Joe Miller: Federal Minimum Wage Is Unconstitutional (VIDEO)

Employees in the U.S. should not be provided a federal guarantee of minimum wage, Alaska Senate candidate Joe Miller said recently. The states, instead, should be left to determine the minimum rate that an employer can provide their workers, he argued.

"That is not within the scope of the powers that are given to the federal government," the Tea Party-backed GOP insurgent argued in a recent ABC News interview. "That is clearly up to the states."

Miller went on to clarify that "the state of Alaska has a minimum wage which is higher than the federal level because our state leaders have made that determination. The minimum level again should be the state's decision."

Such a policy stance is not extraordinary compared to Miller's other anti-government views. But it is the most clear cut he has been on the issue of minimum wage.

Miller captured victory over Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski in a party primary on a platform of slashing the federal government. Social Security, hate crimes laws, the Department of Education and even unemployment insurance should all be put on the constitutional chopping block, Miller believes.

In an interview with Fox News in September, Miller explained federal provisions of safety nets to the nation's unemployed as an "entitlement mentality" that breaches the Constitution.

And shortly after his primary victory, Miller said that Social Security should be phased out in order "to transfer the power back to the states so that states can take up the mantle of those programs if they so desire."

He recently characterized his opposition to the federal minimum wage and his continued disapproval of federal unemployment benefits in much the same way:

"What I'd recommend that you do is go to the Constitution and look at the enumerated powers because what we have is something that we call the 10th amendment that says, look if it's not there if it's not enumerated, then it's delegated to the states," Miller said. "Everything that's not there is reserved to the states and the people."

Miller is facing Democratic candidate Scott McAdams and a write-in challenge from Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski in November. He currently holds a slight lead in certain polls, though surveying the true prowess of the Murkowski campaign, which will rely on voters to write in her name, has proven a complex task.

WATCH Miller calls minimum wage unconstitutional:

Comments

[Sean777]

02:10 PM on 10/06/2010

Joe Miller can be compared to Fidel Castro, like most Tea Baggers, Miller just wants to be in Power for his own personal benefit. Tea Baggers want the government to work for them but they don’t a government working for anybody else.

[MJinCanada]

03:13 AM on 10/06/2010

Chuck Norris wannabe?

[HHUA]

12:48 AM on 10/06/2010

Who is REALLY behind these tea party candidates?

The tea party movement was organized and is funded by Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks --both groups which David Koch ( of Koch Industries: the largest privately-held energy company in the country!) helped to create and currently sits as chairman of the board for the prior. And is also funded by the Sarah Scaife Foundation which has given a total of $2.96 million in funding to FreedomWorks. The Sarah Mellon Scaife Foundation is financed by the Mellon industrial, oil, and banking fortune. That would be the same BANKING industry that collapsed our economy!

Yes, how "organic"! And these idiots in the tea party think that their movement is "grass roots"? The only thing at the "root" of their movement is BIG CORPORATE MONEY (and their own stupidity!)...What a bunch of moronic suckers!

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Tea_Party_movement_funding

[stape45]

08:36 PM on 10/05/2010

I have to go to Google to see if I can find Joe-the-Miller, a razor that wasn't union-made.

[HHUA]

01:07 AM on 10/06/2010

Bingo!

[Inspire01]

07:54 PM on 10/05/2010

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 2010
Todd Palin: We Support Joe Miller

By Sheya

Last night Todd Palin called in to KBYR and talked to Amy Kremer of the Tea Party Express who was hosting the show:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2q_v7XW0uZc&feature=player_embedded

[Sean777]

07:22 PM on 10/05/2010

The Tea Party is based on hooliganism and predatorily politics. For instance, while around the world a few of extreme religious fundamentalists run countries can create laws to denigrate woman, for the first time in US history Sharron Angle is campaigning about changing our abortion laws to force woman into incest or procreate with rapists. Sharron Angle also believes that government should not require insurance companies to cover autism or maternity care. Joe Miller wants to lower the wages of American workers. Rand Paul wants to eliminate Medicare and Medicaid for our seniors and the list of anti-American proposals from Tea Baggers goes on and on. True Republicans and Democrats need to stop the Tea Party on November.

[HHUA]

12:02 PM on 10/06/2010

"True Republicans and Democrats need to stop the Tea Party on November"

Agreed! These people (tea party candidates) are NOT Republican they are a whole new breed of CRAZY!

