The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation: Annotations of Cases Decided by the Supreme Court of the United States to June 30, 1952
History
The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation: Annotations of Cases Decided by the Supreme Court of the United States to June 30, 1952
Constitutional law -- United States; Constitutions -- United States
In the Steward Machine Company case, it was a taxpayer who complained of
the invasion of the State sovereignty and the Court put great emphasis
on the fact that the State was a willing partner in the plan of
cooperation embodied in the Social Security Act.[295] A decade later the
right of Congress to impose conditions upon grants-in-aid over the
objection of a State was squarely presented in Oklahoma _v._ United
States Civil Service Commission.[296] The State objected to the
enforcement of a provision of the Hatch Act,[297] whereby its right to
receive federal highway funds would be diminished in consequence of its
failure to remove from office a member of the State Highway Commission
found to have taken an active part in party politics while in office.
Although it found that the State had created a legal right which
entitled it to an adjudication of its objection, the Court denied the
relief sought on the ground that, "While the United States is not
concerned with, and has no power to regulate local political activities
as such of State officials, it does have power to fix the terms upon
which its money allotments to State shall be disbursed. * * * The end
sought by Congress through the Hatch Act is better public service by
requiring those who administer funds for national needs to abstain from
active political partisanship. So even though the action taken by
Congress does have effect upon certain activities within the State, it
has never been thought that such effect made the federal act
invalid."[298]
"Debts of the United States"
The power to pay the debts of the United States is broad enough to
include claims of citizens arising on obligations of right and
justice.[299] The Court sustained an act of Congress which set apart for
the use of the Philippine Islands, the revenue from a processing tax on
coconut oil of Philippine production, as being in pursuance of a moral
obligation to protect and promote the welfare of the people of the
Islands.[300] Curiously enough, this power was first invoked to assist
the United States to collect a debt due to it. In United States _v._
Fisher[301] the Supreme Court sustained a statute which gave the Federal
Government priority in the distribution of the estates of its insolvent
debtors. The debtor in that case was the endorser of a foreign bill of
exchange which apparently had been purchased by the United States.
Invoking the "necessary and proper" clause, Chief Justice Marshall
deduced the power to collect a debt from the power to pay its
obligations by the following reasoning: "The government is to pay the
debt of the Union, and must be authorized to use the means which appear
to itself most eligible to effect that object. It has, consequently, a
right to make remittances by bills or otherwise, and to take those
precautions which will render the transaction safe."[302]
Clause 2. _The Congress shall have Power_ * * * To borrow Money on the
credit of the United States.
The Borrowing Power
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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