welfare and allowed by the United States in Congress shall be defrayed out of a common treasury," etc. A similar language again occurs in article ninth. Construe either of these articles by the rules which would justify the construction put on the new Constitution, and they vest in the existing Congress a power to legislate in all cases whatsoever. But what would have been thought of that assembly, if, attaching themselves to these general expressions and disregarding the specifications which ascertain and limit their import, they had exercised an unlimited power of providing for the common defense and general welfare? I appeal to the objectors themselves, whether they would in that case have employed the same reasoning in justification of Congress as they now make use of against the convention. How difficult it is for error to escape its own condemnation.
Here are some explinations from the Father of the Constitution:
James Madison: "If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare,and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare,they may take the care of religion into their own hands;they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads;in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislationdown to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress.... Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America."
James Madison: “The government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.”
James Madison: “If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions.”
James Madison: “With respect to the two words ‘general welfare,’ I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.”
James Madison: Federalist #41:
Some who have not denied the necessity of the power of taxation have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed that the power "to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,"amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare. No stronger proof could be given of the distress under which these writers labor for objections, than their stooping to such a misconstruction.Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution than the general expressions just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some color for it; though it would have been difficult to find a reason for so awkward a form of describing an authority to legislate in all possible cases. A power to destroy the freedom of the press, the trial by jury, or even to regulate the course of descents, or the forms of conveyances, must be very singularly expressed by the terms "to raise money for the general welfare."But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon? If the different parts of the same instrument ought to be so expounded as to give meaning to every part which will bear it, shall one part of the same sentence be excluded altogether from a share in the meaning; and shall the more doubtful and indefinite terms be retained in their full extent, and the clear and precise expressions be denied any signification whatsoever? For what purpose could the enumeration of particular powers be inserted, if these and all others were meant to be included in the preceding general power? Nothing is more natural nor common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars. But the idea of an enumeration of particulars which neither explain nor qualify the general meaning, and can have no other effect than to confound and mislead, is an absurdity, which, as we are reduced to the dilemma of charging either on the authors of the objection or on the authors of the Constitution, we must take the liberty of supposing had not its origin with the latter.The objection here is the more extraordinary, as it appears that the language used by the convention is a copy from the Articles of Confederation. The objects of the Union among the States, as described in article third, are "their common defense, security of their liberties, and mutual and general welfare," The terms of article eighth are still more identical: "All charges of war and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common defense or general welfare and allowed by the United States in Congress shall be defrayed out of a common treasury," etc. A similar language again occurs in article ninth. Construe either of these articles by the rules which would justify the construction put on the new Constitution, and they vest in the existing Congress a power to legislate in all cases whatsoever. But what would have been thought of that assembly, if, attaching themselves to these general expressions and disregarding the specifications which ascertain and limit their import, they had exercised an unlimited power of providing for the common defense and general welfare? I appeal to the objectors themselves, whether they would in that case have employed the same reasoning in justification of Congress as they now make use of against the convention. How difficult it is for error to escape its own condemnation.
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