f the people, the money raised by these imposts is drawn from their
pockets. Congress has no right under the Constitution to take money from
the people unless it is required to execute some one of the specific
powers intrusted to the Government; and if they raise more than is
necessary for such purposes, it is an abuse of the power of taxation,
and unjust and oppressive. It may indeed happen that the revenue will
sometimes exceed the amount anticipated when the taxes were laid. When,
however, this is ascertained, it is easy to reduce them, and in such a
case it is unquestionably the duty of the Government to reduce them, for
no circumstances can justify it in assuming a power not given to it by
the Constitution nor in taking away the money of the people when it is
not needed for the legitimate wants of the Government.

Plain as these principles appear to be, you will yet find there is a
constant effort to induce the General Government to go beyond the limits
of its taxing power and to impose unnecessary burdens upon the people.
Many powerful interests are continually at work to procure heavy duties
on commerce and to swell the revenue beyond the real necessities of the
public service, and the country has already felt the injurious effects
of their combined influence. They succeeded in obtaining a tariff of
duties bearing most oppressively on the agricultural and laboring
classes of society and producing a revenue that could not be usefully
employed within the range of the powers conferred upon Congress, and
in order to fasten upon the people this unjust and unequal system of
taxation extravagant schemes of internal improvement were got up in
various quarters to squander the money and to purchase support. Thus
one unconstitutional measure was intended to be upheld by another, and
the abuse of the power of taxation was to be maintained by usurping
the power of expending the money in internal improvements. You can
not have forgotten the severe and doubtful struggle through which we
passed when the executive department of the Government by its veto
endeavored to arrest this prodigal scheme of injustice and to bring
back the legislation of Congress to the boundaries prescribed by the
Constitution. The good sense and practical judgment of the people
when the subject was brought before them sustained the course of the
Executive, and this plan of unconstitutional expenditures for the
purposes of corrupt influence is, I trust, fi