But these are
not the only objects to which the jurisdiction of the Union, in respect
to revenue, must necessarily be empowered to extend. It must embrace a
provision for the support of the national civil list; for the payment of
the national debts contracted, or that may be contracted; and, in
general, for all those matters which will call for disbursements out of
the national treasury. The conclusion is, that there must be interwoven,
in the frame of the government, a general power of taxation, in one
shape or another.
Money is, with propriety, considered as the vital principle of the body
politic; as that which sustains its life and motion, and enables it to
perform its most essential functions. A complete power, therefore, to
procure a regular and adequate supply of it, as far as the resources of
the community will permit, may be regarded as an indispensable
ingredient in every constitution. From a deficiency in this particular,
one of two evils must ensue; either the people must be subjected to
continual plunder, as a substitute for a more eligible mode of supplying
the public wants, or the government must sink into a fatal atrophy, and,
in a short course of time, perish.
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