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Welcome back to the Lars Larson Show.
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It's a pleasure to be with you, and I'm glad to take your phone calls and emails in a moment.
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We'll get to that at 866-A Lars.
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And as always, on this program, naysayers go to the head of the line at 866-439-5277.
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Send your emails to talk at LarsLarson.com.
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You can answer our X poll question, a brand new question from the news of the day.
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You'll find at Lars Larson Show on X, also on my website at LarsLarson.com, but we're a conservative show.
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So only vote once.
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It's a real pleasure to welcome back to the program Professor Elon Worman, who is the author most recently, and I think it's a very needed book, The Constitution of 1789, a new introduction.
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Professor, welcome back.
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Thanks so much for having me, Lars.
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Love the show and really looking forward to the conversation.
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Now, would you mind telling my audience you are an originalist?
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I consider myself an originalist, although I'm not a college professor, I'm not a lawyer.
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What did you want to get across in this book to people about how we ought to look at the Constitution from 2026?
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So I've been teaching constitutional law at law schools for almost a decade.
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And it is just astonishing that there is no generally accessible introduction to the original meaning of the Constitution, the Constitution of 1789, not 1791.
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So the book is not about the Bill of Rights.
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It talks a little bit about the Bill of Rights, but the separation of powers, federalism, legislative power, executive power, judicial power.
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Like what were the original meaning of these terms and this original distribution of powers between Congress and the executive?
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What was the original role of the courts, which have gone totally out of control today, as you well know, Lars?
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And so the objective was to supply that book, to supply that introduction to the Constitution from an originalist, textualist, conservative perspective for anybody who's, you know, never set eyes or read a book uh about uh, you know, uh the original meaning of the Constitution and so on.
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I have supplied that book, and and that's really why I wrote it.
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I mean, do you think uh I I've always thought that the folks who wrote the Constitution, the folks who founded this country, were geniuses, and they very much anticipated the needs of a country, even though they couldn't anticipate all the technological change that has happened over the last 250 years.
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So they wrote a document that still serves us very well.
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Is that an accurate statement, or are there some major deficits in it that you could see uh from your study and your teaching of it?
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So part of the reason I also wrote the book is because I believe the Constitution is inspirational and we should strive to keep it.
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And I thought that if people understood the original meaning of what they did, and we've diverged in many respects from that original meaning, people would grow to admire and appreciate the constitution that they wrote and conclude that we should continue to be bound by that.
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Because they were geniuses.
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They really were.
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As Alexander Hamilton said in Federalist number one, it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country to determine whether mankind is forever destined to be governed by accident and force, or whether they can actually be governed by reflection and choice.
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And that's what the founders were engaged in reflection and choice, deliberation in a really interesting and intense period of human history where they got to decide, probably for the first time in history, what kind of government do we want to live under?
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And so they really were uh in absolutely inspirational.
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Now, does that mean the Constitution is a hundred percent perfect?
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Well, let me say two things.
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Number one, I think it would be better if we went back to the original meaning of the Constitution in many respects.
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And that would make it better, right, than the system we have today.
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But there are things that are really hard to turn back the clock on, like broad delegations of power to the administrative state, for example.
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Some people think that these are just inevitable.
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Well, if that's true, I've actually proposed an amendment to the Constitution to give Congress what's called the legislative veto over presidential or administrative or executive action.
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I love it.
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I think that would do a Yeah.
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And so I proposed that for as one example for a report.
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Well, ha have we seen some of that fixed with some recent decisions by the courts that have effectively said we used to assume that if the bureaucracy said this is the way we interpret the law, that they were allowed to do that, even though sometimes the bureaucracy went well beyond what the con what the Congress had written into the law.
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And now that's been reined in uh a bit with some decisions that effectively threw out that Chevron doctrine and said, no, no, the bureaucratic state isn't always trustworthy.
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So uh so Congress and and I think effectively the courts are saying to Congress, do your job.
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If you need to have a law that says something, then write the law.
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And you don't let the bureaucrats write laws.
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Mr.
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Larson, are you sure you're not a lawyer?
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Yeah, very good.
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That's very nice.
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That's very generous of you, Professor.
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Very good and astute uh question.
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So that's exactly right.
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So rewind rather, ten or so years ago, there was a doctrine uh called Chevron deference.
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This is a doctrine that held that courts should defer to an agency's interpretation of a statute that it administers.
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And so the the problem here, you know, some statutes are genuinely ambiguous.
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You know, so problem number one is ordinarily you would think that courts are experts in interpreting law and interpreting statutes.
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But putting that aside, giving deference to an agency's interpretation of the statute, you know, um, as long as it's reasonable, as long as it's plausible, it doesn't have to be the best reading, right?
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That was what this doctrine was.
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It encouraged agencies to be particularly adventurous.
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Let me give you some examples.
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The Obama administration clean power plan, which totally remade sort of American energy, even though it never went into effect, because you know the industry was like thought it was going to go into effect, and so they planned.
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So they had to react to it, didn't they?
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Exactly.
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It was based on a totally adventurous interpretation of the statute.
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Like, what is a best system of emissions reduction?
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And usually, you know, people thought about that as like a technological system within the plant, like in the fence line.
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And the Obama administration said, eh, the best system, a system is the nationwide energy system.
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Well, like, yes, it could mean no one had everything.
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That's the kind of thing that would get chevron deference.
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Biden's student relief.
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There the statutes basically said that the secretary could waive or modify requirements of the student uh uh debt program.
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And so what they said is, well, there are conditions under which we are allowed to discharge debt.
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If we waive those, then we can discharge debt for everybody.
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Like, obviously, that's like kind of possible to see that from the statute, but nobody ever thought that's what the statute meant.
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No reasonable person would read the statute that way, but courts would refer to such interpretations so long as they were colorable or plausible.
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And the Supreme Court has overturned that, overturned deference two years ago in a case called Loper Bright.
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So now courts must decide for themselves what the best meaning of the statutes are.
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But not only then, and I'll say this very briefly, when it comes to questions of major political and economic significance, the courts actually now demand a clear statement from Congress.
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This is what's called the major questions doctrine.
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So not only is there no deference anymore generally, but now there's a kind of anti-deference.
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If it's a really big and important question, we're gonna expect exceptional clarity from Congress.
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And so you're right, through a series of statutory interpretation doctrines, the court has sought to rest help restore Congress's role.
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That's absolutely true.
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Does that does that effectively tell the Congress, get back and start doing your job again?
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Because I don't know if you agree with me, Professor.
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I'm talking to Professor Elon Worman, who is the author most recently of The Constitution of 1789, a new introduction.
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Um I don't I think Congress has become lazy.
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They let they love that the bureaucratic state will do their job for them, and they can just sit back because if they had to actually vote on some of these things and say, yes, we're going to allow gender-affirming mutilation of teenage children, uh, yes, we're going to ban coal-fired power and make all your power bills go up dramatically, why they might not get re-elected.
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So they'll let the bureaucrats do it instead and say, well, there's nothing we can do about it.
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Does the do the does erasing, does Loperbright by erasing the Chevron doctrine, say to the uh bureaucracy, get back in your lane and to Congress, do your job?
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Or am I overstating this?
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Uh I I think you might be overstating a little because I think Congress will come up with ingenious ways to avoid doing its job.
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Okay.
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Um, but you're absolutely right, but this is classic public choice theory.
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What led to this increase of delegations to administrative agencies in the first place?
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Well, it's classic public choice theory, right?
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It's a win-win situation.
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The legislators vote for things like, oh, we shall have clean air.
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And they go back to their constituents and they say, hey, look, I voted for clean air.
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Who could oppose clean air or who could oppose clean water?
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But when it comes to actually determining who has to pollute, oh, you know, we, we, or who has to stop producing coal, we delegated that question to the EPA.
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And then when the EPA regulates in a way you don't want, you can say, Oh, I didn't mean that.
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And so you win on the front end because you voted for clean air, and you win on the back end because you could lobby the agency on behalf of your constituents.
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So look, it forces them to do more work.
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Do I think Congress is going to get attacked together?
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I don't know.
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That that's a tough one.
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I'm talking to Professor Elon Worman.
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He is a uh he's a constitutional law professor, teaches at law schools.
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He is the author most recently of the Constitution of 1789, a new introduction.
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You mentioned that, you know, before the Bill of Rights came along, the ideas embody in the Constitution are pretty durable.
