If, as this decision claims, Congress has the power to reach into and control anything and everything through the power of taxation, regardless of the specific and limited powers delegated by the States and the People to the Federal government, then the limits of the Constitution are utterly meaningless, as long as Congress cloaks their exercise of undelegated power in the veil of "taxation."
"Grant the validity of this law, and all that Congress would need to do, hereafter, in seeking to take over to its control any one of the great number of subjects of public interest, jurisdiction of which the states have never parted with, and which are reserved to them by the Tenth Amendment, would be to enact a detailed measure of complete regulation of the subject and enforce it by a socalled tax upon departures from it. To give such magic to the word 'tax' would be to break down all constitutional limitation of the powers of Congress and completely wipe out the sovereignty of the states."
[Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Co., 259 U.S. 20 (1922)]
It is elementary law that every statute is to be read in the light of the constitution. However broad and general its language, it cannot be interpreted as extending beyond those matters which it was within the constitutional power of the legislature to reach.
[McCullough v. Com. Of Virginia, 172 U.S. 102 (1898)]
If, as this decision claims,
The decision only claims that which is the proper function of taxation. To finance the Constitutional operation of the government.
Congress has the power to reach into and control anything and everything through the power of taxation, regardless of the specific and limited powers delegated by the States and the People to the Federal government, then the limits of the Constitution are utterly meaningless, as long as Congress cloaks their exercise of undelegated power in the veil of "taxation."
The power of taxation only extends to the payment of debt, provision for the common defense and general welfare of the United States as delimited in enumerated powers. Nothing more but certainly nothing less.
Constitution for the United States of America:
- Article VI: "This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding."
- Article I Section 8: "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises,
to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States;
but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; "
- Article I Section 8: "To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof."
Tell us how the authority to tax to finance the Constitutional functions of government is an unlimited power to control. It certainly is not in the Constitution. Neither does the Court recognize a power to control via the excercise of taxation with the exception of those specific powers granted in which regulation is a clear mandate.
MCCRAY v. U S, 195 U.S. 27 (1904)
- "Let us concede that if a case was presented where the abuse of the taxing power was so extreme as to be beyond the principles which we have previously stated, and where it was plain to the judicial mind that the power had been called into play, not for revenue, but solely for the purpose of destroying rights which could not be rightfully destroyed consistently with the principles of freedom and justice upon which the Constitution rests, that it would be the duty of the courts to say that such an arbitrary act was not merely an abuse of a delegated power, but was the exercise of an authority not conferred. "
It's up to the people to select virtuous representatives in a Republic; "Eternal Vigilence", slack off and the concequence for lack of electorate virtue is automatic and certain. It is inherent to the functioning of a Republic.
Sir Alex Fraser Tytler (1742-1813). Scottish jurist and historian:
"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury. From that time on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the results that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.
McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. 316 (1819)
- "The power of taxing the people and their property is essential to the very existence of government, and may be legitimately exercised on the objects to which it is applicable, to the utmost extent to which the Government may choose to carry it. The only security against the abuse of this power is found in the structure of the Government itself. In imposing a tax, the legislature acts upon its constituents. This is, in general, a sufficient security against erroneous and oppressive taxation."
Springer v. United States(1880), 102 U.S. 586
"If the laws here in question involved any wrong or unnecessary harshness, it was for Congress, or the people who make congresses, to see that the evil was corrected.
The remedy does not lie with the judicial branch of the government."Champion v. Ames(1903), 186 U.S. 321
- 'But if what Congress does is within the limits of its power, and is simply unwise or injurious, the remedy is that suggested by Chief Justice Marshall in Gibbons v. Ogden [21 US 1, 9 Wheat. 1, 6 L. ed. 23], when [195 U.S. 27, 56] he said: 'The wisdom and the discretion of Congress, their identity with the people, and the influence which their constituents possess at elections, are, in this, as in many other instances, as that, for example, of declaring war, the sole restraints on which they have relied, to secure them from its abuse. They are the restraints on which the people must often rely solely, in all representative governments."
If you expect the Courts to do your job, you are barking up the wrong tree.