Senator Frist: an enemy of our written Constitution?

Please provide United States Supreme Court authority that conclusively supports your position that the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research.

thanks john w k - I understand it more now. So to understand the Constitution it's necessary to read it as it was when it was written. I imagine that the various amendments have also to be read when they were written as well?

Debra_Law wrote:

Please provide United States Supreme Court authority that conclusively supports your position that the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research.

Never said "...the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research" That is an insinuation you made up, just as you always make things up about what I write.

“July 18, 2001—Nashville, TN: Tennessee Senator Bill Frist today announced his support for embryo stem cell research, including tax payer funding of the destructive practice.”

Senator Frist supports using the force of government to finance stem cell research?

And by what constitutional authority does Senator Frist rely upon to use the force of government in such a manner?

But, in general, the founding fathers agreed free enterprise to be the best depository in the advancement of science, and intentionally sought to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts by granting a limited power to Congress to protect the work of authors and inventors by issuing patents and copyrights!

Madison's Notes on the convention of 1787 reveals that Charles Pinckney, on August 18th during the federal convention, proposed a power to be vested in Congress "To establish seminaries for the promotion of literature and the arts and sciences", but this proposal, as many other proposals, was rejected by the Convention, and the only power agreed upon by the Framers and Ratifiers relating to the advancement of science, was the limited power "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts". How? "... by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." See Art.1, Sec. 8. U.S.Constitution

JWK
American Constitutional Research Service

The legislature not only commands the purse, but prescribes the rules by which the duties and rights of every citizen are to be regulated.

Please provide United States Supreme Court authority that conclusively supports your position that the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research.

Never said "...the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research" That is an insinuation you made up, just as you always make things up about what I write.

It is not my fault that you do not share a common understanding of the English language that the rest of us have. Apparently, your inability to convey your "real" message--which you appear twist and turn when you're doing your evasion maneuver--makes a rational discussion impossible.

John wrote to Brandon

This brings us to the question of federal funding for NASA. An argument can be forcefully made that the founders, having knowingly and intentionally delegating power to Congress to raise and support Armies, and to provide and support a Navy, etc., the framers and ratifiers, without question, intended that Congress ought to have sufficient authority and powers in the area of national defense. I would imagine that if Congress’ funding of NASA was indeed restricted to those specific areas which are without question essential to our national defense, the framers and ratifiers would have had no objection to such funding. So, to remark on your conclusion that NASA must be abolished, I do not know if that statement would be constitutionally applicable across the board

Debra_Law wrote:

Once again Debra provides nothing to support her made up assertion that my position is "…the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research."

JWK

Oh, give it up, JWK. Read your title to this thread, and just give up.

Madison's Notes on the convention of 1787 reveals that Charles Pinckney, on August 18th during the federal convention, proposed a power to be vested in Congress "To establish seminaries for the promotion of literature and the arts and sciences", but this proposal, as many other proposals, was rejected by the Convention, and the only power agreed upon by the Framers and Ratifiers relating to the advancement of science, was the limited power "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts". How? "... by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." See Art.1, Sec. 8. U.S.Constitution

JWK
American Constitutional Research Service

The legislature not only commands the purse, but prescribes the rules by which the duties and rights of every citizen are to be regulated.

john w k wrote:

Debra_Law wrote:

Once again Debra provides nothing to support her made up assertion that my position is “…the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research.“

JWK

Oh, give it up, JWK. Read your title to this thread, and just give up.

Just did! See nothing in the title which asserts “…the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research.“

So if someone thinks the gov't should not fund research for stem cells, would the same line of thinking apply to them funding cancer research, AIDS research, arthritis or any other type of scientific research? To me, finding out what progress we can make in science is promoting the general welfare of the citizens. Just my opinion.

Since the foundation of the nation, sharp differences of opinion have persisted as to the true interpretation of the phrase. Madison asserted it amounted to no more than a reference to the other powers enumerated in the subsequent clauses of the same section; that, as the United States is a government of limited and enumerated powers, the grant of power to tax and spend for the general national welfare must be confined to the enumerated legislative fields committed to the Congress. In this view the phrase is mere tautology, for taxation and appropriation are or may be necessary incidents of the exercise of any of the enumerated legislative powers.

Hamilton, on the other hand, maintained the clause confers a power separate and distinct from those later enumerated is not restricted in meaning by the grant of them, and Congress consequently has a substantive power to tax and to ap- [297 U.S. 1, 66] propriate, limited only by the requirement that it shall be exercised to provide for the general welfare of the United States. Each contention has had the support of those whose views are entitled to weight. This court has noticed the question, but has never found it necessary to decide which is the true construction.

