Can the federal government legislate on health care?
In response to those who cite the "general welfare" clause as basis for federal health care mandates. This gives no question as to what was really meant by this term. (See Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution.)
"Some who have not denied the necessity of the power of the taxation have grounded a very fierce attack against the the Constitution on the language in which it is defined....that 'the power to lay and collect taxes...for the common defence and general welfare...' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defence or general welfare....
"Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution, than the general expression just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some colour for it...But what colour can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows; and it is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon....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 or common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars."
--James Madison, Independent Journal, January 19, 1788. (Found in "The Debate on the Constitution, Part Two", pp. 54-55. --ISBN 0-940450-64-x)
(Somehow I think the "Father of the Constitution" would know what was meant by it better than anybody else.)
So what does this mean? According to the 10th Amendment, any powers not laid out in the Constitution are reserved to the states respectively. As afore mentioned, some have quoted the "general welfare" clause as basis for the federal health care legislation.
Now that we know that "general welfare" just means the things that followed the term in the document, go see what it says there in Article 1, Section 8.
http:// www.usconstitution.net/const.html
"Some who have not denied the necessity of the power of the taxation have grounded a very fierce attack against the the Constitution on the language in which it is defined....that 'the power to lay and collect taxes...for the common defence and general welfare...' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defence or general welfare....
"Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution, than the general expression just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some colour for it...But what colour can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows; and it is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon....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 or common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars."
--James Madison, Independent Journal, January 19, 1788. (Found in "The Debate on the Constitution, Part Two", pp. 54-55. --ISBN 0-940450-64-x)
(Somehow I think the "Father of the Constitution" would know what was meant by it better than anybody else.)
So what does this mean? According to the 10th Amendment, any powers not laid out in the Constitution are reserved to the states respectively. As afore mentioned, some have quoted the "general welfare" clause as basis for the federal health care legislation.
Now that we know that "general welfare" just means the things that followed the term in the document, go see what it says there in Article 1, Section 8.
http:// www.usconstitution.net/const.html