THINGS CONGRESS CANNOT DO

Though Congress has the power to accept or dismiss laws that can shape the entirety of American society, there are limitations on their powers, and rightfully so—history is dotted with examples of unchecked lawmaking and the results have not been pretty. To responsibly restrain the powers of Congress, America’s founding fathers built multiple provisions into the US Constitution that ensure we will never face the type of tyrannical rule that caused them to revolt against the British in the first place.   

Further Exploration of America’s Founding Documents

https://www.congress.gov/founding-documents

TAX EXPORTS

Though Congress does possess broad powers of taxation, they may not pass laws that tax the export of American-made products (to clarify, an “export” is defined as a product shipped to a destination outside of the US, not a product shipped between states). Laws that establish taxes of this nature could potentially discourage or even disable specific US businesses, as well as keep certain businesses from ever forming. Instead, through income tax, the US taxes the profits generated by these exports, ensuring the fees levied remain proportionate to the monies a business earns, giving them a better chance to succeed. An export tax would also grant Congress an unchecked ability to manipulate import vs. export levels.    

CREATE EX POST FACTO LAWS

“Ex post facto” is a Latin phrase meaning “after the fact”, so to create an ex post facto law means to declare something a crime after the act has been committed. To ensure justice is served, it would seem helpful to allow Congress to do this, and in concept, it could; if a known murderer (an admitted murderer even), were to somehow be declared innocent on a technicality, the creation of an ex post facto law related to an indisputable action the murderer had taken could ensure they were jailed.  But if ex post facto laws were permitted, Congress could technically make anything a crime, and thereby jail anyone at will.   

PASS A BILL OF ATTAINDER

A bill of attainder (also known as a bill of pains and penalties), is a law that could jail an individual or entire group of people without any trial. In this manner, it is similar to an ex post facto law, as it could give Congress the power to immediately establish guilt. To pass a law like this would violate several basic legal principles, including separation of powers and the right to due process. In one example of the potential consequences of a bill of attainder, King Henry Vlll of England passed a law in 1542 that resulted in the immediate executions of multiple leaders he deemed foes.

MAKE LAWS THAT CONTRADICT THE BILL OF RIGHTS

Along with the US Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and the Federalist Papers, the Bill of Rights is one of the primary documents America was founded upon. The Bill of Rights informs every law related to US citizens, so to contradict it with any new law would be to compromise the entire American judicial system. To use an analogy, if the judicial system were a house, passing a law that ignores or contradicts the Bill of Rights would be like knocking out a support beam from the structure after it was built—it would collapse the entire building.       

FAVOR CERTAIN STATES OVER OTHERS

One of the primary principles of US government, if not the primary principle, is fundamental equality—equal rights for citizens of all genders, races, ages, sexual orientations and religions, as well as equal enforcement of law across these groups. On a larger scale, this principle applies to states as well. In accordance, Congress is forbidden to pass a law for any reason, be it political, economic, faith-driven or otherwise motivated, that blatantly extends any type of privilege to, or imposes limitations on, one state over another.