Source: https://lonang.com/library/reference/story-commentaries-us-constitution/sto-324/
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 04:30:51+00:00

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§ 1234. Secondly. The convention might have attempted a positive enumeration of the powers comprehended under the terms, necessary and proper. The attempt would have involved a complete digest of laws on every subject, to which the constitution relates. It must have embraced all future, as well as all present exigencies, and been accommodated to all times, and all occasions, and all changes of national situation and character. Every new application of the general power must have been foreseen and specified; for the particular powers, which are the means of attaining the objects of the general power, must, necessarily, vary with those objects; and be often properly varied, when the objects remain the same.9 Who does not at once perceive, that such a course is utterly beyond human reach and foresight?10 It demands a wisdom never yet given to man; and a knowledge of the future, which belongs only to Him, whose providence directs, and governs all.
§ 1242. Neither can the degree, in which a measure is necessary, ever be a test of the legal right to adopt it. That must be a matter of opinion, (upon which different men, and different bodies may form opposite judgments,) and can only be a test of expediency. The relation between the measure and the end, between the nature of the means employed towards the execution of a power, and the object of that power, must be the criterion of constitutionality; and not the greater or less of necessity or expediency.24 If the legislature possesses a right of choice as to the means, who can limit that choice? Who is appointed an umpire, or arbiter in cases, where a discretion is confided to a government? The very idea of such a controlling authority in the exercise of its powers is a virtual denial of the supremacy of the government in regard to its powers. It repeals the supremacy of the national government, proclaimed in the constitution.
§ 1243. It is equally certain, that neither the grammatical, nor the popular sense of the word, “necessary,” requires any such construction. According to both, “necessary” often means no more than needful, requisite, incidental, useful, or conducive to. It is a common mode of expression to say, that it is necessary for a government, or a person to do this or that thing, when nothing more is intended or understood, than that the interest of the government or person requires, or will be promoted by the doing of this or that thing. Every one’s mind will at once suggest to him many illustrations of the use of the word in this sense.25 To employ the means, necessary to an end, is generally understood, as employing any means calculated to produce the end, and not as being confined to those single means, without which the end would be entirely unattainable.
§ 1248. There are yet other grounds against the restrictive interpretation derived from the language, and the character of the provision. The language is, that congress shall have power “to make all laws, which “shall be necessary and proper.” If the word “necessary” were used in the strict and rigorous sense contended for, it would be an extraordinary departure from the usual course of the human mind, as exhibited in solemn instruments, to add another word “proper;” the only possible effect of which is to qualify that strict and rigorous meaning, and to present clearly the idea of a choice of means in the course of legislation.31 If no means can be resorted to, but such as are indispensably necessary, there can be neither sense, nor utility in adding the other word; for the necessity shuts out from view all consideration of the propriety of the means, as contradistinguished from the former. But if the intention was to use the word “necessary” in its more liberal sense, then there is a peculiar fitness in the other word. It has a sense at once admonitory, and directory. it requires, that the means should be, bonâ fide, appropriate to the end.
§ 1249. The character of the clause equally forbids any presumption of an intention to use the restrictive interpretation. In the first place, the clause is placed among the powers of congress, and not among the limitations on those powers. In the next place, its terms purport to enlarge, and not to diminish, the powers vested in the government. It purports, on its face, to be an additional power, not a restriction on those already granted.32 If it does not, in fact, (as seems the true construction,) give any new powers, it affirms the right to use all necessary and proper means to carry ‘into execution the other powers, and thus makes an express power, what would otherwise be merely an implied power. In either aspect, it is impossible to construe it to be a restriction. If it have any effect, it is to remove the implication of any restriction. If a restriction had been intended, it is impossible, that the framers of the constitution should have concealed it under phraseology, which purports to enlarge, or at least give the most ample scope to the other powers. There was every motive on their part to give point and clearness to every restriction of national power; for they well knew, that the national government would be more endangered in its adoption by its supposed strength, than by its weakness. It is inconceivable, that they should have disguised a restriction upon its powers under the form of a grant of power. They would have sought other terms, and have imposed the restraint by negatives.33 And what is equally strong, no one, in or out of the state conventions, at the time when the constitution was put upon its deliverance before the people, ever dreamed of or suggested, that it contained a restriction of power. The whole argument on each side, of attack and of defence, gave it the positive form of an express power, and not of an express restriction.
