"To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical. .. A wise and frugal government ... shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. ... Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare but only those specifically enumerated. ... Would it not be better to simplify the system of taxation rather than to spread it over such a variety of subjects and pass through so many new hands?" --Thomas Jefferson.

"I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents...." --James
Madison.

"I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for public charity, [such spending] would be contrary to the letter and the spirit of the Constitution and subversive to the whole theory upon which the Union of these States is founded." --President Franklin Pierce.

"I feel obliged to withhold my approval of the plan to indulge in benevolent and charitable sentiment through the appropriation of public funds. .. I find no warrant for such an appropriation in the Constitution." --President Grover Cleveland.

"That the power to tax involves the power to destroy ... is not to be denied." --John Marshall

"The left always focuses its attention on dividing wealth -- rather than producing it -- and they do so because of their love affair with government power. Bureaucrats can work to apportion riches in a manner they deem fair, but government never produces the riches in the first place -- only private enterprise can do that. --Michael Medved