A1S8

[kona]

1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

What did the founders mean by general welfare?

What did they mean by uniform?

[Swordsmyth]

1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

What did the founders mean by general welfare?

What did they mean by uniform?

General welfare meant that it had to be for the good of all the states and uniform meant that it had t apply equally to all the states.

[kona]

General welfare meant that it had to be for the good of all the states and uniform meant that it had t apply equally to all the states.

Right, but what did they specifically believe could constitute general welfare? Was the uniform tax a dollar tax or % of wealth tax?

Seems like general welfare is a massive weakness of the Constitution.

[Swordsmyth]

Right, but what did they specifically believe could constitute general welfare? Was the uniform tax a dollar tax or % of wealth tax?

Seems like general welfare is a massive weakness of the Constitution.

General Welfare was only supposed to describe the collective use of the powers enumerated but it was a poorly chosen (or deliberately sabotaged) and has been abused.

Uniform could be argued to mean either in dollars or percentages and should have been better specified.

[kona]

Did Jefferson or any non-Hamiltonian write anything on how general welfare just meant the sum of all enumerated powers?

[Swordsmyth]

Did Jefferson or any non-Hamiltonian write anything on how general welfare just meant the sum of all enumerated powers?

There is some good info in this old thread I found:

Do You Know How and When the "General Welfare Clause" got hijacked?