[Protagoras]

That is obtuse. Social security is unconstitutional because of the 10th amendment, despite all the pols who have twisted the meaning to allow it. So are most of the other things the federal government does. Good night, no minds will be changed here.

[Looking for Diogenes]

Social security is unconstitutional because of the 10th amendment, despite all the pols who have twisted the meaning to allow it.

Amendment X.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Since the "general welfare" clause delegates power to the Congress to provide for the general welfare of the United States, the 10th Amendment doesn't apply. Tha's the short answer. The long answer is contained in this opinion of the Supreme Court:

CHAS. C. STEWARD MACH. CO. v. DAVIS, 301 U.S. 548 (1937)

Here is how FindLaw summarizes the jurispurdence on Social Security:

Social Security Act Cases .
--Although holding that the spending power is not limited by the specific grants of power contained in Article I, Sec. 8, the Court found, nevertheless, that it was qualified by the Tenth Amendment, and on this ground ruled in the Butler case that Congress could not use moneys raised by taxation to ''purchase compliance'' with regulations ''of matters of State concern with respect to which Congress has no authority to interfere.''

Within little more than a year this decision was reduced to narrow proportions by Steward Machine Co. v. Davis, which sustained the tax imposed on employers to provide unemployment benefits, and the credit allowed for similar taxes paid to a State. To the argument that the tax and credit in combination were ''weapons of coercion, destroying or impairing the autonomy of the States,'' the Court replied that relief of unemployment was a legitimate object of federal expenditure under the ''general welfare'' clause, that the Social Security Act represented a legitimate attempt to solve the problem by the cooperation of State and Federal Governments, that the credit allowed for state taxes bore a reasonable relation ''to the fiscal need subserved by the tax in its normal operation,'' since state unemployment compensation payments would relieve the burden for direct relief borne by the national treasury.

The Court reserved judgment as to the validity of a tax ''if it is laid upon the condition that a State may escape its operation through the adoption of a statute unrelated in subject matter to activities fairly within the scope of national policy and power.''

Good night, no minds will be changed here.

I don't expect to change anyone's mind. I'm just explaining what is right.