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If there was a part for declaring war, I missed it. the parts I say had to do with judicial.
WC, can you find even one example of a Founding Father saying that the President should have this power? How about a court precedent? Legal opinion?
If there was a part for declaring war, I missed it. the parts I say had to do with judicial.
I don't believe they did.
Again, this was an accepted part of the CiC role during the period. Therefore, since the president is CiC, he naturally gets that role, unless specifically taken away by cons ution.
Which it was you ing moron.
Except America was creating a new system of government, so what other govts did at the time doesn't matter. What matters is what they wrote down.
Can you provide any evidence for your interpretation? Anything?
Are you sure you read them? It's in black and white.
Show me the quote please.
IOW, they recognized that in those days the king/CiC had the authority to start wars, and didn't grant our President that power specifically in order to limit his power."[The Commander-in-Chief power] would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces, as first general and admiral of the confederacy: while that of the British king extends to the declaring of war, and to the raising and regulating of fleets and armies; all which, by the cons ution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature." The Federalist No. 69, p. 357.
Again, can you find any Founding Father who stated that the President would have the right to declare war? Or is this just an assumption?
There are pages upon pages of do ents to support my view.
Or are you going to also argue that the President has the right to fund armies too, since that's what kings did in those days?
Not all ideas talked about in the federalist papers were adopted. That doesn't sway my viewpoint.
Care to provide any proof for your side? Legal precedent? Anything?
Can you find even one quote from someone who signed the Cons ution that supported such an idea?
WC the Cons ution interpreter never fails to disappoint...
I told you my angle. Sorry that you cannot disprove my point either.
He already did. You're just too prideful/re ed/chicken to accept you were wrong.
No, that did not address my point satisfactorily.
At this point you're arguing with the SCOTUS...
Do you realize how re ed that is?
What I read of the SC decision was other CiC functions that are addressed cons utionally. It had nothing to do with the right to declare war. If I am wrong, that is what I asked to see earlier. What was quoted was a compilation of authors. I don't know what is quoted from the SC decision and what isn't. Some of it obviously is not in the SC decision.
Last edited by Wild Cobra; 04-03-2011 at 11:46 PM.
Do you realize his post include quotes of SCOTUS opinions on the subject at hand, right?
Here's the entire opinion: http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/project...law/hamdi.html
If I understand him right, WC's argument seems to be that the President has the cons utional power to declare war. That's re ed. Nothing in Article II gives him said power.
That being said, I think there is a smart way of articulating his argument. The way Article I and Article II are introduced are very different. Article I starts with "All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested . . ." while Article II begins with a reference to "the Executive Power" which is vested in the president. Article II doesn't have the limiting terms of "all legislative powers herein granted." Instead, the Executive Power is vested in the president - and one could easily interpret Article II to suggest that there are executive powers beyond those granted by Article II.
An expanisve view of the Executives CiC powers also aligns with the history and design of the cons ution. The Articles of Confederation were problematic because they gave the states to much power, to the detriment of the federal government. The Cons ution was designed to remedy that problem by empowering the federal government over the states (e.g., supremacy clause). Part and parcel of that design was the creation of a national army and navy (which didn't exist under the Articles of Confederation) and the installation of the president as the CiC. I don't think you can assert 1) this history of the cons ution and 2) that the cons ution limits the President's war-making powers.
That said, the declaration power is contained in Article I - Article II makes no reference to it. However, I also don't think much emphasis should be placed on this fact. The quoted section of Hamdi also notes that there was no standing army in the late 18th century. IOW, we should understand the declaration power in light of congress's power to raise an army via appropriations. 200 years later, we obviously live with a standing army - therefore, I think it wise to de-emphasize the necessity or legal strength of the declaration power. In other words, I think it not uncons utional for the President to commit troops, without a congressional declaration, to foreign military hostilities.
An other argument could be made as follows: if Article I supposes full congressional (meaning House + Senate) assent to military operations, the President would be unable to quickly mobilize troops to military operations. Neither Article I or II makes reference to the need (or lack thereof) of congressional authorization in the event the US is attacked. In other words, if you think that the Cons ution requires the President to obtain congressional authorization every time the military is mobilized - what happens when the US is attacked, and congress does not approve military action for hours or even days? Is the President supposed to sit back and watch?
I've disproved it multiple times, by pointing out US precedent and words from the very people who wrote the Cons ution on why they specifically didn't allow the President this power.
You just don't want to accept that. That's why you won't provide proof, because there's none to be found.
Why can't you just admit you're wrong?
Vy, thats what the War Powers Act of 73 is there for.
That said, if America was attacked, do you really think the majority of citizens wouldn't want to go to war?
And let's say that we were attacked, and for some reason the majority didnt want to go to war. Is it still moral for the President to commit resources to a war that most Americans don't want?
Like boutonski, WC is pathologically unable to be incorrect.
I'm not really a big fan of the WPA for starters and I was limiting my point to what's in the Cons ution - not what congress thinks the cons ution means.
As for your addendum to my hypothetical, I think it kind of misses the point. I was focusing on congressional authorization for military action while you're focusing on public support for military action. Those are two different things - and get at two different points.
That said, I think the answer to your hypothetical would revolve largely around whether the President thinks he is obligated, per his oath to uphold the Cons ution, to commit military forces despite public disproval.
What I mean is that the question of whether the President should commit military forces is a legal question revolving around his interpretation of the oath of office. I don't see what morals have to do with what I think is a legal question.
My point was just that we shouldn't really take the declaration of war clause too literally because it can produce ridiculous results (like having to wait for congressional authorization before starting to mobilize defenses) and is outdated.
Long story short: I don't think using the declaration of war clause is a legally effective way to say that our Libyan involvement is illegal or uncons uonal.
The article more focused on Yoo and Addington's warped gloss of Article II and the hypermodern sentiment that it is inappropriate for the Congress to limit the president, and that laws do not control his war making powers in general -- roughly, the president may make war at his sole discretion.
So maybe the cons ution is inconvenient and a bit outdated, but public officials still take an oath to uphold it, and courts still occasionally defer to it. If the president feels it don't apply to him, so much the worse for us.
Who said it was? My own cite was related to WC's weird hypothesis about the president's "common law" attributes. Greenwald emphasizes the at ude of lawlessness and contempt for Congressional limitation in the executive (a brazenness very much in accord with your blase' dismissal of the plain meaning of the US cons ution, and also with the near universal tendency to prefer expedience above morality, the laws, etc,.) Who did you conceive yourself to be responding to, vy65?
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