General Welfare Clause Revisited:
James Madison’s Warning Against Federal Meddling in Local Schools
According to the father of the
Constitution, the powers delegated to the central government “are few
and defined and those that remain in the States are numerous and
indefinite.” Federalist Papers #45
Madison also explained that those
powers are “reserved to external objects” of “war, peace, negotiation,
and foreign commerce.” He also stated that the central government’s
power to tax is intended to be limited to those powers. Fed #45
Madison clarified the meaning of the
often-abused “clauses” in 1792 during the Cod Fishery Bill debate.
Specifically, that the General Welfare, Necessary and Proper, Commerce,
and Tax and Spend clauses were not powers of their own but descriptions
of the purposes of those limited and enumerated powers already
mentioned.
The General Welfare clause, he
explains, was added to describe the purpose of the limited powers being
delegated to the central government, i.e., so the central government
could use those powers for the “general welfare” of the union, rather
than for the benefit of one State over the other. The debates make it
crystal clear that this is not a blanket power to “do anything you can
think of” to promote the so-called general welfare. It is, in fact, a
limitation to direct that the power be wielded equitably.
In this debate, Madison also warns of
the consequences of interpreting this clause as a general boilerplate
power, rather than a description of the intent that the limited powers
be to the general benefit of the entire union.
He said, ” for if the
clause in question really authorizes Congress to do whatever they think
fit, provided it be for the general welfare, of which they are to judge,
and money can be applied to it, Congress must have power to create and
support a judiciary establishment, with a jurisdiction extending to all
cases favorable, in their opinion, to the general welfare, in the same
manner as they have power to pass laws, and apply money providing in any
other way for the general welfare…
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 for the poor; they
may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads; in
short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation down to
the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of
Congress; for every object I have mentioned would admit of the
application of money, and might be called, if Congress pleased,
provisions for the general welfare.” James Madison, On The Cod Fishery
Bill, Granting Bounties, 1792
It is relevant to note in this
discussion that Madison is remarking that it is an obvious abuse of
power for the central government to assume the role of education. He is
speaking to his colleagues in extremes to show his point that
interpreting the clauses in this way would result in an unlimited
central government, a notion that would be highly offensive to the men
involved in this debate.
Therefore, it is clear that the
General Welfare clause does not give power or permission for federal
involvement in school and much less for the Federal Department of
Education. And to the contrary, according to “the Father of the
Constitution,” once we have adopted this erroneous interpretation and
application of the General Welfare clause and perhaps see federal
involvement in our schools, we will know we have a ridiculously out of
control federal government.
As Madison himself said it, ” I
venture to declare it as my opinion, that, 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; and what inferences might be
drawn, or what consequences ensue, from such a step, it is incumbent on
us all to consider.”
Because we have turned Constitutional
interpretation over to our own musings that we have indeed “transmuted”
into something other than a representative republic. In our arrogance,
we have decided that the wisdom sown into our founding documents and
expressed in the profuse writings of its framers does not need to be
consulted. The fact is that this wisdom, as you know, is tied to over
700 years of lessons in history and 5 foundational Liberty Charters, not
to mention the liberty philosophers and writers that our founders
diligently consulted.
The question is this: Where is such
negligence leading us?
What kind of government are we creating?
Into
what are we transmuting?
*Article by KrisAnne Hall
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