§ 1252. And not only may implied powers, but implied exemptions from state authority, exist, although not expressly provided for by law. The collectors of the revenue, the carriers of the mail, the mint establishment, and all those institutions, which are public in their nature, are examples in point. It has never been doubted, that all, who are employed in them, are protected, while in the line of their duty, from state control; and yet this protection is not expressed in any act of congress. It is incidental to, and is implied in, the several acts, by which those institutions are created; and is preserved to them by the judicial department, as a part of its functions.39 A contractor for supplying a military post with provisions cannot be restrained from making purchases within a state, or from transporting provisions to the place, at which troops are stationed. He could not be taxed, or fined, or lawfully obstructed, in so doing.40 These incidents necessarily flow from the supremacy of the powers of the Union, within their legitimate sphere of action.
1. The Federalist, No. 33, 44; 1 Elliot’s Deb. 293, 294, 300; 2 Elliot’s Deb. 196, 342.
2. 1 Tuck. Black. Comm. App. 286, 287; 4 Elliot’s Deb. 216, 217, 224, 225.
3. The Federalist, No. 33; 2 Elliot’s Debates, 196; Hamilton on Bank, 2 Hamilton’s Works, 121; M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheaton’s R. 419.
4. M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 409; 4 Elliot’s Debates, 217, 218, 220, 221.
5. The Federalist, No. 44. See also President Monroe’s Exposition and Message, 4th of May, 1822, p. 47; 3 Elliot’s Deb. 318.
6. The Federalist, No. 44.
7. See The Federalist, No. 38, 44; 4 Wheat. R. 423; 4 Elliot’s Deb. 218, 219.
8. M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 406, 407, 423.
9. The Federalist, No. 44; 2 Elliot’s Deb. 223.
10. M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 407; 4 Elliot’s Deb. 223, 224; Anderson v. Dunn, 6 Wheat. R. 204, 225, 226.
11. The Federalist, No. 44.
12. The Federalist, No. 44.
13. The Federalist, No. 33, 44.
14. Some few statesmen have contended, that the clause gave farther powers, than mere incidental powers. But their reasoning does not seem very clear or satisfactory. See Governor Randolph’s Remarks, 2 Elliot’s Debates, 342; Mr. Gerry’s Speech in February, 1791, 4 Elliot’s Debates, 295, 227. These Speeches are, however, valuable for some striking views, which they present, of the propriety of a liberal construction of the words.
15. See Virginia Report and Resolutions, Jan., 1800, p. 33, 34; 1 Tuck. Black. Comm. App. 287, 288; President Monroe’s Exposition and Message, 4th of May, 1822, p. 47; 5 Marshall’s Wash. App. note 3; 1 Hamilton’s Works, 117, 121.
16. 4 Jefferson’s Corresp. 525, 526; 4 Elliot’s Deb. 216, 217, 224, 225, 267; M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 412, 413.
17. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 119; 5 Marshall’s Wash. App. note 3, p. 9; Mr. Madison, 4 Elliot’s Deb. 223.
18. United States v. Fisher, 2 Cranch, 358; 1 Peters’s Cond. R. 421; Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 119; 5 Marshall’s Wash. note 3, p. 9, 10; Mr. Madison, 4 Elliot’s Deb. 223.
19. United States v. Fisher, 2 Cranch. R. 358; 1 Peters’s Condens. R. 421.
20. See 4 Elliot’s Debates, 265, 280.
21. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 120.
22. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 112.
23. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 117; 5 Marshall’s Wash. App. note 3, p. 8.
24. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 129, 120; 5 Marshall’s Wash. App. note 3, p. 9, 10; M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 423.
25. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 118; 5 Marshall’s Wash. App. note 3, p. 9.
26. M’CuIloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheaton’s R. 413 to 415.  In this case (4 Wheaton’s R. 411 to 425,) there is a very elaborate argument of the Supreme Court upon the whole of this subject, a portion of which has been already extracted in the preceding Commentaries, on the rules of interpretation of the constitution.
27. M’CuIloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 418.
28. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 120, 121.
29. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 122.
30. The Federalist, No. 33, 44.
31. M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 418, 419.
32. M’CuIloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 419, 420.
33. M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 420.
34. M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. R. 420, 421, 423. See also 4 Elliot’s Debates, 220, 221, 222, 223, 224, 225; 2 Elliot’s Debates, 196, 342; 5 Marsh. Wash. App. No. 3; 2 American Museum, 536; Anderson v. Dunn, 6 Wheat. It. 204, 225, 226; Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 111 to 123.
35. Hamilton on Bank, 1 Hamilton’s Works, 115.
36. See Dugan v. United States, 3 Wheat. R. 173, 179, 180.
37. United States v. Tingey, 5 Peters’s R. 115.
38. United States v. Bevans, 3 Wheaton’s R. 388; The Exchange, 7 Cranch, 116; S.C. 2 Peters’s Cond. R. 439.
39. Osborn v. Bank of U. States, 9 Wheat. R. 365, 366.

References: § 1242

§ 1243

§ 1248

§ 1249

§ 1252
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