What are the enumerated powers listed in Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution?

The legislative powers of the United States Congress are explicitly stated in the Constitution. Article I Section I states “All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives”. The enumerated powers of Congress are laid in out in Section 8 of the Article I. The eighteen enumerated powers are explicitly stated in Article I, Section 8.

1. Power to tax and spend for the general welfare and the common defense.
2. Power to borrow money.
3. To regulate commerce with states, other nations, and Native American tribes.
4. Establish citizenship naturalization laws and bankruptcy laws
5. Coin money
6. Power to punish counterfeiters of money and stocks
7. Power to establish post offices and roads
8. Power to regulate patents and copyrights
9. Power to establish lower courts from the Supreme Court
10. Power to establish piracy laws of the sea
11. To declare war
12. Power to raise and support Army
13. Provide and maintain the Navy
14. Make rules for the Government and regulation of naval forces
15. Power to call a militia (National Guard today)
16. Power of regulating a militia
17. Power to govern the District of Columbia and properties for federal government purposes
18. Authority to create laws that are necessary and proper to carry out the laws of the land (Necessary and Proper Clause)

Article I, Section 8, Clause 18 is known as the Necessary and Proper Clause which gives Congress the authority to create any laws that are necessary and proper to carry out the enumerated powers of the Constitution. The Necessary and Proper clause has been up for interpretation since the writing of the Constitution. A Supreme Court case that challenged the clause was McCollough v. Maryland (1819). The court ruled that the Necessary and Proper clause gave Congress the implied power to create a second national bank in Maryland and the state could not tax the bank. Another Congressional power that was explicitly stated in the Constitution was the impeachment powers in Article I, Section 2 and 3. Congress has the authority to impeach a sitting President in office. The impeachment process is as such, the House of Representatives brings articles of impeachment against the official and then the Senate is responsible for the impeachment trial. In order to impeach a sitting President, the Senate must vote two-thirds. Article III, Section 3 gives Congress the authority to decide on the punishment of treason.

The Founding Fathers explicitly stated the powers of Congress in the Constitution in order to solidify that the power of the government comes from the people. The Constitution is a protected document that has been interpreted since its writing. The powers of Congress were laid out in order to establish our government for the people, by the people.

Earn your online bachelor’s degree from a regionally accredited university that has been an online education leader for more than 15 years. Complete the form to learn more about how you can earn your bachelor’s in political science and pick up in-demand emphasis areas and certificates along the way, giving yourself a competitive edge in the job market. Contact us today to get started.

References

The Constitution of the United States: A Transcription. (2018, December 18). Retrieved February 27, 2019, from https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript

By: Angie Kirby, EKU Graduate Assistant              

Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution specifies the “expressed” or “enumerated” powers of Congress. These specific powers form the basis of the American system of “federalism,” the division and sharing of powers between the central government and the state governments.

• Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution grants the U.S. Congress 17 specifically “enumerated” powers, along with unspecified “implied” powers considered “necessary and proper” to carry out the enumerated powers.
• Congress also assumes additional lawmaking powers through the “Commerce Clause” of Article I, Section 8, which grants Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce—business activities “among the states.”
• Under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution, all powers not granted to Congress are reserved for the states or the people.

The powers of Congress are limited to those specifically listed in Article I, Section 8 and those determined to be “necessary and proper” to carry out those powers. The Article’s so-called “necessary and proper” or “elastic” clause creates the justification for Congress to exercise several “implied powers,” such as the passage of laws regulating the private possession of firearms.

In addition, Article III Section 3 of the Constitution grants Congress the power to assess punishment for the crime of treason, and Article IV Section 3 grants Congress the power to create rules and regulations considered “needful” in dealing with the U.S. territories or “other Property belonging to the United States.” 

Perhaps the most important powers reserved to Congress by Article I, Section 8 are those to create taxes, tariffs and other sources of funds needed to maintain the operations and programs of the federal government and to authorize the expenditure of those funds. In addition to the taxation powers in Article I, the Sixteenth Amendment authorizes Congress to establish and provide for the collection of a national income tax. The power to direct the expenditure of federal funds, known as the “power of the purse,” is essential to the system of “checks and balances” by giving the legislative branch great authority over the executive branch, which must ask Congress for all of its funding and approval of the president’s annual federal budget.

The complete text of Article I, Section 8 creating the 17 enumerated powers of Congress reads as follows:

• Clause 1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts, and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
• Clause 2: To borrow Money on the credit of the United States; 
• Clause 3: To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes; 
• Clause 4:  To establish a uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States; 
• Clause 5: To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures; 
• Clause 6: To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States;​
• Clause 7: To establish Post Offices and post Roads; 
• Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries; 
• Clause 9: To constitute Tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court; 
• Clause 10: To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations; 
• Clause 11: To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water; 
• Clause 12: To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years; 
• Clause 13: To provide and maintain a Navy; 
• Clause 14: To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces; 
• Clause 15: To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions; 
• Clause 16: To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
• Clause 17: To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings; 

The final clause of Article I, Section 8—known as the “Necessary and Proper Clause” is the source of the implied powers of Congress.

• Clause 18: To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.

One of the first and most famous uses of implied power arose from the Supreme Court’s landmark 1819 McCulloch vs. Maryland decision. In this case, Congress had created the Second Bank of the United States, deeming its action “necessary and proper” for the general welfare of the United States and its people. When Maryland tried to place a tax on notes issued by the bank, U.S. Representative John McCulloch appealed it. The Supreme Court unanimously ruled in McCulloch’s favor, preserving the Second Bank and creating the precedent for Congress to use its implied powers in creating laws.

Since McCulloch vs. Maryland, Congress has used its implied powers in enacting laws regulating firearms, establishing the federal minimum wage, creating the income tax, and establishing the military draft, among others.

In passing many laws, Congress draws its authority from the “Commerce Clause” of Article I, Section 8, granting Congress the power to regulate business activities “among the states.”

Over the years, Congress has relied on the Commerce Clause to pass environmental, gun control, and consumer protection laws because many aspects of business require materials and products to cross state lines.

However, the scope of the laws passed under the Commerce Clause is not unlimited. Concerned about the rights of the states, the U.S. Supreme Court in recent years has issued rulings limiting the power of Congress to pass legislation under the commerce clause or other powers specifically contained in Article I, Section 8. For example, the Supreme Court has overturned the federal Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 and laws intended to protect abused women on the grounds that such localized police matters should be regulated by the states.

All powers not granted to the U.S. Congress by Article I, Section 8 are left to the states. Worried that these limitations to the powers of the federal government were not clearly enough stated in the original Constitution, the First Congress adopted the Tenth Amendment, which clearly states that all powers not granted to the federal government are reserved to the states or the people.