Congress is back in session. A multiplicity of promises about cutting government spending and reducing government’s size fill the air. Promises are one thing, of course. Delivery on promises is something else.

A few months ago, as he answered a constituent’s question about where the federal government got the authority to enact a particular law, Congressman Pete Stark, D-Calif., stated: “In this country, the federal government can do pretty much whatever it wants to.” He wasn’t specific about where he found such vast power in the Constitution, but he and many others obviously believe they are so empowered. For far too long, there have been five main rationales used by members of Congress to build government and attack freedom. We list them and explain briefly how wrong each always has been.

1. Article I, Section 8, Clause 1: “provide for the…general welfare” By this, the founders were referring to the general welfare of the nation as a whole, not that of individuals and groups. The general welfare of the nation is best served, they knew, through less government and less taxation. This clause has nothing to do with welfare as the term is employed today

2. Article I, Section 8, Clause 3: “regulate commerce…among the several states.” The main purpose of this clause was to prevent one state from taxing another’s goods as they crossed the state border. It was never intended that Congress should have a say in anything related to commercial activity.

3. Article I, Section 8, Clause 18: the “necessary and proper clause” (frequently labeled “the elastic clause”). After listing powers delegated to Congress in 17 previous clauses of Article I, Section 8, the Constitution states that Congress shall have power “To make all laws which are necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.” Members of Congress regularly cite only “To make all laws which are necessary and proper…” and stop right there. If Congress can make laws about anything its members believe “necessary and proper,” then why did the founders go to the trouble of listing legitimate powers in the previous 17 clauses of Article I, Section 8?

4. Article VI, Clause 2: the “supremacy clause.” The Constitution names itself as “the supreme law of the land.” This clause in no way states that the federal government shall be empowered over all local and state governments.

5. Article VI, Clause 2: treaty law. The Constitution states that all treaties made “under the authority of the United States” shall be the law of the land. But it also states that all laws must be “made in pursuance thereof’ of the Constitution. Treaty law cannot supersede the Constitution. If it could, as Hamilton, Madison and Jefferson stated, then we have no Constitution.

All should be on guard against the use of any of these rationales to justify the past or present tortured interpretations of the Constitution that result in more government, more taxation, more indebtedness and more cancellation of God-given rights and freedoms.

Edwin “Stormy” Storm

Enumclaw