Mr. Justice Story, in his Commentaries, espouses the Hamiltonian position. 12 We shall not review the writings of public men and commentators or discuss the legislative practice. Study of all these leads us to conclude that the reading advocated by Mr. Justice Story is the correct one. While, therefore, the power to tax is not unlimited, its confines are set in the clause which confers it, and not in those of section 8 which bestow and define the legislative powers of the Congress. It results that the power of Congress to authorize expenditure of public moneys for public purposes is not limited by the direct grants of legislative power found in the Constitution.

But the adoption of the broader construction leaves the power to spend subject to limitations.

As Story says: 'The Constitution was, from its very origin, contemplated to be the frame of a national government, of special and enumerated powers, and not of general and unlimited powers.' 13

Again he says: 'A power to lay taxes for the common defence and general welfare of the United States is not in common sense a general power. It is limited to those objects. It cannot constitutionally transcend them.' 14

That the qualifying phrase must be given effect all advocates of broad construction admit. Hamilton, in his [297 U.S. 1, 67] well known Report on Manufactures, states that the purpose must be 'general, and not local.' 15 Monroe, an advocate of Hamilton's doctrine, wrote: 'Have Congress a right to raise and appropriate the money to any and to every purpose according to their will and pleasure? They certainly have not.' 16 Story says that if the tax be not proposed for the common defense or general welfare, but for other objects wholly extraneous, it would be wholly indefensible upon constitutional principles. 17 And he makes it clear that the powers of taxation and appropriation extend only to matters of national, as distinguished from local, welfare.

The Federalist papers might be useful as one clue to the founders' intent, but they are not, by themselves, binding. You can't quote Federalist papers as if they have the weight of Supreme Court decisions. They do not.

And what is your point, if any, with reference to the discussion and what I have posted?

As to the "weight" of a Supreme Court decision, its weight depends upon the documentation contained in it which demonstrates and confirms the intent of the Constitution as contemplated by those who framed it and the people who adopted it.

So if someone thinks the gov't should not fund research for stem cells, would the same line of thinking apply to them funding cancer research, AIDS research, arthritis or any other type of scientific research? To me, finding out what progress we can make in science is promoting the general welfare of the citizens. Just my opinion.

JWK wrote:

Quote:

Madison's Notes on the convention of 1787 reveals that Charles Pinckney, on August 18th during the federal convention, proposed a power to be vested in Congress "To establish seminaries for the promotion of literature and the arts and sciences", but this proposal, as many other proposals, was rejected by the Convention, and the only power agreed upon by the Framers and Ratifiers relating to the advancement of science, was the limited power "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts". How? "... by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." See Art.1, Sec. 8. U.S.Constitution

JWK
American Constitutional Research Service

Debra Responds:

So what? What does Charles Pinckney's alleged views on copyrights and patents have to do with governmental funding of scientific research? And, what difference does it make anyway? If you're not claiming that the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research, why are you labeling Frist as an enemy of the written constitution?


Here is what Hamilton said Federalist No. 78:

Quote:

The legislature not only commands the purse, but prescribes the rules by which the duties and rights of every citizen are to be regulated.

http://thomas.loc.gov/home/histdox/fed_78.html

Congress commands the purse! Are you now going to argue against Hamilton and the Federalist Papers?


ANSWER

But Debra my dear, I seen nothing in your quote from Hamilton which appears in Federalist Paper 78, to remotely suggest Congress is authorized to spend money from that ‘purse” on whatever objects it so desires.

I guess no such indication appears because Hamilton forcefully states the following observation in Federalist 83, in reference to the general welfare clause, "...the power of Congress...shall extend to certain enumerated cases. This specification of particulars evidently excludes all pretension to a general legislative authority, because an affirmative grant of special powers would be absurd as well as useless if a general authority was intended..."

Having now seen that the maxims relied upon will not bear the use made of them, let us endeavor to ascertain their proper use and true meaning. This will be best done by examples. The plan of the convention declares that the power of Congress, or, in other words, of the NATIONAL LEGISLATURE, shall extend to certain enumerated cases. This specification of particulars evidently excludes all pretension to a general legislative authority, because an affirmative grant of special powers would be absurd, as well as useless, if a general authority was intended.

In like manner the judicial authority of the federal judicatures is declared by the Constitution to comprehend certain cases particularly specified. The expression of those cases marks the precise limits, beyond which the federal courts cannot extend their jurisdiction, because the objects of their cognizance being enumerated, the specification would be nugatory if it did not exclude all ideas of more extensive authority.

