T-B, you're quoting a case from 1874. Here's the Supreme Court ruling in that case:
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/script...l=87&invol=655
What they're saying is that taxes are legal if they serve a public good, but not if they merely take money from one citizen and give it to another. But the key sticking point was that there was a small number of beneficiaries.
That is not a blanket condemnation of progressive taxation, nor does it rule out welfare programs.
Here's a case study:
http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/case/ncba...dy/brsugar.htm
Still many state courts, concerned that the public interest be protected, identified specific criteria essential to making a determination that a particular subsidy would benefit the people. See Mae Nan Ellingson, Jerry C.D. Mahoney, Public Purpose and Economic Development: The Montana Perspective, 51 Montana L. Rev. 356, 374 (1990) (identifying four factors common to those programs appropriately considered to have a public purpose: the program has traditionally been conducted by government; it cannot be conducted as effectively by the private sector or without government sponsorship;
it benefits primarily or directly all citizens or general class of citizens; and the program is reasonably related to the intended benefit).
The problem is giving money to a very narrow constituency with no valid public purpose.