Stealing From The Taxpayer and the Constitution

[rightwinger]

The Constitution is the only document to which the free people of the United States agreed to be governed.
The Constitution. That is why it is called 'the law of the land.'


At one time this was true.
But not since President Franklin Roosevelt.

Here is a tale that compared the two versions of America....before Roosevelt, and since.
This tale took place before that presidency, and so it conformed to the law of the land.




1. "The Erie Canal is a canal in New York that originally ran about 363 miles (584 km) from Albany, New York, on the Hudson River to Buffalo, New York, at Lake Erie. It was built to create a navigable water route fromNew York Cityand the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes..... – because of this vital connection and others to follow, such as the railroads,New York State would become known as the "Empire State" or "the great Empire State"
Erie Canal - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia




2. "The building of the Erie Canal and the politics surrounding it, became a landmark event in American economic history....almost all American wanted better roads and new canals- 'internal improvements' as they were called.....Building the Erie Canal was a splendid idea.
The only question was how to fund it: with federal spending, state funding, or by entrepreneurs?" Folsom and Folsom, "Uncle Sam Can't Count," p.56.

3. In 1811, NY Congressman Peter Porter argued before Congress that the federal government should fund the canal. After all, an Erie Canal would have national benefits, and not just commercially! It would encourage settlement all along it's length, and cause the Great Lakes to flourish.

a. But the Constitution did not empower the federal government to tax all the people of the nation for a road that mainly benefited one state.
Porter's bill failed.

b. But the War of 1812 added a national defense reason and the bill was brought back; Congress passed it in 1817.
"Erie Water West: A History of the Erie Canal, 1792-1854,"by Ronald E. Shaw, p. 39-40, 47.





4. As I said, this was before Franklin Roosevelt, so the Constitution was still in effect. On March 3, 1817, on his next to the last day in office, President James Madison vetoed the bill, saying "I am constrained by the insuperable difficulty I feel in reconciling the bill with the Constitution of the United States..."

He went on to make two significant points, points that successive Presidents should have noted:

a. "....To refer the power in question to the clause "to provide for common defense and general welfare" would be contrary to the established and consistent rules of interpretation,... Such a view of the Constitution would have the effect of giving to Congress a general power of legislation instead of the defined and limited one hitherto understood to belong to them, the terms "common defense and general welfare" embracing every object and act within the purview of a legislative trust." James Madison Veto of federal public works bill March 3 1817

This, from the leader of the Constitutional Convention; he, more than anyone, understood how the general welfare clause was to be read.


b. Don't misunderstand: Madison was in favor of internal improvements- he knew that the Constitution's design was that such projects should be undertaken by the state, or by private citizens.
"I am not unaware of the great importance of roads and canals and the improved navigation of water courses, and that a power in the National Legislature to provide for them might be exercised with signal advantage to the general prosperity."
...But he knew that the Constitution did not provide for such as expansion of the federal government..." I have no option but to withhold my signature from it, and to cherishing the hope that its beneficial objects may be attained [by other means]."
Ibid.


And that is the way it's 'sposed to be.

Damn

Madison was a fucking moron for opposing the Erie Canal

Although I eschew the language you Liberals use, I feel the same way about you for opposing the United States Constitution.



5. From the inception of this nation, the idea was for localities to fund their own projects, rather than the federal government doing so.

"The Kanawha River, or Great Kanawha River (the Little Kanawha River is further north), originates thirty-five miles southeast of Charleston, at Gauley Bridge. A confluence of the Gauley River and the New River, which rises in the mountains of North Carolina, the Kanawha meanders ninety-seven miles from Gauley Bridge until it meets the Ohio River at Point Pleasant.

A steamboat first tried to navigate the river in 1819 but came to grief at the Red House Shoals, approximately thirty miles west of Charleston. That prompted the Virginia legislature to approve a bill for "cutting chutes through the river's shoals, building wing dams and removing snags," and so began the era of the Kanawha steamboat service, as tourists and traders proceeded serenely down the river agog at the beauty of the scenery."
"The West Virginia Encyclopedia,"Ken Sullivan(Editor), p. 393

Thanks for reminding us how fucking dumb Madison really was

Even a simpleton can understand the national economic impacts these major infrastructure projects can have. The Erie Canal helped to make the United States, for a moron like Madison to oppose it on the grounds it is a "state problem" shows why his views on the Constitution should not be trusted

Well, I can't thank you for doubling-down on how little respect you have for the Constitution.