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There may be a few places where we could fault the founders for not having covered one thing or another, but let me ask you about federalism.
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In general, the federal government is supposed to have a set of enumerated duties.
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If here are your jobs, stay in your lane.
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I don't think the federal government has stayed in its lane, but that's my opinion.
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Do you think the f the Constitution has kept the Federal Government where it belongs and left everything else to the states as I think the Constitution said?
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Well, you are absolutely right to intuit that there are places where modern practices diverge quite significantly from the original meaning of the Constitution.
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And one of those areas is federalism.
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So the genius of the framers was that they created this new compound republic.
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It wasn't just a league of states.
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It wasn't just a treaty like your Articles of Confederation.
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It would be a genuine government.
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The central government, the general government would be a genuine government, it would operate on the people, by the people, for the people, it would be adopted by the people, but only within its limited sphere.
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The idea was that the general government, the what today we call the federal government, would only do things that each individual state were sort of incompetent to handle on their own.
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Exactly.
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Exactly.
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War, national defense, foreign policy, commerce among the states, because you don't want commercial rivalries.
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The problem is that this commerce power, which was originally uh just about you know exchanging goods across state line, has been interpreted since the New Deal to mean not just commerce, but anything economic, okay?
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So think production, manufacturing, labor, agriculture, the things that used to be uh historically regulated regulated by the states, like a minimum wage law, okay?
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How's that commerce?
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It's economic, it's labor, it's production.
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But in the New Deal, as FDR and Congress sought to increase the federal role in such economic matters, these were initially struck down, and then there was sort of this switch, you know, a famous switch in time that saved nine, so to speak, though that might be slightly historically imprecise.
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But the point is there was a shift, and the Supreme Court started upholding these things such that any economic activity that, if done by enough people, has a substantial effect on interstate commerce, uh, then you know it's constitutional.
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At its heyday, there were four liberal justices for the proposition that Congress could regulate carrying a gun near a school.
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What does that have to do with interstate commerce?
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Nothing.
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Absolutely.
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Literally, the dissenters, I think this is Justice Rider, okay, with the four liberals at the time.
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This is in 1996, the Lopez gun-free school zones case.
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They said, well, carrying guns near schools might, you know, affect the educational environment and increase fear on occasion when there's violence.
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And that means people's educational attainment would go down, they'd be less productive citizens, which would over time have an effect on interstate commerce.
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Right?
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That was the reason.
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That is ridiculous.
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The majority would think, I know, it's crazy.
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It's crazy.
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Well, let's let me ask you about one that's always troubled me, Professor Worman.
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I'm talking to Professor Elon Worman, the author of the Constitution of 1789, brand new book, a new introduction.
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The one where not engaging in interstate commerce is commerce.
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And if if I remember right, it was a case involving a guy who grew wheat, and uh, but he only used the wheat for his own and his family's consumption on his farm.
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And they said, well, the fact that you're growing the wheat, I think if I remember the case right, the fact that you're growing the wheat and you're not selling it in the marketplace means that affects commerce because if you don't sell the, I don't know, 40 bushels of wheat your family eats in the form of bread and and cereal every year, then that affects commerce because those 40 bushels are not in the stream of commerce, and that affects commerce.
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Wasn't that a fairly notorious Supreme Court decision?
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You could teach my constitutional law class any day.
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That is exactly right.
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The case is called Wickard Against Filburn.
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And the way you remember, I I the heuristic I use kind of jokingly, but also a little seriously, so only half facetiously, is wicked wickard versus farmer Filburn.
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So farmer Filburn was growing wheat entirely on his own farm, entirely within a single state, entirely for his own consumption and for the consumption of his animals, right?
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For his cattle.
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But there were national quotas, and he argued that the quotas by the agri of agriculture couldn't apply to him because he was not engaged in any commerce in wheat, let alone interstate commerce.
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And the reasoning of the court was exactly as you said.
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If he withhold if he grows his own wheat, okay, what is the implication?
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It means that he doesn't have to go into the interstate market to buy wheat, therefore, reducing the demand by some small quantum.
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Now, if enough people did what Farbra Philburn did, Farbra Filburn did, then in the aggregate, that would substantially reduce the interstate price for wheat.
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And therefore, effectively the ruling was we can impose a quota on you, even if you are not engaged in interstate commerce, forcing you into the interstate market to get your wheat needs, so to speak.
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It's pretty preposterous.
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It is really maligned as like one of the sort of really the apex, the apogee, I should say, of the uh the Supreme Court's New Deal Commerce Clause jurisprudence.
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Aaron Powell Well, is there any way to push uh the Constitution and its interpretations back within that line and say if it's not selling across state lines, it's not commerce, and you have no business regulating it, leave it to the states.
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The only way is if enough people buy my book and someday we have nine Supreme Court justices, or at least five, you know, sort of who agree with it.
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But let me say one other thing.
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People also forget about the spending power.
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So Congress today, first of all, spends uh enormously on welfare and entitlements.
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Probably the edgiest, most controversial part of my book comes in the very last chapter.
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I do not think, properly understood, the Constitution gives Congress a power to spend for the general welfare, which would mean things like a national social security program is unconstitutional.
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Why?
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Because when you look at it, it cut the clause, it's actually just a power to tax.
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It says Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, excises, right, things like that, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare.
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This has been interpreted to be two powers.
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Congress can collect taxes for any reason it wants, and then it can pay for the common defense and general uh welfare.
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And therefore, but that's actually not true.
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If you look at the historical evidence, almost everybody understood that the that the general welfare clause proviso was a limitation on the power to tax.
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You could only raise money for national purposes.
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You couldn't tax, in other words, in order uh to you know regulate the the states in some way.
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So like you couldn't just tax goods made with child labor because you didn't want the states to engage in child labor.
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That would be a tax for a regulatory purpose, right?
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Yep.
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So what do you do with the money?
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What do you do with the money that you raise?
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You could only spend it pursuant to the enumerated powers under the necessary and proper clause.
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So you could spend money on post roads, you could spend money on the military, on national defense, you can, you know, uh spend money to pay government employees.
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It has to be in furtherance of an enumerated power.
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There's no free-floating additional power to spend for the general welfare.
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And yet, since the 1930s, the Supreme Court said, eh, close enough, sure there is.
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And that's where we get things like Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid.
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You know, which really I think the Overton Windows is moving on this, but look at the astronomical amounts of fraud, you know, that are going on.
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I was just going to say constitutional.
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Since Professor Warman, you're still teaching in Minnesota, aren't you?
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I sure am.
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Which means that there's no money that you can collect and pay out to learning centers in Minnesota in Minneapolis.
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There are plenty of learning centers.
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Um fortunately, the University of Minnesota, my institution, is a genuine institution of learning, not just learning.
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Uh but yeah, it's like it's tough.
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Like you pay so many, so much taxes.
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And just to think that it all goes down the drain, almost all of it, you know?
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And it's really it's really sad.
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And the other thing I'll say about welfare is it's like this is a pretty edgy um view, uh, Mr.
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Larson.
00:18:31.359 --> 00:18:32.880
But like I don't have a problem with that.
00:18:33.279 --> 00:18:33.920
Families.
00:18:34.079 --> 00:18:35.839
Uh here we here we go.
00:18:36.559 --> 00:18:42.880
Families and ek strong families and economic independence is essential for political freedom.
00:18:43.279 --> 00:18:55.759
I'm I'm gonna suggest that Minnesota, while it is the most uh, I guess, bright, shining example of lots and lots of fraud, multiple billions of dollars of fraud on the taxpayers, I know it's not the only state.
00:18:55.920 --> 00:18:57.680
I know that there are other states that are doing it.
00:18:57.839 --> 00:19:08.240
In fact, at a recent uh round table on fraud at the White House, uh it was actually suggested by one of the President staffers, but we have so much fraud going on that even though the U.S.
00:19:08.480 --> 00:19:20.160
has a current budget deficit of almost$2 trillion a year, that we could erase the entire deficit of$2 trillion a year if we could just root out most of the fraud within the system.
00:19:20.400 --> 00:19:25.920
That's kind of where we left off with Professor Warman talking about his book, The Constitution of 1789.
00:19:26.319 --> 00:19:27.519
How do we get that back?
00:19:27.680 --> 00:19:32.960
How do we get the Federal Government to climb out of that lane and hang- don't even collect the money.
