Are national parks constitutional?

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Are national parks constitutional?

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1. 'General Welfare' extends only to those national things that are outside the sphere of state government.

2. That's not how the Constitution sees states relative to the federal government.

3. The value of the Constitution is irrelevant to what it says. Interpretation is very objective when you adhere to the original meaning of the text.

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Uh, no, clearly they are not. You don't understand how the word 'general' was used at the time the Constitution was written, and should really quit pretending otherwise.

Would it be of equal value to me? No. But that would not change what the document so clearly says.

You don't seem to understand the difference between 'interpretation' and 'making things up.' I have to interpret your posts to respond. Interpretation is clearly very objective; that's how people communicate.

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"General" means more than being open to the nation, as Emsworth and I have explained several times. It means national, as distinguished from local: those national things outside the sphere of the states.

We understand each other very clearly.

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Um, citing a Supreme Court opinion over a specific issue does not mean you agree with the whole thing.

The taking of private property under eminent domain does not put it under DC-like jurisdiction. The federal government must still abide by its limited, enumerated powers under the Constitution.

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Would operation and ownership of the Gettysburg National Military Park fall inside or outside of the general welfare of the United States?  ... Preservation of sites of special historical significance is clearly of interest and benefit to the United States, and not merely to the people in southern Pennsylvania.

I'm afraid not. The park may have some sort of intangible national benefit, but the welfare is not general, as distinguished from local. It should be preserved by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, not the United States.

'welfare' is intangible, just as is 'defense'.  Don't confuse it with the meaning of payments to indigent persons.

welfare - 1. the state of being or doing well; the condition of health, prosperity, and happiness; well-being.

The well-being of the United States is enhanced by the protection and preservation of sites of particular national historical, cultural, geological, biological, or recreational significance.

You agree that preservation of the site is of national[/b] benefit.  That it is of benefit to the united States and not to some particular States that makes it general, rather than specific or local in scope.

Uh, we know what welfare means. I guess you were confused by it or something, and assumed we were as clueless as you.

For something to be general, as we've explained several times, it has to be national as distinguished from local, meaning it must be outside the sphere of the states. This clearly is not.

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The taking of private property under eminent domain does not put it under DC-like jurisdiction.

Agreed, but that's totally consistent with what Collins v. Yosemite Park says.  It takes state consent to do that.  Now, I'll grant that a hyper-constuctionist would argue that the feds can only assume sole sovereignity under Clause 17, even if a State be willing to dicker with the Feds over who controls what.  However, even under a hyper-constructionist view of the constitution, national parks are still constitutional, they simply wouldn't be immune to the laws of the state they are in, that's all.

The federal government can only purchase land to carry into execution one (or more) of its enumerated powers.

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It is abundantly clear that the protection of national treasures is very much in the general welfare of the people of the United States under even the most strict of interpretations.  The Grand Canyon is not of sole interest to the people of Arizona, but it is clearly of interest to the entire nation.

To quote James Monroe, "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."

Under the broad construction advocated by Hamilton, the powers of taxation and appropriation extend only to matters of national, as distinguished from local, welfare.

To be national as distinguished from local, it is quite clear that an appropriation must do more than merely benefit the American people. If your interpretation is correct, Congress has power to establish public schools; to appoint teachers in every state, county, and parish, and to pay them out of the public treasury; to take control of all roads, rather than merely post roads; to establish national industries of every kind, rather than merely banking; or, in short, to destroy local self-government and federalism.

Your assertion that even the most narrow interpretation of the General Welfare Clause would allow for national parks is quite plainly wrong. That interpretation was offered by the Father of the Constitution himself, James Madison.

To Madison, the words 'General Welfare' and 'Common Defense' were just a convenient way of referring to the other powers, and confer no independent spending power of their own.

Furthermore, the power to spend for the General Welfare certainly can not mean that the federal government may purchase land for any purpose they choose, as that too would subvert federalism.

The only honest choices are to (A) revert to the Madison doctrine, in which case 90% of what the federal government does is unconstitutional; or (B) limit federal expenditures to those purposes which do not fall within "the sphere of state government."

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No, he is correct. Hamilton, in his Report on Manufacturers, said, "The only qualification of the generallity of the Phrase [General Welfare] is this -- That the object to which an appropriation of money is to be made be General and not local; its operation extending in fact ... throughout the Union, and not being confined to a particular spot."

The "common sense" view that Congress has adopted is that "general" and "welfare" are both policy questions, that the judiciary will not review. This view, in addition to having been rejected by both Madison and Hamilton, is patently absurd.

As Madison put it, "If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands; they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads; in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation down to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress... Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America."

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Nonsense. It has always been understood that the federal government is one of few and defined powers. The question is the extent of those powers.

No one can argue, in the light of the tenth amendment, that anything else is the case. That is why liberals instead insist on stretching the "interstate commerce clause" and the power to spend for the "general welfare."

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When judges change the meaning of the Constitution, we no longer have a Constitution.

I don't really like the term "originalism." I prefer "not making random **** up as we go along."

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I am not a strict constructionist, and you are not a loose constructionist. When you simply ignore a very plain rule of construction, you've entered a realm tantamount to no construction at all.

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but by your logic neither is Social Security, Funding of Arts and Humanities, National Institutes of Health research, etc.

All of those things are also unconstitutional, in my opinion.

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I highlighted the correct words. Its operation, not benefit, must extend throughout the union even under Hamilton's very broad interpretation.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Madison was wrong.

No, he was quite plainly correct on this. You can disagree with his interpretation, but you can't deny that if Congress can spend money on whatever it wants, it can do each and every one of those things.

Certainly, education and transportation have more of a national benefit than some park.

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So in other words, the federal government is allowed to establish public schools in your view. What a joke this "interpretation" is.

I suppose the post roads power was completely futile. As was the power to raise and support armies, and the power to provide and maintain a navy.

'General welfare' means more than having a national benefit, as has been explained. You simply reject it because you don't like the result, so I'll just quit arguing with entirely results-based posters.

What's amusing is that this alleged blank check, that would devoir every aspect of federalism, was copied from none other than the Articles of Confederation.

http://www.usconstitution.net/articles.html

Article VIII. All charges of war, and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common defense or general welfare, and allowed by the United States in Congress assembled, shall be defrayed out of a common treasury, which shall be supplied by the several States in proportion to the value of all land within each State, granted or surveyed for any person, as such land and the buildings and improvements thereon shall be estimated according to such mode as the United States in Congress assembled, shall from time to time direct and appoint.

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What, in your view, stops the federal government from establishing public schools, forming a military, or assuming provision of all roads under the 'General Welfare' and 'Common Defense' Clause?

If the answer is nothing, then your interpretation would not only (in my view) undermine federalism, but make several of the other enumerated powers useless.

The idea was that the states would supply the money. There was no way for the Congress to itself collect money, but that doesn't change the principle: surely no one would argue that the Congress under the Articles had all this theoretical power.

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He makes a good point about the words 'Common Defense.' Clearly, the power "To ... maintain a Navy" is a spending power.

Perhaps the most probable theory concerning the words 'General Welfare' and 'Common Defense' is that they were just a convenient way of referring to the other powers, as in the Articles of Confederation from which they were copied.