I suspect that it was Madison's use of the 'e' word that makes you so sensitive:

"Education is the true foundation of civil liberty."

Shirley you don't think redirecting the discussion will save your thread

 

[rightwinger]

Thank god we don't listen to a moron like Madison when it comes to the Constitution

Applying Madisons interpretation there would be no

Erie Canal
Panama Canal
Intercontinental Railroad
Intrstate Highway System

Applying Madison's Constitution - he didn't interpret it - he fucking wrote it - you would be somewhere out there digging ditches and honestly earning a living.

.

Its not his Constitution it is ours

Bullshit.

You motherfuckers want it substituted with communism.

.

link

 

[Contumacious]

Thank god we don't listen to a moron like Madison when it comes to the Constitution

Applying Madisons interpretation there would be no

Erie Canal
Panama Canal
Intercontinental Railroad
Intrstate Highway System

Applying Madison's Constitution - he didn't interpret it - he fucking wrote it - you would be somewhere out there digging ditches and honestly earning a living.

.

Its not his Constitution it is ours

Bullshit.

You motherfuckers want it substituted by communism.

.

Thank god we don't listen to a moron like Madison when it comes to the Constitution

Applying Madisons interpretation there would be no

Erie Canal
Panama Canal
Intercontinental Railroad
Intrstate Highway System

Applying Madison's Constitution - he didn't interpret it - he fucking wrote it - you would be somewhere out there digging ditches and honestly earning a living.

.

Its not his Constitution it is ours

Bullshit.

You motherfuckers want it substituted with communism.

Thank god we don't listen to a moron like Madison when it comes to the Constitution

Applying Madisons interpretation there would be no

Erie Canal
Panama Canal
Intercontinental Railroad
Intrstate Highway System

Applying Madison's Constitution - he didn't interpret it - he fucking wrote it - you would be somewhere out there digging ditches and honestly earning a living.

.

Its not his Constitution it is ours

Bullshit.

You motherfuckers want it substituted with communism.

.

link

link

 

[PoliticalChic]

The Constitution is the only document to which the free people of the United States agreed to be governed.
The Constitution. That is why it is called 'the law of the land.'


At one time this was true.
But not since President Franklin Roosevelt.

Here is a tale that compared the two versions of America....before Roosevelt, and since.
This tale took place before that presidency, and so it conformed to the law of the land.




1. "The Erie Canal is a canal in New York that originally ran about 363 miles (584 km) from Albany, New York, on the Hudson River to Buffalo, New York, at Lake Erie. It was built to create a navigable water route fromNew York Cityand the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes..... – because of this vital connection and others to follow, such as the railroads,New York State would become known as the "Empire State" or "the great Empire State"
Erie Canal - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia




2. "The building of the Erie Canal and the politics surrounding it, became a landmark event in American economic history....almost all American wanted better roads and new canals- 'internal improvements' as they were called.....Building the Erie Canal was a splendid idea.
The only question was how to fund it: with federal spending, state funding, or by entrepreneurs?" Folsom and Folsom, "Uncle Sam Can't Count," p.56.

3. In 1811, NY Congressman Peter Porter argued before Congress that the federal government should fund the canal. After all, an Erie Canal would have national benefits, and not just commercially! It would encourage settlement all along it's length, and cause the Great Lakes to flourish.

a. But the Constitution did not empower the federal government to tax all the people of the nation for a road that mainly benefited one state.
Porter's bill failed.

b. But the War of 1812 added a national defense reason and the bill was brought back; Congress passed it in 1817.
"Erie Water West: A History of the Erie Canal, 1792-1854,"by Ronald E. Shaw, p. 39-40, 47.





