No, you haven't.

Yes, I have. It is you who have shown no proof to back up your allegations.

Everything I've posted does indeed support that premise.


No, it isn't, because every human being suffers from an inability to see the future. However, a logical law is a logical law, and should not change. 2+2=4 should not change to 2+2=5 in 250 years just because the supreme court of 2258 A.D. thinks that 2+2=4 is not really the intended meaning by the mathematicians of that day.

If I do have an alleged problem, then I want to understand it. Since you claim to understand it, please explain precisely why that was an implied insult, because I did not intend it as an insult.

Thanks for the assist. And that is the issue.


Exactly, an opinion isn't proof of anything.


Well said.

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

One doesn't show "proof" of how your proof fails to prove what you say it does. Your own comments, and your own remarks provide the proof of how your proof does not prove what you say it proves.

No, your word choice here of "claim" to understand it, is rather obnoxious, so you figure it out yourself.

__________________
"Of course the fact that a person believes in racial equality doesn't prove that he's a communist...but it certainly makes you look twice, doesn't it? You can't get away from the fact that racial equality is part of the communist line." - Joseph McCarthy

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Here's something from James Madison, the Father of the Constitution:

EDSITEment - Lesson Plan
Madison repeatedly called for a standing army as well while he was a Congressman and later when he was President.

He calls for the army to be no more than 1% of the population and our present army is even smaller than that. It's about 1/3 of 1%. It seems that different Founders had different ideas about whether or not to have a standing army, with the principle Founder being in favor of it.


WEB

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"Of course the fact that a person believes in racial equality doesn't prove that he's a communist...but it certainly makes you look twice, doesn't it? You can't get away from the fact that racial equality is part of the communist line." - Joseph McCarthy

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Hamilton was in favor of a standing army, so long as its funding was approved every 2 years by the Congress. The Congress approves the army budget EVERY YEAR, so our policy on a standing army acts in accord with another founding father: Alexander Hamilton.

Article 1, Section 8, Clause 12: Alexander Hamilton, Federalist, no. 26, 164--71
Hamilton is saying that as long as the Congress signs off on the standing army, it's all good.

__________________
"Of course the fact that a person believes in racial equality doesn't prove that he's a communist...but it certainly makes you look twice, doesn't it? You can't get away from the fact that racial equality is part of the communist line." - Joseph McCarthy

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The issue is - you failed to disprove T-B's valid argument.

Truth-Bringer is making a reasonable request here. Frankly, I'm having a hard time seeing the "insult" angle on that also. It doesn't seem to fit.

No, this is incorrect. There is no issue in that I showed that T-B's initial points did not prove his point. There could still be some issue about how many Founders opposed standing armies, but I've already shown that Madison and Hamilton, the most influential of the Founders of the Constitution, supported standing armies. You've failed to honestly recognize that.

Mind your own business on that.

__________________
"Of course the fact that a person believes in racial equality doesn't prove that he's a communist...but it certainly makes you look twice, doesn't it? You can't get away from the fact that racial equality is part of the communist line." - Joseph McCarthy

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Alexander Hamilton was the most statist of the Founders (this is why today's liberals love him), and he was never elected to national office. Most of his desires for government can be found in the Communist Manifesto. To use Hamilton as the standard for the Founding Fathers, when he was sometimes the sole voice in opposition to the majority of the Founders, simply isn't legitimate.

No, this is incorrect. You have not showed this.