I’m trying to annoy a friend who loves Calvin Coolidge
Give me a reason, silly or serious, that Calvin Coolidge was a bad president
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During a flood on the Mississippi River, he refused to allocate funds to help the people, instead sending Herbert Hoovet to help them by raising money, but they needed more money, and he refused. This all happened when congress was out of session, but when they came back, they sent aid.
I think Randy Newman wrote a song about that, it's called "Louisiana 1927"
Actually, I think the song was “You got a friend in me (unless you live along the Mississippi River)”
Wonder what he thinks the preamble to the constitution means? One of the specific reasons stated for the purpose of the government is “to promote the general Welfare.”
They thought it so important that the even capitalized welfare in the middle of a sentence.
These “hands off government” people certainly are not true Americans.
If that were intended to enable anything that sounds like a good idea, what would be the purpose of the other provisions?
If you're relying on capitalization from that era, well...it was deeply inconsistent. In that same sentence, General was also capitalized. Is there a deep meaning in that as well?
So someone who disagrees with you isn’t an American? The constitution says a lot that people like you interpret too widely to suit your own political views.
If only you knew what you were talking about.
James Madision (i.e. the father of the Constitution) strongly disagrees with you.
"With respect to the 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." — James Madison
"If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, . . . . it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America." — James Madison
That makes me admire him.