You are hereJoe, did you read Article Eight?
Joe, did you read Article Eight?
On a program I did with John Friend last night, my friend Northpal called in and claimed that the Constitution was only a way to foist the war debt upon the people. As if the people should not have paid the war debt? Say it ain't so, Joe! Joe cited the Articles of Confederation, as if they had no provisions for such debt. What I believe Joe missed, was that Article VIII of the Articles of Confederation indeed made provision for the payment of the debt, by requiring the individual States to levy a land tax. Remember that the AofC were signed in 1778, while the war was already well under way.
Here is 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.
The taxes for paying that proportion shall be laid and levied by the authority and direction of the legislatures of the several States within the time agreed upon by the united States in congress assembled.
So there you go, Joe. It is my opinion that the Constitution, where the only means the federal government was granted to raise revenue was through tariffs, was the superior document in that regard. Of course, the Articles of Confederation did have some provisions which we would consider better today, such as term limits.
Note this also: Article VIII contains the same dangerous "general welfare" clause which is also found in the Constitution, which so many politicians have abused to the detriment of the people.
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Right, Joe, taxation under the Articles of Confrederation was in the hands of the States, and not the Federal government. However your initial argument was who was responsible for the debt, and not how it would be paid. The Articles of Conferderation placed that burden on all property owners, regardless of how much property they owned. So stop changing the argument every time you are defeated, like you have also done here with the State currency issue.
Go read a book, rather than running your mouth ignorantly.
During the period from 1793 to the beginning of the "Civil War" in 1861, approximately 1,600 private banks were permitted to print and circulate their own paper currency under state charters. The fact that these united States had a central bank, did not infringe on the rights of the States to regulate their own banking. That infringement came much later, and you cannot blame the authors of the Constitution for it. During this same period, the Federal government of these united States did not regularly issue paper money. It did, however, issue Treasury Notes temporarily on three occasions, 1812 (war), 1846 (war), and 1857 (financial panic).
The Constitutional Convention delegates were originally to amend the Articles of Confederation, in order to resolve some of the serious deficiencies experienced during the War. The delegates chose to start from scratch instead. The granting of the federal government to borrow money, and to raise money through tariffs, was not a restriction on the States or the people, and was considered necessary in the light of the wartime experience.
The Constitution had witnesses, not signatories, because the delegates had no power to bind the sovereign States to any such agreement. The States each did that by themselves, by fulfilling the ratification process outlined therein (Article VII).
The Constitution had nothing to do with a Central Bank, and especially a private bank. It's authors cannot be blamed for actions taken by a later Congress. In fact, the first central bank, the Bank of North America, was established by the Continental Congress in 1781.
The conspiratorial view of Constituional history which you have espoused elsewhere borders on the ridiculous, because it completely ignores the role of the sovereign State legislatures in the creation of the Continental Congress (1774), the choosing of all delegates to that Congress, the approbation given to the war effort, the call for a new Constitutional Convention (1787), and the ratification of the results.
Only a simpleton ignorant of history could fall for the idea that the whole thing was orchestrated by a "gang of thugs".
Arrogance is inventing your own version of history, in spite of the documented facts. But I will approve your comment, so that your hard-headed insolence is all the more manifest. I answered your questions, and there is a documented historic record that substantiates my answers.
By 1789, the year in which it took effect, 12 of the 13 sovereign States had ratified the "non-existent" (as you call it) Constitution in their various legislatures according to its provisions outlined in Article VII, so evidently their opinions concerning its validity were somewhat contrary to your ignorant blather.
[The provisions of a contract indeed exist before you agree to them, and when you agree to them it is often in accordance with language within the contract which specifies the terms of the agreement.]
There is no bank or regulation of banking mentioned in the Constitution because that was obviously one of the powers left to the people. The Central Bank dilemma belonged to the first Congress, and not to the framers of the Constitution. Therefore it is you who are putting the cart before the horse.
You have heretofore ignored the fact that a privately-owned central bank existed under the Articles of Confederation as well. But neither does that document mention a bank or seek to regulate banking. Therefore it should be fully evident to your dumb ass that the bank problem is a totally separate issue from the matter establishing the union between the sovereign States - which was the purpose of both the Articles of Confedertion and the Constitution which replaced them.
There is no doubt that the central bank as it was established in 1791 was contrary to the interests of the people. There is no doubt that some of the men involved, namely Hamilton and Morris and also many of those identfied as Federalists, were in favor of such a scheme. But the Constitution itself and the great majority of its framers in general cannot be blamed for that, and many of them were avid and vocal opponents of a privately-owned central bank.
Your simplistic and even childish view of history is not beneficial to our common cause, so grow the fuck up.
Yeah, grow the fuck up. You have not proven a damned thing. You have only made a lot of baseless accusations, and they have all been countered with facts, NONE of which you have acknowledged or disproven, but you have the nerve to call me arrogant, jumping up and down like a sissy. Why don't you post some proof to some of your baseless accusations. I will tell you why: you do not have any proof.
The Constitutional Convention was acting as a Congress. It was agreed to by all of the thirteen States. Where, Mr. Know-it-all, was the "real" Congress which had met every year since 1774, if the Constitutional Convention was not it? The only "con" here is your obstinate self.
Stop avoiding your obvious defeat by continually changing the topic. You have ignored the facts at every turn, and only provided more baseless bullshit.