4. As I said, this was before Franklin Roosevelt, so the Constitution was still in effect. On March 3, 1817, on his next to the last day in office, President James Madison vetoed the bill, saying "I am constrained by the insuperable difficulty I feel in reconciling the bill with the Constitution of the United States..."

He went on to make two significant points, points that successive Presidents should have noted:

a. "....To refer the power in question to the clause "to provide for common defense and general welfare" would be contrary to the established and consistent rules of interpretation,... Such a view of the Constitution would have the effect of giving to Congress a general power of legislation instead of the defined and limited one hitherto understood to belong to them, the terms "common defense and general welfare" embracing every object and act within the purview of a legislative trust." James Madison Veto of federal public works bill March 3 1817

This, from the leader of the Constitutional Convention; he, more than anyone, understood how the general welfare clause was to be read.


b. Don't misunderstand: Madison was in favor of internal improvements- he knew that the Constitution's design was that such projects should be undertaken by the state, or by private citizens.
"I am not unaware of the great importance of roads and canals and the improved navigation of water courses, and that a power in the National Legislature to provide for them might be exercised with signal advantage to the general prosperity."
...But he knew that the Constitution did not provide for such as expansion of the federal government..." I have no option but to withhold my signature from it, and to cherishing the hope that its beneficial objects may be attained [by other means]."
Ibid.


And that is the way it's 'sposed to be.

Damn

Madison was a fucking moron for opposing the Erie Canal

Although I eschew the language you Liberals use, I feel the same way about you for opposing the United States Constitution.



5. From the inception of this nation, the idea was for localities to fund their own projects, rather than the federal government doing so.

"The Kanawha River, or Great Kanawha River (the Little Kanawha River is further north), originates thirty-five miles southeast of Charleston, at Gauley Bridge. A confluence of the Gauley River and the New River, which rises in the mountains of North Carolina, the Kanawha meanders ninety-seven miles from Gauley Bridge until it meets the Ohio River at Point Pleasant.

A steamboat first tried to navigate the river in 1819 but came to grief at the Red House Shoals, approximately thirty miles west of Charleston. That prompted the Virginia legislature to approve a bill for "cutting chutes through the river's shoals, building wing dams and removing snags," and so began the era of the Kanawha steamboat service, as tourists and traders proceeded serenely down the river agog at the beauty of the scenery."
"The West Virginia Encyclopedia,"Ken Sullivan(Editor), p. 393

Thanks for reminding us how fucking dumb Madison really was

Even a simpleton can understand the national economic impacts these major infrastructure projects can have. The Erie Canal helped to make the United States, for a moron like Madison to oppose it on the grounds it is a "state problem" shows why his views on the Constitution should not be trusted

Well, I can't thank you for doubling-down on how little respect you have for the Constitution.

I suspect that it was Madison's use of the 'e' word that makes you so sensitive:

"Education is the true foundation of civil liberty."

Shirley you don't think redirecting the discussion will save your thread

1.Save it???

As though a dunce like you can pass judgement????


2. My function is to provide truth and education.

I do that...that is success.

Whether or not you learn from it is not, in any way, my responsibility.

3. And, more bad news for you: There is no vaccine against stupidity.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Lest we forget, Madison wasn't the only President who honored the Constitution....


8 . “[Of President Grover Cleveland's 584 vetoes, that of the "Texas Seed Bill" (February 16, 1887) may be the most famous. Members of Congress wanted to help suffering farmers in the American West, but Cleveland rejected their bill, citing the limited mission of the general government and arguing that private charity and already-existing government programs should furnish the necessary aid.]

To the House of Representatives:

I return without my approval House bill number 10203, entitled "An Act to enable the Commissioner of Agriculture to make a special distribution of seeds in drought-stricken counties of Texas, and making an appropriation therefor."

And yet I feel obliged to withhold my approval of the plan as proposed by this bill, to indulge a benevolent and charitable sentiment through the appropriation of public funds for that purpose.

I can find no warrant for such an appropriation in the Constitution, and I do not believe that the power and duty of the general government ought to be extended to the relief of individual suffering which is in no manner properly related to the public service or benefit. A prevalent tendency to disregard the limited mission of this power and duty should, I think, be steadfastly resisted, to the end that the lesson should be constantly enforced that, though the people support the government, the government should not support the people.