00:19:33.119 --> 00:19:39.440
Leave it up to the States and say, if you want to have a massive welfare state, Massachusetts or California, go ahead.
00:19:39.519 --> 00:19:51.920
But do it on your own dime in your own time, and then people can decide if they want to stay there or move to some a more sensible place like, I don't know, Idaho or uh, you know, Texas or some other place that that doesn't do that kind of thing.
00:19:52.079 --> 00:19:55.119
How do we get back to that under the Constitution?
00:19:56.880 --> 00:20:13.440
So even assuming that the Constitution grants us power, I do hope that the massive widespread fraud that we're seeing creates some sort of political momentum and really moves over to the window in a way that allows us to say things like, hey, maybe welfare programs actually aren't a good idea, right?
00:20:13.519 --> 00:20:15.519
And they're just a tremendous waste of money.
00:20:15.680 --> 00:20:24.480
They're just rife with fraud, and they've totally sort of you know surpassed their original uh intended, exceeded their original intended purposes and functions.
00:20:24.720 --> 00:20:35.680
But the constitutional argument that I make in my book that the Constitution only grants Congress a power to tax for national purposes, and the money must be spent pursuant to enumeration of powers, right?
00:20:35.759 --> 00:20:46.880
There's no independent power to spend for the general welfare, which would mean Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, things like that would be unconstitutional under this best correct original meaning of the Constitution.
00:20:47.119 --> 00:20:53.359
Hopefully that would be sort of an argument politically where we could say, okay, look, probably all this is unconstitutional.
00:20:53.519 --> 00:20:58.160
We should do what we can to send this back to the states, even if politically it's too impossible, right?
00:20:58.319 --> 00:21:09.680
I mean, you could say, look, anybody who's entitled to social security right now on existing law, you'll get what you what what we're owed, you'll get what you paid into it, but we've got to terminate the program, you know, at some point, and just send it back to the states.
00:21:09.759 --> 00:21:15.440
Again, the states are perfectly capable of doing these things uh on their own.
00:21:15.680 --> 00:21:24.640
The last thing I would say, and this is, you know, I started to say uh at the end of the last segment, I really do think entitlements and welfare are foundational in the following sense.
00:21:24.880 --> 00:21:32.720
I think political freedom requires, as preconditions, strong independent families and economic independence from the states, right?
00:21:32.799 --> 00:21:41.119
If the states controlled all the means of production, then you can't have, you know, you better tell the party lying or you'll be debaned, which is actually kind of what's happening, right?
00:21:41.200 --> 00:21:43.599
I mean, it's kind of scary when you think about it.
00:21:43.680 --> 00:21:46.720
So you need economic independence, but you also need strong families, right?
00:21:46.799 --> 00:21:49.759
I mean, thank goodness for the marital privilege, right?
00:21:49.920 --> 00:21:53.839
You can speak quietly and privately, you know, within the family unit.
00:21:53.920 --> 00:21:55.839
You can educate your children and so on.
00:21:56.000 --> 00:21:59.759
But welfare undermines not only economic independence.
00:22:00.319 --> 00:22:02.400
But it also undermines the family in a way.
00:22:02.559 --> 00:22:05.200
Like you don't have to worry about taking care of your parents.
00:22:05.279 --> 00:22:09.599
You don't have to worry about taking care of your grandparents because that's what the government will do.
00:22:09.839 --> 00:22:17.680
It's just amazing how a lot of these progressive policies really undermine the very foundations of a free society.
00:22:17.839 --> 00:22:19.039
And that worries me.
00:22:19.119 --> 00:22:23.359
Now it's a bit outside the lane, you know, of my book, which is purely on the constitutional question.
00:22:24.079 --> 00:22:26.079
But people think, oh, you're just crazy, right?
00:22:26.160 --> 00:22:26.720
You're just crazy.
00:22:27.599 --> 00:22:29.119
You think secure to our constitutional?
00:22:29.279 --> 00:22:30.960
Well, you know what the Exactly.
00:22:31.440 --> 00:22:34.559
Professor Warman is the author of the Constitution of 1789.
00:22:34.720 --> 00:22:52.000
I think it's almost worse than what you say because not only are we saying you don't have to worry about your parents, we will pay to take care of your parents, but we now have something that I think is even more pernicious, and that is the government can go to you and say, um, you have an elderly parent who needs to be taken care of.
00:22:52.079 --> 00:22:53.440
And you say, Well, how should I do that?
00:22:53.680 --> 00:22:56.640
I could put them in an institution that would be very expensive.
00:22:56.720 --> 00:23:00.880
Um, and they say, Well, we will pay you to take care of your family members.
00:23:01.119 --> 00:23:18.160
So to me, this is so offensive because it's saying something that should be an obligation of every person in a family, and that is to take care of all members of the family, the little six-month-old who can't get by on her own, the 96-year-old who can't get by on her own.
00:23:18.240 --> 00:23:23.200
Um then the government comes in and says, we'll actually pay you to do that function.
00:23:23.599 --> 00:23:29.039
And it also suggests, and if we don't pay you, uh then you don't have to do it at all.
00:23:29.200 --> 00:23:33.519
And there are public schools right now that literally are saying summer's coming up.
00:23:33.839 --> 00:23:35.519
How are these kids going to eat during the summer?
00:23:35.599 --> 00:23:43.920
And I say, well, if you adopt a dog and then you stop feeding it, the police will show up at your house and say, it's illegal for you to starve that dog.
00:23:44.160 --> 00:23:54.400
But if your kid is being starved, the public schools say, we're gonna feed your child for you, breakfast, lunch, dinner, even in the summertime when the schools are out, we will do it for you.
00:23:54.640 --> 00:24:05.680
So it suggests to both the parents it's not your job to feed your kids, and it suggests to the kids you don't actually get sustenance from your parents, you get it from the government, where everything else good comes from.
00:24:05.839 --> 00:24:08.480
And that I think is is completely destructive.
00:24:08.720 --> 00:24:10.480
Am I way off base, Professor?
00:24:11.759 --> 00:24:13.920
I think it's even more pernicious than that.
00:24:14.240 --> 00:24:24.880
Because as soon as the government says, we will pay for you to do X, Y, or Z, we will pay for you to take care of your parents, it's like, oh, but you must meet the following conditions.
00:24:25.039 --> 00:24:31.839
And all of a sudden, the federal government interposes and put in an area that it really shouldn't be interposing in.
00:24:31.920 --> 00:24:42.880
So, for example, uh some decade ago uh during the Obama administration, the federal government provided funds to help modernize physicians' record keeping practices.
00:24:43.039 --> 00:24:46.799
Okay, we want to move from paper records to electronic systems.
00:24:47.039 --> 00:24:51.839
So we will pay money for doctors and hospitals and physicians' groups and so on.
00:24:52.079 --> 00:25:01.359
We will give you the money to update your systems and to develop these electronic record systems, but only if they qualify under our program.
00:25:01.440 --> 00:25:05.920
And to qualify under our program, you must must meet all of these certain conditions.
00:25:06.000 --> 00:25:07.200
And over time, what does it mean?
00:25:07.359 --> 00:25:12.319
It's like, oh, you need to ask all your patients what their gender identity is, right?
00:25:12.480 --> 00:25:14.640
It limits the kinds of things you could prescribe.
00:25:14.799 --> 00:25:18.400
All of a sudden, with money comes all sorts of strings attached.
00:25:18.480 --> 00:25:28.799
It's not just that it totally disassociates in one's mind the true obligation and responsibility and relationship between doctor and patient, between parent and child and so on.
00:25:28.960 --> 00:25:35.839
But it's a it's a it's just the road to having the government regulate and impose conditions because they'll take the money.
00:25:35.920 --> 00:25:37.440
Like who doesn't want the money?
00:25:37.680 --> 00:25:37.920
Right?
00:25:38.160 --> 00:25:40.880
I'll take the money, sure, I'll do what you want, because I want the money.
00:25:40.960 --> 00:25:43.119
I'd rather you pay for it than I'll pay for it, right?
00:25:43.279 --> 00:25:44.640
It's totally pernicious.
00:25:45.279 --> 00:25:47.680
And it also perverts the private marketplace.
00:25:47.839 --> 00:25:51.279
I mean, I'll I'll tell you, Professor, one of my favorite examples is New Zealand.
