Federalist No. 41 – General View of the Powers Conferred by the Constitution, For the Independent Journal (Madison)

In a lengthy essay, Madison embarks on a series of defenses of Congressional powers that he pursues in more detail through Federalist 46. In Federalist 41, he proposes to divide that task over the course of the following several essays by examining whether any particular power is unnecessary and improper and also whether the entire mass of powers is dangerous to the continued vitality of the states.

He opens with a reminder that, in the end, the Constitution is a practical undertaking, not a theoretical blueprint for an ideal state. He derides the opponents as having “chosen rather to dwell on the inconveniences which must be unavoidably blended with all political advantages; and on the possible abuses which must be incident to every power of trust, of which a beneficial use can be made.” He proceeds with a powerful and very relevant indictment. “[This tactic] may display the subtlety of the writer; it may open a boundless field for rhetoric and declamation; it may inflame the passions of the unthinking, and may confirm the prejudices of the misthinking: but cool and candid people will at once reflect, that the purest of human blessings must have a portion of alloy in them; that the choice must always be made, if not of the lesser evil, at least of the GREATER, not the PERFECT good; and that in every political institution, a power to advance the public happiness, involves a discretion which may be misapplied and abused.”

This passage richly describes a basic phenomenon in politics. Human institutions are designed by imperfect beings to control imperfect beings and administered by imperfect beings. “A government of laws, not of men,” matters, but only to a point. In the end, government is still administered by humans. Perfect systems are imaginary. “Utopia,” which we treat as if derived from the Greek “Eutopia” (a good place), actually is Greek for “not a place.” Utopias do not exist. Rhetorical appeals over potential, yet unrealized, abuses of power are a staple of political discourse. When considering the merits of politicians and political choices, there are always ideological purists who accentuate slight differences rather than bountiful similarities. For them, a political figure who does not perfectly reflect their own vision of the perfect system is suspect, and a political choice that deviates even in minor particulars from their utopian views must be condemned. The perfect, as the saying goes, becomes the enemy of the good.  As he did in earlier efforts, such as in Federalist 37 and 38, Madison urges more temperate and balanced reflection.

After some general observations, he returns to a favorite topic of contention, the keeping of a peacetime army. He proclaims that the matter “has been too far anticipated, in another place, to admit an extensive discussion of them in this place.” Yet, he proceeds to declaim about the topic for half the paper, evidence once again of the frequency and relentlessness of the opponents’ attacks. Those attacks resonated with the public and with many delegates because of the troubling history of standing armies and the tension they reflect with republican ideas.

Two passages stand out. The first is, “Security against foreign danger, is one of the primitive objects of civil society. It is an avowed and essential object of the American union.” There are those who will happily give to the government powers to intrude into the most everyday matters, but act aghast when miliary funding is sought or when a state (reacting to the failure of the federal government to carry out its responsibility in such matters) seeks to protect its people from threats to security coming across the border. This kind of attitude inverts the purpose of government, to provide for personal security for people and allow them to pursue happiness as befits them, not to reduce people to a state of dependency on the government for personal needs.

The second passage is, “It is in vain to oppose constitutional barriers to the impulse of self-preservation. It is worse than in vain: because it plants in the constitution itself necessary usurpations of power, every precedent of which is a germ of unnecessary and multiplied repetitions.” As Publius has written before, necessity knows no bounds in the law. The first rule of nature, for individuals and societies, is self-preservation. There always exists, as countless writers on political theory have declared, a natural right of self-defense. For the proper exercise of that right, there must be a right to arm oneself with reasonable means, a right that applies to individuals as much as nations. Any attempt to restrict that right will fail, as the impulse to self-preservation will prevail at least in those individuals or societies who have not become personally or civilizationally enervated. Indeed, restricting that right will undermine the legitimacy of the constitution itself, as respect for the whole is undermined by repeated violations of an unsustainable provision.

The last portion of the essay discusses a power that has become a conspicuous symbol of the expansion of government, the power to spend. Madison objects that opponents of the Constitution have mislead the people in arguing that the power to “lay taxes…to pay the debts, and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States,” gives the Congress the power to legislate for the general welfare. First, he declares correctly that this is a nonsensical reading. “A power to destroy the freedom of the press, the trial by jury, or even to regulate the course of descents…must be very singularly expressed by the terms ‘to raise money for the general welfare.’” The general welfare language, then, is not a broad grant of power that would make the following enumeration of powers superfluous and contradictory, but a limitation on the power to spend the revenue raised under the taxing power.

As an interesting historical side note, during the Convention, the clause, derived from language in the Articles, was intended to prevent spending of money for “internal improvements” that promoted the welfare of particular states or localities, rather than the general welfare of the United States. But Pennsylvania’s Gouverneur Morris, a strong nationalist who was also the principal draftsman on the Committee of Style that was responsible for the final wording of the text, surreptitiously inserted a semicolon between the power “to lay and collect…excises,” and the limitation of “to pay the debts….” That made the latter seem like an independent power, just as the other powers were separated by semi-colons. Connecticut’s Roger Sherman discovered Morris’s sleight of hand, and the Convention voted to replace the semicolon with a comma.

Second, Madison defines the general welfare as defined by the following specific clauses. He maintained that position in later debates. Hamilton, in contrast, during the debates in the Washington cabinet over the Bank of the United States, claimed that the other enumerated powers of Congress already include within them an implied power to spend for those objectives. Thus, a power to establish post offices includes the power to pay for them. According to Hamilton, the power to spend for the general welfare goes beyond the objectives listed in the Constitution. That is the long-established view of the Supreme Court, as well.

However, that raises the question of what limits exist on the power of Congress to spend. After all, if Congress can spend for objects not within its enumerated powers, it might be able to do indirectly what it cannot do directly. Spend money to control education, for example. Hamilton insisted that the limit was that the spending had to be for the “general” welfare. Yet, unlike the Convention, he also supported spending on subsidies for manufactures and, after some initial misgivings, on internal improvements. He had a much laxer view of “general” welfare.

Today, that leaves Congress in charge of defining “general” welfare. Since many expenditures are earmarked for projects that benefit particular individuals, companies, or communities, the Congress is adept at cloaking rather everything as somehow affecting the general welfare. The spending power has gone far beyond the understanding of the Framers. Bloated spending may prove to be much more of a threat to the national well-being of the country than the standing armies that prompted such concern.

Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010

An expert on constitutional law, Prof. Joerg W. Knipprath has been interviewed by print and broadcast media on a number of related topics ranging from recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions to presidential succession. He has written opinion pieces and articles on business and securities law as well as constitutional issues, and has focused his more recent research on the effect of judicial review on the evolution of constitutional law.  Prof. Knipprath has also spoken on business law and contemporary constitutional issues before professional and community forums.  His website is http://www.tokenconservative.com.

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