TNHarley
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- Sep 27, 2012
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- #521
I posted him specifically because during the constitutional convention, he wanted it to mean an expansive welfare state but it got shot down. That quote was after the signing.Alexander Hamilton who supported an extensive spending clause during the Constitutional Convention said this : language is not, as Madison contended, a shorthand way of limiting the power to tax and spend in furtherance of the powers elsewhere enumerated in Article I, Section 8; but it does contain its own limitation, namely, that spending under the clause be for the “general” (that is, national) welfare and not for purely local or regional benefit.
Which is just his opinion on what "general" means. Others had different opinions. Hamilton's is not the be-all, end-all. And if we got rid of welfare, how will red states subsidize their low tax rates?