00:25:51.440 --> 00:26:00.880
New Zealand hit the wall a few decades ago financially, and they went to all their farmers that they've been subsidizing to grow whatever the government told them to grow and said, Hey, we're out of cash.
00:26:00.960 --> 00:26:02.160
Uh figure it out on your own.
00:26:02.319 --> 00:26:08.079
So the farmers went out and said, Well, what can we grow or or raise, you know, in the way of livestock that'll make money?
00:26:08.319 --> 00:26:12.720
They became incredibly productive when they were cut off from the government heat.
00:26:12.880 --> 00:26:18.480
But until that happened, if the government said grow avocados, you grew avocados, even if it made no sense at all.
00:26:18.720 --> 00:26:23.759
America right now produces two, I think it's two million barrels of cranberries every year.
00:26:23.920 --> 00:26:31.119
There's a marketplace for one million, which means the government is telling farmers, grow this stuff, nobody wants it, but we're gonna pay you to grow it.
00:26:31.279 --> 00:26:38.000
And it produces all kinds of bizarre results in exactly the place where you and I started, which is commerce, saying, make a product.
00:26:38.160 --> 00:26:39.279
Does anybody want to buy it?
00:26:39.359 --> 00:26:44.559
No, but the government will pay me to make these widgets, so I'm gonna make as many as they'll pay me to do.
00:26:45.839 --> 00:26:51.200
I love this because as I said, people think my book is crazy in this respect, right?
00:26:51.279 --> 00:26:53.440
Like, would you think social security is unconstitutional?
00:26:53.680 --> 00:26:54.319
That's crazy.
00:26:54.720 --> 00:26:56.079
I also think it's a Ponzi scheme.
00:26:57.599 --> 00:26:58.880
Yeah, well, there we go.
00:26:59.119 --> 00:27:06.240
You know, you think that we should go back to pre-1887, pre-New Deal commerce, where this there's no national minimum wage law.
00:27:06.400 --> 00:27:06.960
Like, yeah.
00:27:07.119 --> 00:27:07.359
Yes.
00:27:07.599 --> 00:27:20.960
I mean, good, you know, God forbid that that there might be some different policies and ideas and uh, you know, a lot for experimentation, you know, maybe you could uh get more high schoolers back into the labor market if you paid them a little bit less and they'd be happy to take it, right?
00:27:21.200 --> 00:27:26.480
And so I feel like I'm the one everyone thinks says, you know, uh well, look, I walk in the halls of academia, right?
00:27:26.559 --> 00:27:30.000
So my colleagues are overwhelmingly progressive and they think I'm crazy.
00:27:30.079 --> 00:27:39.759
And I'm like, I feel like I'm taking crazy pills, you know, because everybody else around me has these just normative priors um that really colors their views about a lot of things.
00:27:40.000 --> 00:27:44.720
And the reason I wrote this book is look, my normative priors, they're not progressive.
00:27:44.880 --> 00:27:46.640
I tend to be quite conservative.
00:27:46.799 --> 00:27:51.759
And so, like, if the if the answer is that social security is unconstitutional, so be it.
00:27:51.839 --> 00:27:53.759
I'm not saying we have to go back to that.
00:27:53.839 --> 00:28:05.359
I'm just trying to be, I don't mind going where the evidence leads me because you know, normatively, a lot of where the evidence leads me doesn't bother me very much in the way that it would bother, say, progressives.
00:28:05.440 --> 00:28:07.599
And so anyway, I really doesn't bother me either.
00:28:07.839 --> 00:28:13.440
The book is called The Constitution of 1789, a new introduction by Professor Elon Worman.
00:28:13.599 --> 00:28:14.960
Professor, thank you very much.
00:28:15.119 --> 00:28:16.240
We'll be back in just a moment.
00:28:16.400 --> 00:28:19.519
We'll get to your phone calls and emails at 866-HLAS.
00:28:19.680 --> 00:28:22.720
That's 866 439 5277.
00:28:23.039 --> 00:28:28.400
Send your emails to talk at LarsLarson.com, and you're listening to the Radio Northwest Network.
00:00:00.080 --> 00:00:02.000
Welcome back to the Lars Larson Show.
00:00:02.080 --> 00:00:05.759
It's a pleasure to be with you, and I'm glad to take your phone calls and emails in a moment.
00:00:05.919 --> 00:00:08.000
We'll get to that at 866-A Lars.
00:00:08.240 --> 00:00:14.880
And as always, on this program, naysayers go to the head of the line at 866-439-5277.
00:00:15.039 --> 00:00:18.000
Send your emails to talk at LarsLarson.com.
00:00:18.079 --> 00:00:22.079
You can answer our X poll question, a brand new question from the news of the day.
00:00:22.239 --> 00:00:28.960
You'll find at Lars Larson Show on X, also on my website at LarsLarson.com, but we're a conservative show.
00:00:29.039 --> 00:00:30.320
So only vote once.
00:00:30.480 --> 00:00:42.399
It's a real pleasure to welcome back to the program Professor Elon Worman, who is the author most recently, and I think it's a very needed book, The Constitution of 1789, a new introduction.
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Professor, welcome back.
00:00:44.719 --> 00:00:46.159
Thanks so much for having me, Lars.
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Love the show and really looking forward to the conversation.
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Now, would you mind telling my audience you are an originalist?
00:00:51.679 --> 00:00:55.920
I consider myself an originalist, although I'm not a college professor, I'm not a lawyer.
00:00:56.320 --> 00:01:03.840
What did you want to get across in this book to people about how we ought to look at the Constitution from 2026?
00:01:04.959 --> 00:01:09.280
So I've been teaching constitutional law at law schools for almost a decade.
00:01:09.519 --> 00:01:21.280
And it is just astonishing that there is no generally accessible introduction to the original meaning of the Constitution, the Constitution of 1789, not 1791.
00:01:21.359 --> 00:01:23.680
So the book is not about the Bill of Rights.
00:01:23.840 --> 00:01:30.480
It talks a little bit about the Bill of Rights, but the separation of powers, federalism, legislative power, executive power, judicial power.
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Like what were the original meaning of these terms and this original distribution of powers between Congress and the executive?
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What was the original role of the courts, which have gone totally out of control today, as you well know, Lars?
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And so the objective was to supply that book, to supply that introduction to the Constitution from an originalist, textualist, conservative perspective for anybody who's, you know, never set eyes or read a book uh about uh, you know, uh the original meaning of the Constitution and so on.
00:02:00.640 --> 00:02:03.519
I have supplied that book, and and that's really why I wrote it.
00:02:04.000 --> 00:02:19.759
I mean, do you think uh I I've always thought that the folks who wrote the Constitution, the folks who founded this country, were geniuses, and they very much anticipated the needs of a country, even though they couldn't anticipate all the technological change that has happened over the last 250 years.
00:02:19.919 --> 00:02:23.039
So they wrote a document that still serves us very well.
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Is that an accurate statement, or are there some major deficits in it that you could see uh from your study and your teaching of it?
00:02:31.199 --> 00:02:40.400
So part of the reason I also wrote the book is because I believe the Constitution is inspirational and we should strive to keep it.
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And I thought that if people understood the original meaning of what they did, and we've diverged in many respects from that original meaning, people would grow to admire and appreciate the constitution that they wrote and conclude that we should continue to be bound by that.
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Because they were geniuses.
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They really were.
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As Alexander Hamilton said in Federalist number one, it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country to determine whether mankind is forever destined to be governed by accident and force, or whether they can actually be governed by reflection and choice.
00:03:13.599 --> 00:03:29.199
And that's what the founders were engaged in reflection and choice, deliberation in a really interesting and intense period of human history where they got to decide, probably for the first time in history, what kind of government do we want to live under?
00:03:29.360 --> 00:03:32.639
And so they really were uh in absolutely inspirational.
00:03:32.800 --> 00:03:35.840
Now, does that mean the Constitution is a hundred percent perfect?
00:03:36.000 --> 00:03:37.439
Well, let me say two things.
00:03:37.599 --> 00:03:43.120
Number one, I think it would be better if we went back to the original meaning of the Constitution in many respects.
00:03:43.199 --> 00:03:47.199
And that would make it better, right, than the system we have today.
00:03:47.360 --> 00:03:55.120
But there are things that are really hard to turn back the clock on, like broad delegations of power to the administrative state, for example.
