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Limits on Federal Authority

Limits on Federal Authority
The U.S. Capitol in Washington. lazyllama/Shutterstock
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The previous essay explained that the Constitution is fundamentally a document granting enumerated (listed) powers. Like all such documents, the powers it grants are limited.

These limits are one of the Constitution’s most important features. And they have been targets of a hostile propaganda campaign for many decades.

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Rob Natelson
Rob Natelson
Author
Robert G. Natelson, a former constitutional law professor, is Senior Fellow in Constitutional Jurisprudence at the Mountain States Policy Center and the Independence Institute. He authored “The Original Constitution” (4th ed., 2025) and is a contributor to the Heritage Foundation’s “Heritage Guide to the Constitution.”
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