Posted on 01/19/2005 9:54:17 AM PST by Conservative Coulter Fan
Article One, Section Eight of the United States Constitution limits the Federal Government to twenty Enumerated Powers or “areas.” None of these powers include the Federal Government taking responsibility for the retirement of citizens, getting into the business of retirement, especially by taking money from Americans against their will and forcing them into a government run system that operates like an illegal pyramid scheme.
Some defenders of Social Security contend that the General Welfare Clause in Article One, Section Eight of the Constitution, “…to promote the general welfare,” is in fact clear evidence of the constitutionality of Social Security. While this view is widespread, to say the least, James Madison in Federalist Papers Forty-One & Forty-Two clearly rebuffed such a contention explaining the General Welfare Clause was just a summary of the twenty Enumerated Powers rather than a blanket power as critics of the Constitution, at the time, had argued.
Its worth noting that defenders of Social Security are basing the constitutionality of the largest program in existence on what Madison called a “misconstruction” used by critics who attacked the Constitution. Madison explained, “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 more common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify by an enumeration of the 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 ... what would have been thought of that assembly, if, attaching themselves to these general expressions and disregarding the specifications which limit their import, they had exercised an unlimited power of providing for the general welfare?”
So if Social Security is unconstitutional, hence illegal, why shouldn’t the debate over “reform” center on this grave matter? Shouldn’t it be abolished if indeed the Federal Government has no legal authority to operate such a program?
Just the idea that we'd want the government to take care of us is scary. The greatest generation dropped the ball on this one.
I believe that the Supreme Court declared social security constitutional, after FDR packed the Court.
The federal government doesn't have legal authority over a lot of things but that certainly doesn't stop them.
Probably not, but has that ever stopped them before?!
"No State shall . . . make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts."
Thought is reality to some people. What they think is so, because they think!
That's why some have advocated abolishing the Federal Reserve and returning to the Treasury System.
Of course, it isn't. But then very little of what the federal government doew IS constitutional. The only reason it was not challenged when it was conceived is that FDR threatened to pack the courts with socialists would woud basically be his yes men.
bump
If any senator would even think of getting rid of social security, he would have to contend with an uprising staged by all the grey heads in this country.
Social Security is here to stay forever. It may change over the years, for the better to be sure, but it will always be with us.
FDR never packed the Court.
I would find it difficult to believe that Social Security is unconstitutional. It has been around for 60 years. Certainly some court somewhere has found it constitutional.
He did pack the court with individuals such as Hugo Black...remember the 1947 ruling...it was he that created this whole "seperation" of church and state canard.
I don't believe it. The tide is already turning. And in the next decade or two, most of those "grey heads" are going to belong to people who think like me.
Young workers, like me, aren't going to sit by waiting for the system to collapse.
Feel free to point to the Constitution and provide the specific part of it that makes Social Security constitutional.
If the Supreme Court can legalize abortion under the "penumbra" of a woman's right to privacy, then the "Living Constitution" theory, as espoused by the libs, makes them capable of justifying absolutely anything.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.