Sorry, but like many in the modern judiciary, you're ignoring the more detailed explanations of the Founders, and failing to accept the fact that if they meant the government to have the power to do something, they enumerated it in the Constitution.

BUT, even those enumerations do not imply PERMANENT powers. Some were intended as only temporary (as explained in The Federalist Papers), such as internal taxation, or the power to print fiat currency, or the power to maintain a standing army. Your interpretation of "provide for the common defense" is erroneous based on the clear, detailed explanation I provided earlier:

"True, the Constitution delegates to Congress the powers "[t]o raise and support Armies" and "[t]o provide and maintain a Navy". Article I, Section 8, Clauses 12 and 13. And with such powers comes a duty to exercise them, when necessary and proper. Compare United States v. Marigold, 50 U.S. (9 Howard) 560, 567 (1850), with Article I, Section 8, Clause 18. Otherwise, though, Congress need never "raise and support", and need not continuously "provide and maintain", an army or a navy. Furthermore, the Constitution requires that, even when Congress does "raise" an army, "no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years". Article I, Section 8, Clause 12. This enables the House of Representatives--the House of Congress electorally closest to the people and (in political theory, at least) most chary of their lives, liberties, and property--to prevent an army from continuing in existence when it serves no purpose that justifies its expense, or when it threatens Americans' freedoms."

This is the exact type of deceptive "reasoning" that collectivists have used over the years to justify an expansion of government powers under the "general welfare clause." When we look closer at Madison's specific explanations, we see that government was never intended to have any powers other than those which are specifically enumerated:

The "General Welfare" Clause: What Does It Really Mean?

By Alan Chapman

There seems to be some disagreement as to what the word "welfare" means with regard to the phrase "general welfare" as it appears in the Constitution. Many on FR use the "general welfare" clause as the basis of their support for government schools and Social Security. I started this thread with the intent to discover the true meaning of the term "welfare" with regard to it's use in the Constitution.

The word "welfare" appears twice in the Constitution. Once in the preamble and again in Article 1, Section 8.

The preamble to the Constitution states:

"We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

The preamble is not a delegation of power to the federal government. It is simply a stated purpose.
Article 1, Section 8 states:

The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

We all know the meaning of words can change over time. In order to more accurately assess the meaning of the word "welfare", with respect to it's use in the Constitution, I consulted a source from that period. I happened to own a reprint of the 1828 edition of Noah Webster's American Dictionary of the English Language. Here is how the word "welfare" was defined 40 years after it was written in the Constitution.



A clear distinction is made with respect to welfare as applied to persons and states. In the Constitution the word "welfare" is used in the context of states and not persons. The "welfare of the United States" is not congruous with the welfare of individuals, people, or citizens.

Furthermore, Article 4, Section 4 states:

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.

A Republican form of government is one that is not Democratic. This means that policy cannot be decided based on majority rule. It is impossible to guarantee a Republican form of government and, at the same time, compel people to fund and participate in government programs which are not specifically enumerated in the Constitution.

Rest of Article Here


"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions." - James Madison, Letter to Edmund Pendleton, January 21, 1792 _Madison_ 1865, I, page 546

"I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constitutents." - James Madison, regarding an appropriations bill for French refugees, 1794

"With respect to the words general welfare, I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators." - James Madison, Letter to James Robertson, April 20, 1831 _Madison_ 1865, IV, pages 171-172

"Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated." - Thomas Jefferson