The friendliness and charity of our countrymen can always be relied upon to relieve their fellow citizens in misfortune. This has been repeatedly and quite lately demonstrated. Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of the government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character, while it prevents the indulgence among our people of that kindly sentiment and conduct which strengthens the bonds of a common brotherhood.” Veto of the Texas Seed Bill - Grover Cleveland - Mises Daily

9. Such aid would 'destroy the partitions between proper subjects of Federal and local care and regulation.' ....Cleveland believed the American people would not abandon its fellow citizens in the Lone Star state.

Cleveland could not be more accurate in his predictions. People not only gave, but did so at a level beyond the imagination of the Texas farmers and the politicians who represented them. Fellow Americans from all over the country gave gifts exceeding $100,000. That amount was more than ten times the amount Congress had tried to take from the taxpayers. The Founding Fathers never saw a "charity" role for government, that perspective was validated in both word and deed by Cleveland's courageous veto and his belief in the American people. Hurricane Sandy presidential candidates and Grover Cleveland


So....before Franklin Roosevelt....we actually had a nation based on laws....not a banana republic based on the cult of personality.

 

[g5000]

The Constitution is the only document to which the free people of the United States agreed to be governed.
The Constitution. That is why it is called 'the law of the land.'


At one time this was true.
But not since President Franklin Roosevelt.

Here is a tale that compared the two versions of America....before Roosevelt, and since.
This tale took place before that presidency, and so it conformed to the law of the land.




1. "The Erie Canal is a canal in New York that originally ran about 363 miles (584 km) from Albany, New York, on the Hudson River to Buffalo, New York, at Lake Erie. It was built to create a navigable water route fromNew York Cityand the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes..... – because of this vital connection and others to follow, such as the railroads,New York State would become known as the "Empire State" or "the great Empire State"
Erie Canal - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia




2. "The building of the Erie Canal and the politics surrounding it, became a landmark event in American economic history....almost all American wanted better roads and new canals- 'internal improvements' as they were called.....Building the Erie Canal was a splendid idea.
The only question was how to fund it: with federal spending, state funding, or by entrepreneurs?" Folsom and Folsom, "Uncle Sam Can't Count," p.56.

3. In 1811, NY Congressman Peter Porter argued before Congress that the federal government should fund the canal. After all, an Erie Canal would have national benefits, and not just commercially! It would encourage settlement all along it's length, and cause the Great Lakes to flourish.

a. But the Constitution did not empower the federal government to tax all the people of the nation for a road that mainly benefited one state.
Porter's bill failed.

b. But the War of 1812 added a national defense reason and the bill was brought back; Congress passed it in 1817.
"Erie Water West: A History of the Erie Canal, 1792-1854,"by Ronald E. Shaw, p. 39-40, 47.





4. As I said, this was before Franklin Roosevelt, so the Constitution was still in effect. On March 3, 1817, on his next to the last day in office, President James Madison vetoed the bill, saying "I am constrained by the insuperable difficulty I feel in reconciling the bill with the Constitution of the United States..."

He went on to make two significant points, points that successive Presidents should have noted:

a. "....To refer the power in question to the clause "to provide for common defense and general welfare" would be contrary to the established and consistent rules of interpretation,... Such a view of the Constitution would have the effect of giving to Congress a general power of legislation instead of the defined and limited one hitherto understood to belong to them, the terms "common defense and general welfare" embracing every object and act within the purview of a legislative trust." James Madison Veto of federal public works bill March 3 1817

This, from the leader of the Constitutional Convention; he, more than anyone, understood how the general welfare clause was to be read.


b. Don't misunderstand: Madison was in favor of internal improvements- he knew that the Constitution's design was that such projects should be undertaken by the state, or by private citizens.
"I am not unaware of the great importance of roads and canals and the improved navigation of water courses, and that a power in the National Legislature to provide for them might be exercised with signal advantage to the general prosperity."
...But he knew that the Constitution did not provide for such as expansion of the federal government..." I have no option but to withhold my signature from it, and to cherishing the hope that its beneficial objects may be attained [by other means]."
Ibid.


