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Topic
Board Politics & Society
Re: Thomas Jefferson on the "general welfare" clause...
by
Hawker
on 02/12/2011, 18:34:46 UTC
"They are not to do anything they please to provide for the general welfare, but only to lay taxes for that purpose. To consider the latter phrase not as describing the purpose of the first, but as giving a distinct and independent power to do any act they please which might be for the good of the Union, would render all the preceding and subsequent enumerations of power completely useless. It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good of the United States; and, as they would be the sole judges of the good or evil, it would be also a power to do whatever evil they please... Certainly no such universal power was meant to be given them. It was intended to lace them up straitly within the enumerated powers and those without which, as means, these powers could not be carried into effect." --Thomas Jefferson: Opinion on National Bank, 1791. ME 3:148

So, no, it doesn't mean the federal government can do whatever it wants.

http://www.dailypaul.com/103339/thomas-jefferson-clarifies-to-provide-for-thegeneral-welfare

Um, Jefferson was 1 author among many and his opinion is 1 opinion among many.  
The opinion among the founding fathers was consistent. In the end, there can only be one perspective. Compromise leads to tyranny.

And the founding fathers raised taxes for the general welfare.  No contradiction there.

They raised taxes to support only limited infrastructure and services allotted specifically in the constitution.

You should read up on Hamilton and Washington.  They went a lot further from day 1.

Hamilton was evil and far from a true American. He was tied directly to the foreign central banks.

And there we have it.  He was a founding father as were Washington and Jefferson.  It seems that they were not consistent after all were they?  

Most of them didn't like him:

He became the leader of the Federalist Party, created largely in support of his views, and was opposed by the Democratic-Republican Party, led by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.

He got killed in a duel for a reason. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burr-Hamilton_duel

This nation was not founded on the philosophy of the Federalists like Hamilton.


Actually it was.  He served under Washington and helped Jefferson get elected.  All three maintained a national debt and a national bank and used implied powers to run the country.  Your problem is that you want to cherrypick your facts.