Here is the best quote on the topic I have seen, by Supreme Court Justice McReynolds:
I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for making the Federal Government the great almoner of public charity throughout the United States. . . Can it be controverted that the great mass of the business of Government–that involved in social relations, the internal arrangements of the body politic, tne mental and moral culture of men, the development of local resources of wealth, the punishment of crimes in general, the preservation of order, the relief of the needy or otherwise unfortunate members of society–did in practice remain with the States; that none of these objects of local concern are by the Constitution expressly or impliedly prohibited to the States, and that none of them are by any express language of the Constitution transferred to the United States? Can it be claimed that any of these functions of local administration and legislation are vested in the Federal Government by any implication? I have never found anything in the Constitution which is susceptible of such a construction. No one of the enumerated powers touches the subject, or has even a remote analogy to it.
It is very literally the truth that we are not a Fascist nation because of the so-called “Four Horsemen” of the Supreme Court, who overturned FDR’s National Recovery Act, and Agricultural Adjustment Act, which combined gave Franklin Roosevelt the power to control substantially every aspect of our economy, and by extension our lives. He had the power to control production, dictate wages, and determine profit margins, as I understand the issue.
He lied when he claimed Social Security would be self funding. That possibility ended less than a decade after it was signed into law.
I have said before and will say again that our Constitution is the most brilliant political document ever devised by the mind of man. We are free today only because our Founding Fathers foresaw aspiring tyrants like FDR, who was a stupid, ignorant, unprincipled man whose only talents were his ability to convince people he cared about them, and his ability to perform political calculations and generate accurate results.
People ask about Jim Crow. Well, we got rid of Jim Crow, didn’t we? How are black people faring in this nation? You can’t put lipstick on a pig and call it beautiful, and you cannot call the interferences of the Federal Government in issues of State governance successful. If you fail to empower people because you want to empower government, you get a powerful government, and weak people.
[Edit: I want to be clear here. 60 years ago African Americans were in this nation a proud, hard working people who valued family, church, and civic responsibility. And they were shut out of the flow of much of our economic life. As one example, FDR’s pro-Union policies had the effect of making many of them unemployed, since most Unions were openly racist, and the closed shops they created meant that black people could not approach companies directly.
FDR nominated a former KKK member, Hugo Black, for his Supreme Court. Reason: Black was a reliable Democrat.
I want African Americans integrated into our cultural life. They have been fed vicious lies for 50-60 years, and taught to revere only the State, and the money that the Democrats can get for them. Their families are gone, church is largely irrelevant, and their models are killers, drug pushers, and men who abuse women. This needs to change.
I am doing nothing but speaking the truth here. I see no reason to posit innate differences, but that a cultural divide exists between inner city ghettoes and the suburban/exurban neighborhoods that white flight has created to avoid them, is to me self evident beyond the need for further comment. We don’t legislate this away: we negotiate it away, over as much time as we need to do the thing right.]
We have a mountain of debt we cannot hope to pay, which will saddle future generations with a burden that will make their lives darker, sadder, and harder.
Private pensions were working fine in the 1930’s. There were State social safety net programs as well, for those States that wanted them. Social Security did not write its first check until the Depression’s effects were masked by our mobilization for war, and associated IOU’s issued on behalf of Americans not yet born.
The extent of the fraud and idiocy FDR and his cronies visited on this nation are only now coming into general awareness, after 70 yearsor more. Let us hope We the People are able to wake up from the sopophorics leftists have so diligently planted in our milk, and that of our children, for all these many years.