And that is the way it's 'sposed to be.

This is a very good opening post, and an interesting subject. I am a particular admirer of James Madison, and also like to retrace our steps backward to see how the welfare clause has been eroded by increments over time. This is a good topic to trace those steps forward from our Founding.

So when did this barrier collapse? What incident or design came along which caused expediency to run roughshod over the Constitution's limits on legislative power to fund public works? Did this barrier stand until FDR?

 

[rightwinger]

Damn

Madison was a fucking moron for opposing the Erie Canal

Although I eschew the language you Liberals use, I feel the same way about you for opposing the United States Constitution.



5. From the inception of this nation, the idea was for localities to fund their own projects, rather than the federal government doing so.

"The Kanawha River, or Great Kanawha River (the Little Kanawha River is further north), originates thirty-five miles southeast of Charleston, at Gauley Bridge. A confluence of the Gauley River and the New River, which rises in the mountains of North Carolina, the Kanawha meanders ninety-seven miles from Gauley Bridge until it meets the Ohio River at Point Pleasant.

A steamboat first tried to navigate the river in 1819 but came to grief at the Red House Shoals, approximately thirty miles west of Charleston. That prompted the Virginia legislature to approve a bill for "cutting chutes through the river's shoals, building wing dams and removing snags," and so began the era of the Kanawha steamboat service, as tourists and traders proceeded serenely down the river agog at the beauty of the scenery."
"The West Virginia Encyclopedia,"Ken Sullivan(Editor), p. 393

Thanks for reminding us how fucking dumb Madison really was

Even a simpleton can understand the national economic impacts these major infrastructure projects can have. The Erie Canal helped to make the United States, for a moron like Madison to oppose it on the grounds it is a "state problem" shows why his views on the Constitution should not be trusted

Well, I can't thank you for doubling-down on how little respect you have for the Constitution.

I suspect that it was Madison's use of the 'e' word that makes you so sensitive:

"Education is the true foundation of civil liberty."

Shirley you don't think redirecting the discussion will save your thread

1.Save it???

As though a dunce like you can pass judgement????


2. My function is to provide truth and education.

I do that...that is success.

Whether or not you learn from it is not, in any way, my responsibility.

3. And, more bad news for you: There is no vaccine against stupidity.

Like most of your lame threads, you need someone to come in and salvage it

 

[PoliticalChic]

Although I eschew the language you Liberals use, I feel the same way about you for opposing the United States Constitution.



5. From the inception of this nation, the idea was for localities to fund their own projects, rather than the federal government doing so.

"The Kanawha River, or Great Kanawha River (the Little Kanawha River is further north), originates thirty-five miles southeast of Charleston, at Gauley Bridge. A confluence of the Gauley River and the New River, which rises in the mountains of North Carolina, the Kanawha meanders ninety-seven miles from Gauley Bridge until it meets the Ohio River at Point Pleasant.

A steamboat first tried to navigate the river in 1819 but came to grief at the Red House Shoals, approximately thirty miles west of Charleston. That prompted the Virginia legislature to approve a bill for "cutting chutes through the river's shoals, building wing dams and removing snags," and so began the era of the Kanawha steamboat service, as tourists and traders proceeded serenely down the river agog at the beauty of the scenery."
"The West Virginia Encyclopedia,"Ken Sullivan(Editor), p. 393

Thanks for reminding us how fucking dumb Madison really was

Even a simpleton can understand the national economic impacts these major infrastructure projects can have. The Erie Canal helped to make the United States, for a moron like Madison to oppose it on the grounds it is a "state problem" shows why his views on the Constitution should not be trusted

Well, I can't thank you for doubling-down on how little respect you have for the Constitution.

I suspect that it was Madison's use of the 'e' word that makes you so sensitive:

"Education is the true foundation of civil liberty."

Shirley you don't think redirecting the discussion will save your thread

1.Save it???

As though a dunce like you can pass judgement????


2. My function is to provide truth and education.

I do that...that is success.

Whether or not you learn from it is not, in any way, my responsibility.