[Kenyatta J Yamel]

06:33 PM on 10/05/2010

Joe Miller is an idiot.

[Hillbilly49]

05:38 PM on 10/05/2010

“For those who are going on about how the minimum wage supposedly leads to increased unemployment:

David Card and Alan B. Krueger have already made national news with their path breaking research on the minimum wage. Here they present a powerful new challenge to the conventional view that higher minimum wages reduce jobs for low-wage workers. In a work that has important implications for public policy as well as for the direction of economic research, the authors put standard economic theory to the test, using data from a series of recent episodes, including the 1992 increase in New Jersey's minimum wage, the 1988 rise in California's minimum wage, and the 1990-91 increases in the federal minimum wage. In each case they present a battery of evidence showing that increases in the minimum wage lead to increases in pay, but no loss in jobs.
http://press.princeton.edu/titles/5632.html
In general, there is no valid, research-based rationale for believing that state minimum wages cause measurable job losses. Making the extreme case that the job losses are severe enough to show up in a noticeably elevated state unemployment rate is a wild extension of a largely unfounded theory.

http://www.epi.org/publications/entry/briefingpa­pers_bp150/

[interlude]

07:06 PM on 10/05/2010

Pugcons will simply dismiss this as elitist. I think I'm going to become a pugcon. It would be so freeing to have an easy answer and avoid thinking.

[AllAboutNothing]

05:36 PM on 10/05/2010

He even looks like a da#@ crook. I wouldn't trust him to train my dog. Turn SS UMB etc over to the states yea right.

[EbonBear]

05:20 PM on 10/05/2010

Like every Teabagger, Miller has obviously decided "the Constitution says whatever I think it should say". The courts have already ruled it Constitutional and doing away with it is both economically and morally repugnant.

[mommom]

04:29 PM on 10/05/2010

Maybe he will get together with Christine O'Donnel and proclaim masturbation is unconstitutional.

[emp122]

05:23 PM on 10/05/2010

He would probably try to burn her at the steak, 1776 style.

[Kenyatta J Yamel]

06:37 PM on 10/05/2010

after wages are busted by doing away with the minimum wages more workers will be free to masturbate.

[Vyvjala]

04:08 PM on 10/05/2010

How much more out of touch can this @ $ $ w i p e be?

[TrekBear]

03:57 PM on 10/05/2010

Joe Miller almost certainly hasn't heard about (or is woefullly (willingly?) ignorant of) the Constitution's Commerce Clause. That clause gives Congress wide (and I do mean wide) authority to regulate interstate commerce. If you don't think wages are part of interstate commerce, think again.

[52tucker]

02:53 PM on 10/05/2010

God Bless the Tea Party. They learned all they need to about the constitution from Glenn Beck, which translates to nothing. They've learned all they need to about taxes at the feet of corporations, who are just being taxed too much, gosh darn it! And they'eve learned all they need to about the American people they represent by being completely out of touch with anyone with an education.

[gettingitright]

03:25 PM on 10/05/2010

An apt analysis.

[aaronman]

03:27 PM on 10/05/2010

So you think the Constitution provides a blank check to congress to do whatever they want to do? The Welfare clause entitles them to an unlimited amount of powers so long as it is for the "welfare" of the people? The Commerce clause gives them to power to regulate what drugs we put into our own bodies? This is a stupid and dangerous line of thinking that you have been tricked into believing. We set up checks and balances for a reason, we're a Republic not a Democracy.

"The American Republic will endure until congress learns it can bribe the public with the public's money" - Tocqueville

[emp122]

03:29 PM on 10/05/2010

We are a Republic-Democracy hybrid. Each state receives representation depending on the population of that state. We also have a senate with each state represented equally.

[EbonBear]

05:12 PM on 10/05/2010

The words "Republic" and "Democracy" are not mutually exclusive and there is no conflict between the two, democracy has many forms. One of those is direct (or "Athenisn") democracy but it's not the only one.

And you say "tricked into believing" like only your line of thinking could possibly be valid.

"The American Republic will endure until corporations learn they can bribe the Congress with teh public's money" ~ Me.

[JaCqieBHO]

02:29 PM on 10/05/2010

Crazy is as crazy does. Isn't that the tea party slogan?