“We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi March 8, 2010, before the passage of the National Health Care legislation. It turns out that buried deep within the 2,700 page bill there exists funding to the tune of $105 billion dollars built into it to the year 2019, including five billion for this year alone. Is funding beyond the length of time a member is elected to serve constitutional? Definitely not!!

Why would they do this? The planners knew that given the length of the bill (more especially the several hundred pages injected the night before the final vote) that it would not be read. They also knew, given the massive Tea Party rejection of ever more government in our lives, that it was not popular and that they might lose control of the House in the November 2010 elections making possible the defunding of Obamacare. Whether Americans are in support of the Bill or not this has to go down as the most deceitful piece of legislation in American History. Every lawmaker who did not read it fully should be fired in the next election and everyone who did, and let this kind of hidden funding pass, rejected as well.

What is wrong with it outside the massive indebtedness passed to our children and grandchildren who are already slaves to a debt of over 14 trillion dollars? It also seriously damages the Constitution as well. Article I, Section 7, requires that “All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives.” All spending is also taxing. Spending necessitates taxing or inflating the currency which is also taxing. This was placed in the Constitution to insure that the people were never over taxed as it is the nature of all governments to grow and doing so necessitates taking more money from the people. All taxing bills would also have clarity and transparency as such. The idea of hiding a tax measure, more especially guaranteeing funds for eight years into the future (literally added in the middle of the night as mentioned), would have been foreign to the Founders.

Section 8 of the same Article, Clause 12, defines a spending limit of two years for money financing war. “To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years.” The reason for the two-year limitation on this, and everything else, is that members of the House of Representatives are elected for two-year terms renewed only if they continue to reflect the will of the people. They have no constitutional legitimacy to force the extraction of tax monies past the time they legitimately represent the people—two years.

The $105 billion assures the implementation of the 159 new federal bureaucracies created by the bill no matter what the people or any future Congress feels about it. This was intentionally designed to bypass Congress’s normal appropriations process and to keep the next Congress from undoing their work. Once these bureaucracies are in place it is nearly impossible to undo them, as the thousands of new bureaucrats in place will be highly motivated and vocal to prevent their dismantlement. The 112th Congress, the House of Representatives in particular, must act immediately specifically identifying and defunding each program one-by-one before any already allocated funds are spent and before moving on to any other business. This is that critical. Goliath grows bigger everyday and will forever eat increasingly more out of the taxpayer’s pocket.

For the 111th Congress to extend its’ jurisdiction for an additional eight years, in effect reducing the power of the next four Congresses, is unconscionable. By not challenging this precedent, established by a Constitutionally rogue Congress, it could be used by other Congresses in the future. This must not be permitted. This may well be the most corrupt Congress in U. S. History—certainly one of the most damaging to the U. S. Constitution. The 112th could be second if it does not reassert its power and return to the constitutional appropriations process.

Harold Pease

The 10th Amendment

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

LEARN MORE

01

Featured Articles

On the Constitution, history, the founders, and analysis of current events.

featured articles

02

Tenther Blog and News

Nullification news, quick takes, history, interviews, podcasts and much more.

tenther blog

03

State of the Nullification Movement

232 pages. History, constitutionality, and application today.

get the report

01

Path to Liberty

Our flagship podcast. Michael Boldin on the constitution, history, and strategy for liberty today

path to liberty

02

Maharrey Minute

The title says it all. Mike Maharrey with a 1 minute take on issues under a 10th Amendment lens. maharrey minute

Tenther Essentials

2-4 minute videos on key Constitutional issues - history, and application today

TENTHER ESSENTIALS

Join TAC, Support Liberty!

Nothing helps us get the job done more than the financial support of our members, from just $2/month!

JOIN TAC

01

The 10th Amendment

History, meaning, and purpose - the "Foundation of the Constitution."

10th Amendment

03

Nullification

Get an overview of the principles, background, and application in history - and today.

nullification