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To: DesertRhino

““Promote the general welfare” is an absolutely fine idea. It simply means broad brush, create a society where people prosper.”

“general welfare” is another translation of the res publica: the public riches, the common wealth, the common good, the public good, the general good.

Therefore, the meaning of the clause is that one of the reasons “We the People” ordained the Constitution, was to promote good, or welfare, of all, of the public.


14 posted on 01/09/2015 9:11:41 AM PST by cotton1706 (ThisRepublic.net)
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To: cotton1706
create a society where people prosper

Your display of ignorance off America's Constitution is shared by the progressive movement.

America's Constitution is not about the people. It is solely about how the government is to function within the herein Granted powers.

If Article 1. Section 1. said, “All legislative Powers shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives" you would have a point.

However, what Article 1. Section 1. actually states is, "All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives".

The herein granted powers do not include feeding, clothing, sheltering, or educating the people.

The Constitution does prohibit the Congress from interfering with the people's right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.

Jefferson said it as well as it can be said regarding the general welfare.

To lay taxes to provide for the general welfare of the United States, that is to say, “to lay taxes for the purpose of providing for the general welfare”. For the laying of taxes is the power, and the general welfare the purpose for which the power is to be exercised. They are not to lay taxes ad libitum for any purpose they please; but only to pay the debts or provide for the welfare of the Union. In like manner, they are not to do anything they please to provide for the general welfare, but only to lay taxes for that purpose. To consider the latter phrase, not as describing the purpose of the first, but as giving a distinct and independent power to do any act they please, which might be for the good of the Union, would render all the preceding and subsequent enumerations of power completely useless. It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good of the United States; and as they would be the sole judges of the good or evil, it would be also a power to do whatever evil they please. It is an established rule of construction where a phrase will bear either of two meanings, to give it that which will allow some meaning to the other parts of the instrument, and not that which would render all the others useless. Certainly no such universal power was meant to be given them. It was intended to lace them up strictly within the enumerated powers, and those without which, as means, these powers could not be carried into effect.

You have mistaken America's Constitution with the Communist manifesto.

23 posted on 01/09/2015 1:44:19 PM PST by MosesKnows (Love many, trust few, and always paddle your own canoe.)
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