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Many Americans erroneously believe that the Constitution’s “general welfare” clause serves as justification for congressional spending on anything that can muster a majority vote. That surely wasn’t the vision of the Framers. In 1798 Thomas Jefferson wrote: “Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.” “Specifically enumerated” referred to the listing of congressional powers found in Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution. James Madison elaborated on this limitation in a letter to James Robertson: “[W]ith respect to the two words “general welfare,” I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.” President Grover Cleveland was the king of the veto. He vetoed literally hundreds of congressional spending bills during his two terms as president in the late 1800s. His reason, as he often said: “I can find no warrant for such an appropriation in the Constitution.”

LET'S HAVE THIS HAPPEN AGAIN WITH TODAY'S CONGRESS SINCE THE CONSTITUTION WAS INTENDED TO MAXIMIZE PERSONAL LIBERTY AND MINIMIZE GOVERNMENT. IT IS UP TO US TO HOLD CONGRESS ACCOUNTABLE. LEARN WHY WE SHOULD AND HOW WE CAN ACHIEVE IT AT WWW.JBS.ORG