Page:Is Capital Income, Earle, 1921.djvu/37

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IS CAPITAL INCOME?
37

CHAPTER II.

The Cost of Ignoring the Methods of Constitutional Interpretation as Prescribed by the Supreme Court.

"Constitutional provisions for the security of person and property should be liberally construed. * * * It is the duty of Courts to be watchful for the constitutional rights of the citizen, and against any stealthy encroachments thereon."

Article I, Section 8, Clause 5 of the Constitution provides that Congress shall have power "to coin money." Clause 6: "To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and coin of the United States." It, therefore, expressly provides for the money that Congress is to have the power to make, as well the kind of money that Congress is to have the power of punishing the counterfeiting thereof. It does not leave this power open to implication. The power is definitely defined. The claim that the words "and also issue paper money" should be added, would seem to be disposed of by mere reference to the established maxim "expressum facet cessare tacitum"; for "if authority is given expressly, though by affirmative words, upon a defined condition, the expression of that condition, excludes the doing of the act authorized under other circumstances than those defined, 'expressio unius est exclusio alterius'." Willes, J., North Stafford case, L. R. 3, Ex. 177.

But were there doubt, it was the duty of the Court, as already explained, to solve it, by inquiry as to the