us
to this palpable truth, that a power to lay and collect taxes must be
a power to pass all laws NECESSARY and PROPER for the execution of
that power; and what does the unfortunate and calumniated provision in
question do more than declare the same truth, to wit, that the national
legislature, to whom the power of laying and collecting taxes had been
previously given, might, in the execution of that power, pass all laws
NECESSARY and PROPER to carry it into effect? I have applied these
observations thus particularly to the power of taxation, because it is
the immediate subject under consideration, and because it is the most
important of the authorities proposed to be conferred upon the Union.
But the same process will lead to the same result, in relation to
all other powers declared in the Constitution. And it is EXPRESSLY to
execute these powers that the sweeping clause, as it has been affectedly
called, authorizes the national legislature to pass all NECESSARY and
PROPER laws. If there is any thing exceptionable, it must be sought
for in the specific powers upon which this general declaration is
predicated. The declaration itself, though it may be chargeable with
tautology or redundancy, is at least perfectly harmless.

But SUSPICION may ask, Why then was it introduced? The answer is, that
it could only have been done for greater caution, and to guard
against all cavilling refinements in those who might hereafter feel
a disposition to curtail and evade the legitimate authorities of the
Union. The Convention probably foresaw, what it has been a principal aim
of these papers to inculcate, that the danger which most threatens our
political welfare is that the State governments will finally sap the
foundations of the Union; and might therefore think it necessary, in so
cardinal a point, to leave nothing to construction. Whatever may have
been the inducement to it, the wisdom of the precaution is evident from
the cry which has been raised against it; as that very cry betrays
a disposition to question the great and essential truth which it is
manifestly the object of that provision to declare.

But it may be again asked, Who is to judge of the NECESSITY and
PROPRIETY of the laws to be passed for executing the powers of the
Union? I answer, first, that this question arises as well and as fully
upon the simple grant of those powers as upon the declaratory clause;
and I answer, in the second place, that the national governm