Actually, it's in the Constitution
By The Bakersfield Californian
I read with interest Andy Wahrenbrock's Jan. 24 Another View article "Tax policy adjustment isn't panacea for Social Security," a response to Mark Martinez's Dec. 16 article "The 'Social Security is going bankrupt' lie." I have my opinions about which column was correct, but I was jarred by one of Wahrenbrock's statements: "I wonder if the authors of the Constitution envisioned the nation paying its bills with debt. I rather doubt it."
Hmmm? There's no reason to doubt it at all. The writers of the U.S. Constitution lived in a time where both the states and the national government created by the Articles of Confederation were in tremendous debt, which had been incurred to fight the Revolution. (It's expensive to fight wars.) The framers included as the second paragraph of Article I, Section 8 (the so-called "enumerated powers"), the power of Congress to borrow money on the credit of the United States.
Jay C. Smith
Bakersfield
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