What to cut: The Federal Budget

[Bern80]

I find much of it ambiguous.

How exactly did they arrive at that conclusion?

In 1788, there were well established common law rules of constriction that applied to constitutions and statutes. The official and unofficial documents generated in the process of making the Constitution contain many references to rules of construction.

We could just apply the well established common law rules of construction. There is no evidence whatsoever that the men who participated in framing and giving legal effect to the Constitution believed their intent would be ascertained by looking at historical documents like the federalist papers or the speeches of Hamilton. However, there is an abundance of evidence that they took for granted that the established common law rules of construction would be applied to the Constitution.

Most words are ambiguous, in the sense that they have more than one meaning. What common sense rules of construction should we apply to decide which particular signification of a word should be assigned to a word in the Constitution?

Name one man who participated in the making of the Constitution who also came here to flee an overly powerful tyrannical government.

I suggest we try a little experiment then. Here is the first part of Article 1 Section 8

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;

What exactly do you find ambiguous here?

What rules of interpretation do you want me to use?

I really don't care to be honest.

 

[Bern80]

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

This provision appears to establish three objectives and a means of achieving them.

The first object is payment of debt incurred by the United States. The second object is to provide for the common defense of the U. S. The third is to provide for the general welfare of the U. S.

The means to achieving the three objectives is the power of Congressional to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises.

Are you familiar with the dispute regarding whether the General Convention in Philadelphia had authority to recommend a completely new frame of government; And Madison's argument, in one of the Federalist Papers, that the means may be expanded to enable accomplishment of the object?

Actually scratch my last post. How about you interpret it based on what you know about the english language. It isn't meant to be as hard as you're trying to make it.

Congress and can lay and collect taxes, duties, excises to....

Okay they can collect taxes.....for what exactly? to pay for debts, the commone defense and general welfare.

I would say the first two are self explanatory. So what about general welfare of the U.S? So collected taxes must be for the betterment (welfare) of everyone (general). The end of the clause has a semi-cplon at the end of it. Semi-colon's link what comes before them with what comes after them. So there really shouldn't be any confusion that the enumerated powers that follow it are what is meant by debts, the commone defense and general welfare.

 

[Micky G. Jagger]

I suggest we try a little experiment then. Here is the first part of Article 1 Section 8



What exactly do you find ambiguous here?

What rules of interpretation do you want me to use?

I really don't care to be honest.

If we're not going to first establish a set of fair objective rules of interpretation to guard against personal biases, I don't see the point.

 

[Micky G. Jagger]

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

This provision appears to establish three objectives and a means of achieving them.

The first object is payment of debt incurred by the United States. The second object is to provide for the common defense of the U. S. The third is to provide for the general welfare of the U. S.

The means to achieving the three objectives is the power of Congressional to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises.

Are you familiar with the dispute regarding whether the General Convention in Philadelphia had authority to recommend a completely new frame of government; And Madison's argument, in one of the Federalist Papers, that the means may be expanded to enable accomplishment of the object?

Actually scratch my last post. How about you interpret it based on what you know about the english language. It isn't meant to be as hard as you're trying to make it.

Why don't we use the well established common law rules of construction. There is an abundance of evidence that the framers and ratifiers took for granted that they would be applied to ascertain the meaning of the Constitution.

Congress and can lay and collect taxes, duties, excises to....

Okay they can collect taxes.....for what exactly? to pay for debts, the commone defense and general welfare.

The power to tax is merely the means to an end. The ends sought are payment of any debt incurred by the United States and provisions for the common defense and general welfare of the U. S.

I would say the first two are self explanatory.

The word debt is ambiguous.

So what about general welfare of the U.S? So collected taxes must be for the betterment (welfare) of everyone (general).

Why did you assign those significations to the words "general" and "welfare?" Did you apply a fair and righteous rule to arrive at those definitions, or did you just assign them arbitrary meanings?

The end of the clause has a semi-cplon at the end of it. Semi-colon's link what comes before them with what comes after them. So there really shouldn't be any confusion that the enumerated powers that follow it are what is meant by debts, the commone defense and general welfare.

That's a reasonable interpretation. However, there are other equally reasonbalbe interpreations. What do we do when there is more than one reasonable interpretation?

Are you familiar with Joseph Story's refutation of your argument?

 

[Bern80]

The power to tax is merely the means to an end. The ends sought are payment of any debt incurred by the United States and provisions for the common defense and general welfare of the U. S.

Agreed

. Jagger;2764The word debt is ambiguous.

How so. Debt; as in what the government owes.

. Jagger;2764Why did you assign those significations to the words "general" and "welfare?" Did you apply a fair and righteous rule to arrive at those definitions, or did you just assign them arbitrary meanings?

I went by their accepted definitions. General as in welfare not targeted to a specific segment of the United States.

Betterment might not be quite the right word for welfare. Benefit would be better I think. I think if someone you were to reword what was stated in that clause more 'modernly' it would say congress can collect taxes for the purpose of paying its debts, for military protection of the country for the purpose of benefiting every U.S. citizen.

. Jagger;2764That's a reasonable interpretation. However, there are other equally reasonbalbe interpreations. What do we do when there is more than one reasonable interpretation?

okay. Like what?

. Jagger;2764Are you familiar with Joseph Story's refutation of your argument?

no