00:03:55.439 --> 00:03:57.520
Some people think that these are just inevitable.
00:03:57.680 --> 00:04:06.879
Well, if that's true, I've actually proposed an amendment to the Constitution to give Congress what's called the legislative veto over presidential or administrative or executive action.
00:04:07.120 --> 00:04:07.360
I love it.
00:04:07.599 --> 00:04:09.199
I think that would do a Yeah.
00:04:09.280 --> 00:04:12.400
And so I proposed that for as one example for a report.
00:04:12.800 --> 00:04:30.319
Well, ha have we seen some of that fixed with some recent decisions by the courts that have effectively said we used to assume that if the bureaucracy said this is the way we interpret the law, that they were allowed to do that, even though sometimes the bureaucracy went well beyond what the con what the Congress had written into the law.
00:04:30.480 --> 00:04:40.160
And now that's been reined in uh a bit with some decisions that effectively threw out that Chevron doctrine and said, no, no, the bureaucratic state isn't always trustworthy.
00:04:40.319 --> 00:04:45.920
So uh so Congress and and I think effectively the courts are saying to Congress, do your job.
00:04:46.319 --> 00:04:49.120
If you need to have a law that says something, then write the law.
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And you don't let the bureaucrats write laws.
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Mr.
00:04:53.120 --> 00:04:54.560
Larson, are you sure you're not a lawyer?
00:04:54.959 --> 00:04:56.480
Yeah, very good.
00:04:56.959 --> 00:04:57.519
That's very nice.
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That's very generous of you, Professor.
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Very good and astute uh question.
00:05:03.600 --> 00:05:04.800
So that's exactly right.
00:05:04.959 --> 00:05:12.000
So rewind rather, ten or so years ago, there was a doctrine uh called Chevron deference.
00:05:12.160 --> 00:05:20.560
This is a doctrine that held that courts should defer to an agency's interpretation of a statute that it administers.
00:05:20.879 --> 00:05:25.439
And so the the problem here, you know, some statutes are genuinely ambiguous.
00:05:25.680 --> 00:05:32.399
You know, so problem number one is ordinarily you would think that courts are experts in interpreting law and interpreting statutes.
00:05:32.560 --> 00:05:43.120
But putting that aside, giving deference to an agency's interpretation of the statute, you know, um, as long as it's reasonable, as long as it's plausible, it doesn't have to be the best reading, right?
00:05:43.199 --> 00:05:44.399
That was what this doctrine was.
00:05:44.720 --> 00:05:48.079
It encouraged agencies to be particularly adventurous.
00:05:48.319 --> 00:05:50.079
Let me give you some examples.
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The Obama administration clean power plan, which totally remade sort of American energy, even though it never went into effect, because you know the industry was like thought it was going to go into effect, and so they planned.
00:06:01.839 --> 00:06:03.439
So they had to react to it, didn't they?
00:06:04.639 --> 00:06:05.120
Exactly.
00:06:05.360 --> 00:06:09.519
It was based on a totally adventurous interpretation of the statute.
00:06:09.680 --> 00:06:11.839
Like, what is a best system of emissions reduction?
00:06:12.000 --> 00:06:17.279
And usually, you know, people thought about that as like a technological system within the plant, like in the fence line.
00:06:17.360 --> 00:06:22.879
And the Obama administration said, eh, the best system, a system is the nationwide energy system.
00:06:23.040 --> 00:06:27.199
Well, like, yes, it could mean no one had everything.
00:06:27.680 --> 00:06:29.920
That's the kind of thing that would get chevron deference.
00:06:30.160 --> 00:06:31.759
Biden's student relief.
00:06:32.160 --> 00:06:40.319
There the statutes basically said that the secretary could waive or modify requirements of the student uh uh debt program.
00:06:40.639 --> 00:06:46.639
And so what they said is, well, there are conditions under which we are allowed to discharge debt.
00:06:46.800 --> 00:06:50.560
If we waive those, then we can discharge debt for everybody.
00:06:50.800 --> 00:06:58.160
Like, obviously, that's like kind of possible to see that from the statute, but nobody ever thought that's what the statute meant.
00:06:58.319 --> 00:07:06.800
No reasonable person would read the statute that way, but courts would refer to such interpretations so long as they were colorable or plausible.
00:07:06.959 --> 00:07:12.639
And the Supreme Court has overturned that, overturned deference two years ago in a case called Loper Bright.
00:07:12.800 --> 00:07:18.000
So now courts must decide for themselves what the best meaning of the statutes are.
00:07:18.160 --> 00:07:28.079
But not only then, and I'll say this very briefly, when it comes to questions of major political and economic significance, the courts actually now demand a clear statement from Congress.
00:07:28.160 --> 00:07:29.839
This is what's called the major questions doctrine.
00:07:30.000 --> 00:07:34.240
So not only is there no deference anymore generally, but now there's a kind of anti-deference.
00:07:34.319 --> 00:07:38.800
If it's a really big and important question, we're gonna expect exceptional clarity from Congress.
00:07:38.959 --> 00:07:46.000
And so you're right, through a series of statutory interpretation doctrines, the court has sought to rest help restore Congress's role.
00:07:46.160 --> 00:07:47.199
That's absolutely true.
00:07:47.680 --> 00:07:52.720
Does that does that effectively tell the Congress, get back and start doing your job again?
00:07:52.879 --> 00:07:54.560
Because I don't know if you agree with me, Professor.
00:07:54.720 --> 00:08:02.240
I'm talking to Professor Elon Worman, who is the author most recently of The Constitution of 1789, a new introduction.
00:08:02.399 --> 00:08:04.720
Um I don't I think Congress has become lazy.
00:08:04.959 --> 00:08:24.240
They let they love that the bureaucratic state will do their job for them, and they can just sit back because if they had to actually vote on some of these things and say, yes, we're going to allow gender-affirming mutilation of teenage children, uh, yes, we're going to ban coal-fired power and make all your power bills go up dramatically, why they might not get re-elected.
00:08:24.319 --> 00:08:28.639
So they'll let the bureaucrats do it instead and say, well, there's nothing we can do about it.
00:08:28.879 --> 00:08:38.799
Does the do the does erasing, does Loperbright by erasing the Chevron doctrine, say to the uh bureaucracy, get back in your lane and to Congress, do your job?
00:08:38.960 --> 00:08:40.639
Or am I overstating this?
00:08:41.840 --> 00:08:48.559
Uh I I think you might be overstating a little because I think Congress will come up with ingenious ways to avoid doing its job.
00:08:48.879 --> 00:08:49.200
Okay.
00:08:49.679 --> 00:08:54.000
Um, but you're absolutely right, but this is classic public choice theory.
00:08:54.159 --> 00:08:58.480
What led to this increase of delegations to administrative agencies in the first place?
00:08:58.639 --> 00:09:00.559
Well, it's classic public choice theory, right?
00:09:00.639 --> 00:09:01.759
It's a win-win situation.
00:09:01.919 --> 00:09:05.200
The legislators vote for things like, oh, we shall have clean air.
00:09:05.440 --> 00:09:08.639
And they go back to their constituents and they say, hey, look, I voted for clean air.
00:09:08.799 --> 00:09:11.600
Who could oppose clean air or who could oppose clean water?
00:09:11.759 --> 00:09:20.879
But when it comes to actually determining who has to pollute, oh, you know, we, we, or who has to stop producing coal, we delegated that question to the EPA.
00:09:20.960 --> 00:09:26.000
And then when the EPA regulates in a way you don't want, you can say, Oh, I didn't mean that.
00:09:26.159 --> 00:09:32.399
And so you win on the front end because you voted for clean air, and you win on the back end because you could lobby the agency on behalf of your constituents.
00:09:32.559 --> 00:09:35.679
So look, it forces them to do more work.
00:09:36.320 --> 00:09:38.480
Do I think Congress is going to get attacked together?
00:09:38.799 --> 00:09:39.279
I don't know.
00:09:39.600 --> 00:09:40.480
That that's a tough one.
00:09:40.639 --> 00:09:42.720
I'm talking to Professor Elon Worman.
00:09:42.879 --> 00:09:46.720
He is a uh he's a constitutional law professor, teaches at law schools.
00:09:46.879 --> 00:09:51.919
He is the author most recently of the Constitution of 1789, a new introduction.