3. And, more bad news for you: There is no vaccine against stupidity.

Like most of your lame threads, you need someone to come in and salvage it

I'm not that worried about what you think because I can see you don't do that too often.


And, in this case...you're lying.

The thread made the point that I intended, proven

a. by the fact that folks who aren't big government, anti-Constitution, leftists....like you, understood it.

b. and by the fact that you were forced to lie about it.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Just like Polichics denial that all men are created equal meant something different when it was written verses todays idea that it meant equal rights for all...as being dishonest is a joke beyond reproach in vulgarity of the human condition, and with the evangelical concept she induces which involves the idea that humans have a free spirit to chose...evidently God believes in equality for all....

"...denial that all men are created equal...

Show where I've ever said that, you lying little dirt.

Why don't you just state your opinion on the matter and leave it at that?

 

[PoliticalChic]

The Constitution is the only document to which the free people of the United States agreed to be governed.
The Constitution. That is why it is called 'the law of the land.'


At one time this was true.
But not since President Franklin Roosevelt.

Here is a tale that compared the two versions of America....before Roosevelt, and since.
This tale took place before that presidency, and so it conformed to the law of the land.




1. "The Erie Canal is a canal in New York that originally ran about 363 miles (584 km) from Albany, New York, on the Hudson River to Buffalo, New York, at Lake Erie. It was built to create a navigable water route fromNew York Cityand the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes..... – because of this vital connection and others to follow, such as the railroads,New York State would become known as the "Empire State" or "the great Empire State"
Erie Canal - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia




2. "The building of the Erie Canal and the politics surrounding it, became a landmark event in American economic history....almost all American wanted better roads and new canals- 'internal improvements' as they were called.....Building the Erie Canal was a splendid idea.
The only question was how to fund it: with federal spending, state funding, or by entrepreneurs?" Folsom and Folsom, "Uncle Sam Can't Count," p.56.

3. In 1811, NY Congressman Peter Porter argued before Congress that the federal government should fund the canal. After all, an Erie Canal would have national benefits, and not just commercially! It would encourage settlement all along it's length, and cause the Great Lakes to flourish.

a. But the Constitution did not empower the federal government to tax all the people of the nation for a road that mainly benefited one state.
Porter's bill failed.

b. But the War of 1812 added a national defense reason and the bill was brought back; Congress passed it in 1817.
"Erie Water West: A History of the Erie Canal, 1792-1854,"by Ronald E. Shaw, p. 39-40, 47.





4. As I said, this was before Franklin Roosevelt, so the Constitution was still in effect. On March 3, 1817, on his next to the last day in office, President James Madison vetoed the bill, saying "I am constrained by the insuperable difficulty I feel in reconciling the bill with the Constitution of the United States..."

He went on to make two significant points, points that successive Presidents should have noted:

a. "....To refer the power in question to the clause "to provide for common defense and general welfare" would be contrary to the established and consistent rules of interpretation,... Such a view of the Constitution would have the effect of giving to Congress a general power of legislation instead of the defined and limited one hitherto understood to belong to them, the terms "common defense and general welfare" embracing every object and act within the purview of a legislative trust." James Madison Veto of federal public works bill March 3 1817

This, from the leader of the Constitutional Convention; he, more than anyone, understood how the general welfare clause was to be read.


b. Don't misunderstand: Madison was in favor of internal improvements- he knew that the Constitution's design was that such projects should be undertaken by the state, or by private citizens.
"I am not unaware of the great importance of roads and canals and the improved navigation of water courses, and that a power in the National Legislature to provide for them might be exercised with signal advantage to the general prosperity."
...But he knew that the Constitution did not provide for such as expansion of the federal government..." I have no option but to withhold my signature from it, and to cherishing the hope that its beneficial objects may be attained [by other means]."
Ibid.


And that is the way it's 'sposed to be.

This is a very good opening post, and an interesting subject. I am a particular admirer of James Madison, and also like to retrace our steps backward to see how the welfare clause has been eroded by increments over time. This is a good topic to trace those steps forward from our Founding.

