Re: OT: Politics [Was:Social Contract]
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On Monday 08 May 2006 13:33, Matthias Julius <lists@julius-net.net>
was heard to say:
> The U.S. Constitution does not list all 'jobs' of the government.
Yes, it does. If an additional job is required, amend it so that the
government has that power deligated to it. For instance, the
prohibition of drinking alcohol.
What may come as a surprise to many people is that the "Great
Experiment", as it is often called, had nothing to do with democracy.
Democracy has been around since at least 800BC in various
well-documented forms. The "Great Experiment" was to create a central
government with explicit, limited powers. Those governments
with "general" powers were to be the individual states that make up
the United States.
That means that if it is not explicitly listed, the United States
government has no power to do it. Period. At all. Not even in
an "emergency".
It is also important to remember that this document was written in a
different time. One cannot simply look at the common usage 200 years
later to understand a specific word. Flowery language with lots of
explanation that would not work in an English language highschool
term paper today was common at the time.
That is one reason why there is confusion about the existence of
explanatory clauses. Matthias falls into that trap:
> | Section 8 - Powers of Congress
> |
> | 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;
Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes, duties and
excises. All duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout
the United States. The rest is exposition, explaining why but
otherwise granting no power.
> The glossary for Welfare says...
Welfare, as it is known today, has nothing to do with it. Congress is
granted the power to built post roads, because the general welfare of
the States are improved thereby. Can you understand the difference
between explicit powers granted, and the "general powers" that you
are trying to interpret into the document?
> It does not say the government is to build roads (except Post
> Roads).
Correct. The entire Interstate Highway System was justified as a
defense expenditure. Go read some history about how the roads were
designed around troop and tank carrying trucks, and aircraft using
the roads as runways. (hint: by law, every Interstate highway must
have one perfectly straight mile out of every 5 miles of road, for
use as a military runway)
> It does not mention the building of levees or similar
> structures, supporting hurricane victims or even bringing
> humanitarian aid to people in foreign countries. There are
> certainly many other things the U.S. government does and uses tax
> money for that are not explicitely mentioned in the constitution.
Exactly. Everything you bring up is blatantly unconstitutional.
Murder is illegal, yet murders occur. There is nothing about grabbing
and using power illegally that violates human nature. It is, in fact,
the one thing that you can really count on: Power Corrupts.
> I would put education into that category. It is a necessity for
> prosperity.
I would never presume to stop you from spending your money on
education, nor do I want you to prevent me from doing the same.
Please do not initiate force against me when I have done you no harm.
> To summarize: The congress has the power to collect taxes for
> education. IMHO
>
> Matthias
And your opinion is explicitly wrong. I suggest you go read some of
the original documentation, since it's obvious you have not:
http://www.constitution.org/afp/afp.htm
http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa00.htm
Will this request to actually read the documentation on the subject
about which you are talking fall on the same deaf ears (blind eyes?)
as those concerning the dangers and failures of "gun control"?
How would you expect anyone to take you seriously in a discussion of
the Debian Free Software Guidelines, for example, if you had never
read anything but a few paragraphs from the GPLv1?
That's one of the problems of an online debate: No matter how clearly
the information is presented, there is no way to know if it was read
until the same people show up later and make the same mistakes they
were making before. It's quite sad.
Curt-
- --
September 11th, 2001
The proudest day for gun control and central
planning advocates in American history
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