Madison, Feb 6, 1792, Bounty Payments for Cod
“If Congress can apply money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands; they may establish teachers in every state, county, and parish, and pay them out of the public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the union; they may assume the provision for the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post roads; in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation, down to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress; for every object I have mentioned would admit the application of money, and might be called, if Congress pleased, provisions for the general welfare.”
“In short, sir, without going further into the subject, which I should not have here touched on at all, but for the reasons already mentioned, I venture to declare it as my opinion, that were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundation, and transmute the very nature of the limited government established by the people of America: and what inferences might be drawn or what consequences ensue from such a step, it is incumbent on us all well to consider.”
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-14-02-0192