00:09:52.159 --> 00:09:58.159
You mentioned that, you know, before the Bill of Rights came along, the ideas embody in the Constitution are pretty durable.
00:09:58.399 --> 00:10:04.720
There may be a few places where we could fault the founders for not having covered one thing or another, but let me ask you about federalism.
00:10:05.600 --> 00:10:10.799
In general, the federal government is supposed to have a set of enumerated duties.
00:10:10.960 --> 00:10:13.120
If here are your jobs, stay in your lane.
00:10:13.519 --> 00:10:16.799
I don't think the federal government has stayed in its lane, but that's my opinion.
00:10:17.039 --> 00:10:24.720
Do you think the f the Constitution has kept the Federal Government where it belongs and left everything else to the states as I think the Constitution said?
00:10:26.399 --> 00:10:35.679
Well, you are absolutely right to intuit that there are places where modern practices diverge quite significantly from the original meaning of the Constitution.
00:10:35.840 --> 00:10:38.559
And one of those areas is federalism.
00:10:38.799 --> 00:10:45.039
So the genius of the framers was that they created this new compound republic.
00:10:45.200 --> 00:10:47.279
It wasn't just a league of states.
00:10:47.360 --> 00:10:49.919
It wasn't just a treaty like your Articles of Confederation.
00:10:50.000 --> 00:10:51.200
It would be a genuine government.
00:10:51.279 --> 00:11:01.919
The central government, the general government would be a genuine government, it would operate on the people, by the people, for the people, it would be adopted by the people, but only within its limited sphere.
00:11:02.159 --> 00:11:11.120
The idea was that the general government, the what today we call the federal government, would only do things that each individual state were sort of incompetent to handle on their own.
00:11:14.399 --> 00:11:15.120
Exactly.
00:11:15.360 --> 00:11:16.159
Exactly.
00:11:16.480 --> 00:11:23.279
War, national defense, foreign policy, commerce among the states, because you don't want commercial rivalries.
00:11:23.519 --> 00:11:36.399
The problem is that this commerce power, which was originally uh just about you know exchanging goods across state line, has been interpreted since the New Deal to mean not just commerce, but anything economic, okay?
00:11:36.559 --> 00:11:46.320
So think production, manufacturing, labor, agriculture, the things that used to be uh historically regulated regulated by the states, like a minimum wage law, okay?
00:11:46.480 --> 00:11:47.679
How's that commerce?
00:11:47.840 --> 00:11:50.320
It's economic, it's labor, it's production.
00:11:50.480 --> 00:12:06.639
But in the New Deal, as FDR and Congress sought to increase the federal role in such economic matters, these were initially struck down, and then there was sort of this switch, you know, a famous switch in time that saved nine, so to speak, though that might be slightly historically imprecise.
00:12:06.799 --> 00:12:19.600
But the point is there was a shift, and the Supreme Court started upholding these things such that any economic activity that, if done by enough people, has a substantial effect on interstate commerce, uh, then you know it's constitutional.
00:12:19.759 --> 00:12:28.000
At its heyday, there were four liberal justices for the proposition that Congress could regulate carrying a gun near a school.
00:12:28.159 --> 00:12:30.720
What does that have to do with interstate commerce?
00:12:30.960 --> 00:12:31.200
Nothing.
00:12:31.519 --> 00:12:31.919
Absolutely.
00:12:33.039 --> 00:12:36.879
Literally, the dissenters, I think this is Justice Rider, okay, with the four liberals at the time.
00:12:36.960 --> 00:12:42.799
This is in 1996, the Lopez gun-free school zones case.
00:12:42.879 --> 00:12:51.360
They said, well, carrying guns near schools might, you know, affect the educational environment and increase fear on occasion when there's violence.
00:12:51.519 --> 00:12:58.879
And that means people's educational attainment would go down, they'd be less productive citizens, which would over time have an effect on interstate commerce.
00:12:58.960 --> 00:12:59.120
Right?
00:12:59.200 --> 00:13:00.159
That was the reason.
00:13:00.480 --> 00:13:01.120
That is ridiculous.
00:13:01.840 --> 00:13:03.519
The majority would think, I know, it's crazy.
00:13:03.679 --> 00:13:04.159
It's crazy.
00:13:04.559 --> 00:13:08.080
Well, let's let me ask you about one that's always troubled me, Professor Worman.
00:13:08.320 --> 00:13:14.320
I'm talking to Professor Elon Worman, the author of the Constitution of 1789, brand new book, a new introduction.
00:13:14.559 --> 00:13:19.279
The one where not engaging in interstate commerce is commerce.
00:13:19.440 --> 00:13:28.720
And if if I remember right, it was a case involving a guy who grew wheat, and uh, but he only used the wheat for his own and his family's consumption on his farm.
00:13:28.879 --> 00:13:52.399
And they said, well, the fact that you're growing the wheat, I think if I remember the case right, the fact that you're growing the wheat and you're not selling it in the marketplace means that affects commerce because if you don't sell the, I don't know, 40 bushels of wheat your family eats in the form of bread and and cereal every year, then that affects commerce because those 40 bushels are not in the stream of commerce, and that affects commerce.
00:13:52.559 --> 00:13:56.480
Wasn't that a fairly notorious Supreme Court decision?
00:13:57.759 --> 00:14:00.720
You could teach my constitutional law class any day.
00:14:00.879 --> 00:14:01.840
That is exactly right.
00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:05.200
The case is called Wickard Against Filburn.
00:14:05.360 --> 00:14:15.039
And the way you remember, I I the heuristic I use kind of jokingly, but also a little seriously, so only half facetiously, is wicked wickard versus farmer Filburn.
00:14:15.279 --> 00:14:25.759
So farmer Filburn was growing wheat entirely on his own farm, entirely within a single state, entirely for his own consumption and for the consumption of his animals, right?
00:14:26.000 --> 00:14:27.200
For his cattle.
00:14:27.440 --> 00:14:40.159
But there were national quotas, and he argued that the quotas by the agri of agriculture couldn't apply to him because he was not engaged in any commerce in wheat, let alone interstate commerce.
00:14:40.320 --> 00:14:43.440
And the reasoning of the court was exactly as you said.
00:14:43.919 --> 00:14:48.240
If he withhold if he grows his own wheat, okay, what is the implication?
00:14:48.480 --> 00:14:56.320
It means that he doesn't have to go into the interstate market to buy wheat, therefore, reducing the demand by some small quantum.
00:14:56.480 --> 00:15:04.960
Now, if enough people did what Farbra Philburn did, Farbra Filburn did, then in the aggregate, that would substantially reduce the interstate price for wheat.
00:15:05.039 --> 00:15:15.840
And therefore, effectively the ruling was we can impose a quota on you, even if you are not engaged in interstate commerce, forcing you into the interstate market to get your wheat needs, so to speak.
00:15:16.000 --> 00:15:17.120
It's pretty preposterous.
00:15:17.279 --> 00:15:25.200
It is really maligned as like one of the sort of really the apex, the apogee, I should say, of the uh the Supreme Court's New Deal Commerce Clause jurisprudence.
00:15:25.279 --> 00:15:40.080
Aaron Powell Well, is there any way to push uh the Constitution and its interpretations back within that line and say if it's not selling across state lines, it's not commerce, and you have no business regulating it, leave it to the states.
00:15:41.120 --> 00:15:49.200
The only way is if enough people buy my book and someday we have nine Supreme Court justices, or at least five, you know, sort of who agree with it.
00:15:49.360 --> 00:15:50.879
But let me say one other thing.
00:15:51.039 --> 00:15:54.000
People also forget about the spending power.
00:15:54.240 --> 00:16:00.080
So Congress today, first of all, spends uh enormously on welfare and entitlements.
00:16:00.559 --> 00:16:06.159
Probably the edgiest, most controversial part of my book comes in the very last chapter.
00:16:06.399 --> 00:16:17.200
I do not think, properly understood, the Constitution gives Congress a power to spend for the general welfare, which would mean things like a national social security program is unconstitutional.
00:16:17.360 --> 00:16:17.679
Why?
00:16:17.840 --> 00:16:22.399
Because when you look at it, it cut the clause, it's actually just a power to tax.
00:16:22.879 --> 00:16:33.919
It says Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, excises, right, things like that, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare.
00:16:34.080 --> 00:16:36.159
This has been interpreted to be two powers.
