Can’t They Read?
The Senate held a gala celebration for passing Senate bill 510: FDA Food Safety Modernization Act, but it has revenue provisions. As Rollcall reports that is unConstitutional.
From the US Senate annotated text of the Constitution Article I, Section 7:
All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.
It is rather straightforward and plain, and is a basic question on most civics tests. Three-quarters of the Senate voted for it, but they missed the obvious.
Senate Democrats need a new leader, because Reid just can’t hack it.
7 comments
Been following this and I think Bill Marler, Esq. has some good points up on his “legal” blog.
“…However, I think there is a very strong argument to be made that Section 107 was never intended to be a tax, and in fact, is much more like a fine or a levy upon a facility that relates to reinspection of facilities involved in outbreaks or facilities outside the borders of the United States.”
http://www.marlerblog.com/lawyer-oped/when-is-a-tax-not-a-tax-when-it-is-not-a-tax/
Oh…and the GOP hates children too. They blocked the Children’s Nutrition Bill.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101201/ap_on_bi_ge/us_congress_school_nutrition
Where the f**k (pardon my “Finnish”) are the Democrats?
It doesn’t have to be a tax, per se, it only has to generate revenue. It the bill generates revenue, it has to be originated in the House.
The GOP doesn’t want anything to pass, and we all know it. They want to prove that government can’t work.
Exactly. Vote for Republicans, they want to join government to destroy it. Then we’ll REALLY have a ‘free’ market etc….
We’ll have a “free market” when government stops chartering corporations, and lets them live or die like everyone else in business.
Indeed, the government grant of limited liability to the investors in corporation is the biggest intervention in the free market of any government intervention. Unlike every other business, the owners of Big Business aren’t personally liable for the corporation’s debts and deeds. Yet somehow this intervention, worth trillions of dollars to investors (since fewer people would invest if they had to risk their own personal assets to do so, thereby driving down the price of stocks), gets overlooked every time that someone rants about “government interference in the free market”. Funny how that works, isn’t it? 😈
– Badtux the Snarky Penguin
It’s damn annoying when people complain about “regulation of the private sector” and including corporations in that sector. They are creatures of the government, not the marketplace.