So when did this barrier collapse? What incident or design came along which caused expediency to run roughshod over the Constitution's limits on legislative power to fund public works? Did this barrier stand until FDR?

I, too.


FDR took full advantage of the crises....which he extended more than he solved, and made clear that, like red and green lights in Rome, the Constitution was merely a suggestion.


1. Some believe that there are three co-equal branches of government, yet, under FDR, that was only intermittently true. The Supreme Court, for example, upheld the confiscation and arbitrary revaluation of the price of gold, and the cancellation of mortgage debt…both plainly violations of the Constitution’s Contract Clause.

a. The Great Depression was a perfect opportunity for American socialists, interventionists, and advocates of omnipotent government to prevail in their long struggle against the advocates of economic liberty, free enterprise, and limited, constitutional government. FDR led the statists in using the economic crisis to level massive assaults on freedom and the Constitution. A good example of the kind of battles that were taking place at the state level is the1935 U.S. Supreme Court caseHome Building & Loan Association v. Blaisdell, in which the “Four Horsemen” — Supreme Court Justices George Sutherland, James C. McReynolds, Willis Van Devanter, and Pierce Butler — banded together in an unsuccessful attempt to hold back the forces of statism and collectivism.

b. The Blaisdells, like so many other Americans in the early 1930s, lacked the money to make their mortgage payments. They defaulted and the bank foreclosed, selling the home at the foreclosure sale. The Minnesota legislature had enacted a law that provided that a debtor could go to court and seek a further extension of time in which to redeem the property. The Supreme Court of Minnesota upheld the constitutionality of the new redemption law, and the bank appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

c. Constitution clearly states: “No State shall . . . pass any . . . Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts. . ..”
Did the Minnesota redemption law impair the loan contract between the building and loan association and the Blaisdells? It would seem rather obvious that it did. But in a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court held otherwise.American statists and collectivists won the Blaisdell case, which helped to open the floodgates on laws, rules, and regulations at the state level governing economic activity in America. And their leader, Franklin Roosevelt, was leading their charge on a national level.

d. But what happens when an exercise of the police powers contradicts an express prohibition in the Constitution, which is supposed to be the supreme law of the land, trumping both state legislatures and state courts?

That was the issue that confronted the U.S. Supreme Court in Blaisdell. Writing for the majority, Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes set forth the applicable principles: “Emergency does not create power. Emergency does not increase granted power or remove or diminish the restrictions imposed upon power granted or reserved. The Constitution was adopted in a period of grave emergency. Its grants of power to the Federal Government and its limitations of the power of the States were determined in the light of emergency and they are not altered by emergency. What power was thus granted and what limitations were thus imposed are questions which have always been, and always will be, the subject of close examination under our constitutional system.”

“While emergency does not create power, emergency may furnish the occasion for the exercise of power. . .. The constitutional question presented in the light of an emergency is whether the power possessed embraces the particular exercise of it in response to particular conditions. . ..“The economic interests of the State may justify the exercise of its continuing and dominant protective power notwithstanding interference with contracts.

e. So there you have it. In the old horse-and-buggy era, the individual and his freedom were supreme but now in the new modern era, the collective interests of “society” would have to prevail.

And society could no longer be bound by such quaint notions of constitutional limitations on state power, especially not during emergencies and especially not when the “good of all” depends on state action.
http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0302a.asp

f. In 1937, the court buckled and ceased to act as the guardian of economic liberty, and as a limit on the extension of federal government power. It now upheld many New Deal measures.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Just like Polichics denial that all men are created equal meant something different when it was written verses todays idea that it meant equal rights for all...as being dishonest is a joke beyond reproach in vulgarity of the human condition, and with the evangelical concept she induces which involves the idea that humans have a free spirit to chose...evidently God believes in equality for all....

"...denial that all men are created equal...

Show where I've ever said that, you lying little dirt.

Why don't you just state your opinion on the matter and leave it at that?

. Remember when I asked for your opinion? Yeah...me neither.

 

[Little-Acorn]

And that is the way it's 'sposed to be.

Just like Christians which live strictly by the word of Christ, never happens...

A typical liberal response.

"Other people disobey the rules, so we can too!"