00:16:36.320 --> 00:16:43.120
Congress can collect taxes for any reason it wants, and then it can pay for the common defense and general uh welfare.
00:16:43.360 --> 00:16:45.360
And therefore, but that's actually not true.
00:16:45.919 --> 00:16:55.200
If you look at the historical evidence, almost everybody understood that the that the general welfare clause proviso was a limitation on the power to tax.
00:16:55.360 --> 00:16:58.000
You could only raise money for national purposes.
00:16:58.159 --> 00:17:04.079
You couldn't tax, in other words, in order uh to you know regulate the the states in some way.
00:17:04.160 --> 00:17:09.920
So like you couldn't just tax goods made with child labor because you didn't want the states to engage in child labor.
00:17:10.000 --> 00:17:12.640
That would be a tax for a regulatory purpose, right?
00:17:12.880 --> 00:17:13.039
Yep.
00:17:13.279 --> 00:17:14.559
So what do you do with the money?
00:17:14.720 --> 00:17:16.480
What do you do with the money that you raise?
00:17:16.640 --> 00:17:21.920
You could only spend it pursuant to the enumerated powers under the necessary and proper clause.
00:17:22.079 --> 00:17:30.319
So you could spend money on post roads, you could spend money on the military, on national defense, you can, you know, uh spend money to pay government employees.
00:17:30.480 --> 00:17:32.960
It has to be in furtherance of an enumerated power.
00:17:33.039 --> 00:17:36.079
There's no free-floating additional power to spend for the general welfare.
00:17:36.319 --> 00:17:41.039
And yet, since the 1930s, the Supreme Court said, eh, close enough, sure there is.
00:17:41.200 --> 00:17:45.359
And that's where we get things like Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid.
00:17:45.920 --> 00:17:52.480
You know, which really I think the Overton Windows is moving on this, but look at the astronomical amounts of fraud, you know, that are going on.
00:17:52.880 --> 00:17:54.480
I was just going to say constitutional.
00:17:54.880 --> 00:17:58.319
Since Professor Warman, you're still teaching in Minnesota, aren't you?
00:17:59.200 --> 00:18:00.160
I sure am.
00:18:00.640 --> 00:18:06.640
Which means that there's no money that you can collect and pay out to learning centers in Minnesota in Minneapolis.
00:18:07.920 --> 00:18:09.680
There are plenty of learning centers.
00:18:09.759 --> 00:18:16.319
Um fortunately, the University of Minnesota, my institution, is a genuine institution of learning, not just learning.
00:18:16.400 --> 00:18:17.839
Uh but yeah, it's like it's tough.
00:18:18.000 --> 00:18:19.759
Like you pay so many, so much taxes.
00:18:19.839 --> 00:18:23.599
And just to think that it all goes down the drain, almost all of it, you know?
00:18:23.839 --> 00:18:25.440
And it's really it's really sad.
00:18:25.599 --> 00:18:30.640
And the other thing I'll say about welfare is it's like this is a pretty edgy um view, uh, Mr.
00:18:30.720 --> 00:18:31.279
Larson.
00:18:31.359 --> 00:18:32.880
But like I don't have a problem with that.
00:18:33.279 --> 00:18:33.920
Families.
00:18:34.079 --> 00:18:35.839
Uh here we here we go.
00:18:36.559 --> 00:18:42.880
Families and ek strong families and economic independence is essential for political freedom.
00:18:43.279 --> 00:18:55.759
I'm I'm gonna suggest that Minnesota, while it is the most uh, I guess, bright, shining example of lots and lots of fraud, multiple billions of dollars of fraud on the taxpayers, I know it's not the only state.
00:18:55.920 --> 00:18:57.680
I know that there are other states that are doing it.
00:18:57.839 --> 00:19:08.240
In fact, at a recent uh round table on fraud at the White House, uh it was actually suggested by one of the President staffers, but we have so much fraud going on that even though the U.S.
00:19:08.480 --> 00:19:20.160
has a current budget deficit of almost$2 trillion a year, that we could erase the entire deficit of$2 trillion a year if we could just root out most of the fraud within the system.
00:19:20.400 --> 00:19:25.920
That's kind of where we left off with Professor Warman talking about his book, The Constitution of 1789.
00:19:26.319 --> 00:19:27.519
How do we get that back?
00:19:27.680 --> 00:19:32.960
How do we get the Federal Government to climb out of that lane and hang- don't even collect the money.
00:19:33.119 --> 00:19:39.440
Leave it up to the States and say, if you want to have a massive welfare state, Massachusetts or California, go ahead.
00:19:39.519 --> 00:19:51.920
But do it on your own dime in your own time, and then people can decide if they want to stay there or move to some a more sensible place like, I don't know, Idaho or uh, you know, Texas or some other place that that doesn't do that kind of thing.
00:19:52.079 --> 00:19:55.119
How do we get back to that under the Constitution?
00:19:56.880 --> 00:20:13.440
So even assuming that the Constitution grants us power, I do hope that the massive widespread fraud that we're seeing creates some sort of political momentum and really moves over to the window in a way that allows us to say things like, hey, maybe welfare programs actually aren't a good idea, right?
00:20:13.519 --> 00:20:15.519
And they're just a tremendous waste of money.
00:20:15.680 --> 00:20:24.480
They're just rife with fraud, and they've totally sort of you know surpassed their original uh intended, exceeded their original intended purposes and functions.
00:20:24.720 --> 00:20:35.680
But the constitutional argument that I make in my book that the Constitution only grants Congress a power to tax for national purposes, and the money must be spent pursuant to enumeration of powers, right?
00:20:35.759 --> 00:20:46.880
There's no independent power to spend for the general welfare, which would mean Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, things like that would be unconstitutional under this best correct original meaning of the Constitution.
00:20:47.119 --> 00:20:53.359
Hopefully that would be sort of an argument politically where we could say, okay, look, probably all this is unconstitutional.
00:20:53.519 --> 00:20:58.160
We should do what we can to send this back to the states, even if politically it's too impossible, right?
00:20:58.319 --> 00:21:09.680
I mean, you could say, look, anybody who's entitled to social security right now on existing law, you'll get what you what what we're owed, you'll get what you paid into it, but we've got to terminate the program, you know, at some point, and just send it back to the states.
00:21:09.759 --> 00:21:15.440
Again, the states are perfectly capable of doing these things uh on their own.
00:21:15.680 --> 00:21:24.640
The last thing I would say, and this is, you know, I started to say uh at the end of the last segment, I really do think entitlements and welfare are foundational in the following sense.
00:21:24.880 --> 00:21:32.720
I think political freedom requires, as preconditions, strong independent families and economic independence from the states, right?
00:21:32.799 --> 00:21:41.119
If the states controlled all the means of production, then you can't have, you know, you better tell the party lying or you'll be debaned, which is actually kind of what's happening, right?
00:21:41.200 --> 00:21:43.599
I mean, it's kind of scary when you think about it.
00:21:43.680 --> 00:21:46.720
So you need economic independence, but you also need strong families, right?
00:21:46.799 --> 00:21:49.759
I mean, thank goodness for the marital privilege, right?
00:21:49.920 --> 00:21:53.839
You can speak quietly and privately, you know, within the family unit.
00:21:53.920 --> 00:21:55.839
You can educate your children and so on.
00:21:56.000 --> 00:21:59.759
But welfare undermines not only economic independence.
00:22:00.319 --> 00:22:02.400
But it also undermines the family in a way.
00:22:02.559 --> 00:22:05.200
Like you don't have to worry about taking care of your parents.
00:22:05.279 --> 00:22:09.599
You don't have to worry about taking care of your grandparents because that's what the government will do.
00:22:09.839 --> 00:22:17.680
It's just amazing how a lot of these progressive policies really undermine the very foundations of a free society.
00:22:17.839 --> 00:22:19.039
And that worries me.
00:22:19.119 --> 00:22:23.359
Now it's a bit outside the lane, you know, of my book, which is purely on the constitutional question.
00:22:24.079 --> 00:22:26.079
But people think, oh, you're just crazy, right?
00:22:26.160 --> 00:22:26.720
You're just crazy.
00:22:27.599 --> 00:22:29.119
You think secure to our constitutional?
00:22:29.279 --> 00:22:30.960
Well, you know what the Exactly.
00:22:31.440 --> 00:22:34.559
Professor Warman is the author of the Constitution of 1789.
