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Originally Posted by Platapus
Reference Article 1, Section 8 Paragraph 1
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The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
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is quite a loophole isn't it? Given the nature of the rest of the Constitution and what I have gleaned form the Federalist papers, which have been an important source of interperetation for the Constitution, I believe that they literally meant "welfare of the United States" in the terms of the time. That is, the welfare of the nation. That is, not welfare for the people of the nation.
As you have said, this is a source of frequent and heated debate.
My preference would be for a budget Amendment that limits Federal spending and requires that the Federal Government remain profitable. Not a perfect solution, but one that could effectively curtail their power and prevent their mistakes from passing to the taxpayers, in most cases. I'd prefer that such an Amendment limit the federal budget to a very small percentage of the GNP.
I believe that such a measure would effectively close the loophole created by article 1.
Your thoughts?