Hamilton’s words in Federalist No. 83 are also in harmony with that of Jefferson:

"Our tenet ever was, and, indeed, it is almost the only landmark that divides the Federalists from the Republicans, that Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but were restrained to those specifically enumerated; and that, as it was never meant they should provided for that welfare but by the exercise of the enumerated powers, so it could not have been meant they should raise money for purposes which the enumeration did not place under their action; consequently that the specification of power is a limitation of the purposes for which they may raise money." (letter from Jefferson to Gallatin, June 16th, 1817)

And Madison, in No. 41 Federalist, explaining the meaning of the general welfare clause to gain the approval of the proposed constitution, states the following:

"It has been urged and echoed, that the power "to lay and collect taxes...to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and the general welfare of the United States amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare. No stronger proof could be given of the distress under which these writers labor [the anti federalists] for objections, than their stooping to such a misconstruction...But what color can this objection have, when a specification of the object alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not ever separated by a longer pause than a semicolon?...For what purpose could the enumeration of particular powers be inserted, if these and all others were meant to be included in the preceding general power...But the idea of an enumeration of particulars which neither explain nor qualify the general meaning...is an absurdity."


Likewise, in the Virginia ratification Convention Madison explains the general welfare phrase in the following manner so as to gain ratification of the constitution:

"the powers of the federal government are enumerated; it can only operate in certain cases; it has legislative powers on defined and limited objects, beyond which it cannot extend its jurisdiction."[3 Elliots 95] [also see Nicholas, 3 Elliot 443 regarding the general welfare clause, which he pointed out "was united, not to the general power of legislation, but to the particular power of laying and collecting taxes...."]

Likewise, George Mason, in the Virginia ratification Convention informs the convention

"The Congress should have power to provide for the general welfare of the Union, I grant. But I wish a clause in the Constitution, with respect to all powers which are not granted, that they are retained by the states. Otherwise the power of providing for the general welfare may be perverted to its destruction.".[3 Elliots 442]

For this very reason the Tenth Amendment was quickly ratified, to intentionally put to rest any question whatsoever regarding the general welfare clause and thereby cut off the pretext to allow Congress to extended its powers via the wording “promote the general welfare“ and tax and spend for whatever purpose it may desire..

But according to our resident legal analyst , Debra, Congress and the SCOTUS are free to do what they so desire, and in spite of the intent and beliefs under which our constitution was agreed upon by the people.

JWK

Justice Story writes in his commentaries: "If the Constitution was ratified under the belief, sedulously propagated on all sides, that such protection was afforded, would it not now be a fraud upon the whole people to give a different construction to its powers?"

'The Constitution was, from its very origin, contemplated to be the frame of a national government, of special and enumerated powers, and not of general and unlimited powers.'

'A power to lay taxes for the common defence and general welfare of the United States is not in common sense a general power. It is limited to those objects. It cannot constitutionally transcend them.'

Once again Debra provides nothing to support her made up assertion that my position is “…the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research.“ Her rebuttal is groundless and based upon innuendo, assertions and unsubstantiated conclusions drawn from what I wrote in the thread which are alleged to substantiate that my position is “the Constitution prohibits Congress from funding scientific research”. But note the absoluteness of the statement made by Debra portraying my alleged position.

Now, as to what my feelings really are in this matter, surprisingly they are to be found in this very thread in my post to Brandon, which Debra conveniently ignores in order to perpetuate her mischaracterizations concerning what my position really is.

Quote:

John wrote to Brandon

This brings us to the question of federal funding for NASA. An argument can be forcefully made that the founders, having knowingly and intentionally delegating power to Congress to raise and support Armies, and to provide and support a Navy, etc., the framers and ratifiers, without question, intended that Congress ought to have sufficient authority and powers in the area of national defense. I would imagine that if Congress’ funding of NASA was indeed restricted to those specific areas which are without question essential to our national defense, the framers and ratifiers would have had no objection to such funding. So, to remark on your conclusion that NASA must be abolished, I do not know if that statement would be constitutionally applicable across the board

Come now Debra, how about an apology?


JWK

tommrr wrote:

So if someone thinks the gov't should not fund research for stem cells, would the same line of thinking apply to them funding cancer research, AIDS research, arthritis or any other type of scientific research? To me, finding out what progress we can make in science is promoting the general welfare of the citizens. Just my opinion.

By "gov't", I assume you mean Federal government.

Don't expect a direct answer to that from John wk anytime soon. That issue has been brought up before and he has not responded to it, for good reason.

As John wk's answer to Brandon about NASA makes clear, he believes the consititution forbids Federal funding to any progam that does not have to do with defense or a few other narrow reasons. So his answer would seem to be that since cancer research, AIDS research, arthritis research do not have anything to do with the national defense, they should not receive Federal funding.

State funding, yes. But not Federal.

Since the overwhelming proportion of Americans are just like you, tommrr, and overwhelminmgly support Federal funds for these things, I am not surpirsed the John wk has not responded to this question before when it was raised.