00:22:34.720 --> 00:22:52.000
I think it's almost worse than what you say because not only are we saying you don't have to worry about your parents, we will pay to take care of your parents, but we now have something that I think is even more pernicious, and that is the government can go to you and say, um, you have an elderly parent who needs to be taken care of.
00:22:52.079 --> 00:22:53.440
And you say, Well, how should I do that?
00:22:53.680 --> 00:22:56.640
I could put them in an institution that would be very expensive.
00:22:56.720 --> 00:23:00.880
Um, and they say, Well, we will pay you to take care of your family members.
00:23:01.119 --> 00:23:18.160
So to me, this is so offensive because it's saying something that should be an obligation of every person in a family, and that is to take care of all members of the family, the little six-month-old who can't get by on her own, the 96-year-old who can't get by on her own.
00:23:18.240 --> 00:23:23.200
Um then the government comes in and says, we'll actually pay you to do that function.
00:23:23.599 --> 00:23:29.039
And it also suggests, and if we don't pay you, uh then you don't have to do it at all.
00:23:29.200 --> 00:23:33.519
And there are public schools right now that literally are saying summer's coming up.
00:23:33.839 --> 00:23:35.519
How are these kids going to eat during the summer?
00:23:35.599 --> 00:23:43.920
And I say, well, if you adopt a dog and then you stop feeding it, the police will show up at your house and say, it's illegal for you to starve that dog.
00:23:44.160 --> 00:23:54.400
But if your kid is being starved, the public schools say, we're gonna feed your child for you, breakfast, lunch, dinner, even in the summertime when the schools are out, we will do it for you.
00:23:54.640 --> 00:24:05.680
So it suggests to both the parents it's not your job to feed your kids, and it suggests to the kids you don't actually get sustenance from your parents, you get it from the government, where everything else good comes from.
00:24:05.839 --> 00:24:08.480
And that I think is is completely destructive.
00:24:08.720 --> 00:24:10.480
Am I way off base, Professor?
00:24:11.759 --> 00:24:13.920
I think it's even more pernicious than that.
00:24:14.240 --> 00:24:24.880
Because as soon as the government says, we will pay for you to do X, Y, or Z, we will pay for you to take care of your parents, it's like, oh, but you must meet the following conditions.
00:24:25.039 --> 00:24:31.839
And all of a sudden, the federal government interposes and put in an area that it really shouldn't be interposing in.
00:24:31.920 --> 00:24:42.880
So, for example, uh some decade ago uh during the Obama administration, the federal government provided funds to help modernize physicians' record keeping practices.
00:24:43.039 --> 00:24:46.799
Okay, we want to move from paper records to electronic systems.
00:24:47.039 --> 00:24:51.839
So we will pay money for doctors and hospitals and physicians' groups and so on.
00:24:52.079 --> 00:25:01.359
We will give you the money to update your systems and to develop these electronic record systems, but only if they qualify under our program.
00:25:01.440 --> 00:25:05.920
And to qualify under our program, you must must meet all of these certain conditions.
00:25:06.000 --> 00:25:07.200
And over time, what does it mean?
00:25:07.359 --> 00:25:12.319
It's like, oh, you need to ask all your patients what their gender identity is, right?
00:25:12.480 --> 00:25:14.640
It limits the kinds of things you could prescribe.
00:25:14.799 --> 00:25:18.400
All of a sudden, with money comes all sorts of strings attached.
00:25:18.480 --> 00:25:28.799
It's not just that it totally disassociates in one's mind the true obligation and responsibility and relationship between doctor and patient, between parent and child and so on.
00:25:28.960 --> 00:25:35.839
But it's a it's a it's just the road to having the government regulate and impose conditions because they'll take the money.
00:25:35.920 --> 00:25:37.440
Like who doesn't want the money?
00:25:37.680 --> 00:25:37.920
Right?
00:25:38.160 --> 00:25:40.880
I'll take the money, sure, I'll do what you want, because I want the money.
00:25:40.960 --> 00:25:43.119
I'd rather you pay for it than I'll pay for it, right?
00:25:43.279 --> 00:25:44.640
It's totally pernicious.
00:25:45.279 --> 00:25:47.680
And it also perverts the private marketplace.
00:25:47.839 --> 00:25:51.279
I mean, I'll I'll tell you, Professor, one of my favorite examples is New Zealand.
00:25:51.440 --> 00:26:00.880
New Zealand hit the wall a few decades ago financially, and they went to all their farmers that they've been subsidizing to grow whatever the government told them to grow and said, Hey, we're out of cash.
00:26:00.960 --> 00:26:02.160
Uh figure it out on your own.
00:26:02.319 --> 00:26:08.079
So the farmers went out and said, Well, what can we grow or or raise, you know, in the way of livestock that'll make money?
00:26:08.319 --> 00:26:12.720
They became incredibly productive when they were cut off from the government heat.
00:26:12.880 --> 00:26:18.480
But until that happened, if the government said grow avocados, you grew avocados, even if it made no sense at all.
00:26:18.720 --> 00:26:23.759
America right now produces two, I think it's two million barrels of cranberries every year.
00:26:23.920 --> 00:26:31.119
There's a marketplace for one million, which means the government is telling farmers, grow this stuff, nobody wants it, but we're gonna pay you to grow it.
00:26:31.279 --> 00:26:38.000
And it produces all kinds of bizarre results in exactly the place where you and I started, which is commerce, saying, make a product.
00:26:38.160 --> 00:26:39.279
Does anybody want to buy it?
00:26:39.359 --> 00:26:44.559
No, but the government will pay me to make these widgets, so I'm gonna make as many as they'll pay me to do.
00:26:45.839 --> 00:26:51.200
I love this because as I said, people think my book is crazy in this respect, right?
00:26:51.279 --> 00:26:53.440
Like, would you think social security is unconstitutional?
00:26:53.680 --> 00:26:54.319
That's crazy.
00:26:54.720 --> 00:26:56.079
I also think it's a Ponzi scheme.
00:26:57.599 --> 00:26:58.880
Yeah, well, there we go.
00:26:59.119 --> 00:27:06.240
You know, you think that we should go back to pre-1887, pre-New Deal commerce, where this there's no national minimum wage law.
00:27:06.400 --> 00:27:06.960
Like, yeah.
00:27:07.119 --> 00:27:07.359
Yes.
00:27:07.599 --> 00:27:20.960
I mean, good, you know, God forbid that that there might be some different policies and ideas and uh, you know, a lot for experimentation, you know, maybe you could uh get more high schoolers back into the labor market if you paid them a little bit less and they'd be happy to take it, right?
00:27:21.200 --> 00:27:26.480
And so I feel like I'm the one everyone thinks says, you know, uh well, look, I walk in the halls of academia, right?
00:27:26.559 --> 00:27:30.000
So my colleagues are overwhelmingly progressive and they think I'm crazy.
00:27:30.079 --> 00:27:39.759
And I'm like, I feel like I'm taking crazy pills, you know, because everybody else around me has these just normative priors um that really colors their views about a lot of things.
00:27:40.000 --> 00:27:44.720
And the reason I wrote this book is look, my normative priors, they're not progressive.
00:27:44.880 --> 00:27:46.640
I tend to be quite conservative.
00:27:46.799 --> 00:27:51.759
And so, like, if the if the answer is that social security is unconstitutional, so be it.
00:27:51.839 --> 00:27:53.759
I'm not saying we have to go back to that.
00:27:53.839 --> 00:28:05.359
I'm just trying to be, I don't mind going where the evidence leads me because you know, normatively, a lot of where the evidence leads me doesn't bother me very much in the way that it would bother, say, progressives.
00:28:05.440 --> 00:28:07.599
And so anyway, I really doesn't bother me either.
00:28:07.839 --> 00:28:13.440
The book is called The Constitution of 1789, a new introduction by Professor Elon Worman.
00:28:13.599 --> 00:28:14.960
Professor, thank you very much.
00:28:15.119 --> 00:28:16.240
We'll be back in just a moment.
00:28:16.400 --> 00:28:19.519
We'll get to your phone calls and emails at 866-HLAS.
00:28:19.680 --> 00:28:22.720
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00:28:23.039 --> 00:28:28.400
Send your emails to talk at LarsLarson.com, and you're listening to the Radio Northwest Network.
