The War Powers Act

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Please see the attached pdf essay War Powers Act, “The President versus the World: How Presidents Seized Control of the War Power”. Essentially, the conclusion drawn in that essay is that the War Powers Act is essentially ineffective and, for all intents and purposes, powerless to stop Presidents from unilateral military control and deployment of troops into combat.

Answer the following questions:

  1. If no judicial court of authority, namely the United States Supreme Court, has stricken the 1973 War Powers Act and declared it null and void constitutionally, how is it that the authors of the text book are able to conclude Congress has few, if any, war powers remaining? How can this be? The law is the law, is it not? (Specifically, explain the political phenomenon that has occurred here and has similarly occurred in other legal and constitutional matters allowing the law to be ignored.)
  1. Attempting to think as objectively as possible and placing your political partisan beliefs aside (looking at presidents as just that, presidents, as opposed to Democratic or Republican presidents) what does the increase in presidential unilateral military power do to the United States as a nation, for better or worse? (There is no correct answer, yet think through the checks and balances consequences.)

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AMERICA IN THE WORLD The President versus the World: How Presidents Seized Control of the War Power 8 SANCHEZ ARMY sional declaration. Indeed, the president later pointed out that he had specifically avoided asking Capitol Hill for “authoriza- tion" since such a request might improp- erly imply that Congress "had the final say in ... an executive decision." In 1994, President Clinton planned an invasion of Haiti under the cover of a UN Security Council resolution. Congress expressed strong opposition to Clinton's plans, but he pressed forward nonethe- less, claiming that he did not need con- gressional approval. In a similar vein, between 1994 and 1998, the adminis- tration undertook a variety of military actions in the former Yugoslavia without formal congressional authorization. The 1973 War Powers Resolution bombing of Libya in response to a terror- In 2001, President George W. Bush ordered an attack that soon toppled provided that presidents could not deploy ist attack in Berlin that the administration Afghanistan's Taliban regime. In 2003, he military forces for more than 60 days blamed on Libyan agents. In both cases, sent American forces to oust Saddam Hus- without securing congressional authori- Reagan acted without consulting Con- sein's government in Iraq. Bush had con- zation. Many in Congress saw this time gress and claimed that his authority had gressional support for his actions but, like limit as a restraint on presidential action, come directly from the Constitution. his predecessors, asserted that he did not though it gave the president more discre- Reagan's successor, George H. W. need Congress's permission to undertake tion than the framers of the Constitu- Bush, ordered an invasion of Panama military action. In 2011, President Obama tion had provided. President Gerald Ford designed to oust the Panamanian strong- ordered American forces to assist in the had carefully followed the letter of the man General Manuel Noriega. Congress ultimately successful NATO campaign to law when organizing a military effort to made no official response to the invasion. oust Libya's leader, Mu'ammar Qaddafi. rescue American sailors held by North In 1990-91, the Bush administration sent Like his predecessors, Obama claimed Korea. But this was the first and last a huge American military force into the Congress had no authority in this matter. time that the War Powers Act was fully Persian Gulf in response to Iraq's invasion It is no longer clear what war powers, if any, observed. Between 1982 and 1986, and occupation of Kuwait. Both houses remain in the hands of Congress. President Reagan presented Congress of Congress voted to authorize military with a set of military faits accomplis that action against Iraq, but Bush made it clear "George H. W. Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World Trans- undermined the War Powers Act and, in that he did not feel bound by any congres- formed (New York: Knopf, 1998), p. 441. effect, asserted a doctrine of sole presi- dential authority in the security realm. In October 1983, while American forces forcritical analysis were still in Lebanon, President Reagan ordered an invasion of the Caribbean 1. Article I of the Constitution gives Congress the power to declare war. Why island of Grenada after a coup had led have modern presidents consistently refrained from asking Congress for to the installation of a pro-Cuban govern- such a declaration? ment on the island. Congress threatened 2. The scholar Edward Corwin said that the Constitution invited the president to invoke the War Powers Act, but Reagan and Congress to struggle over war powers. What advantages have allowed withdrew American troops before the Sen- presidents gradually to prevail in this struggle over the past century? ate acted. In 1986, Reagan ordered the 522
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Running Head: THE WAR POWERS ACT

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The War Powers Act
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THE WAR POWERS ACT

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Question 1
If no judicial court of authority, namely the United States Supreme Court has stricken the
1973 War Powers Act and declared it null and void constitutionally, how is it that the authors of
the text book are able to conclude Congress has few, if any, war powers remaining? How can this
be? The law is the law, is it not? (Specifically, explain the political phenomenon that has occurred
here and has similarly occurred in other legal and constitutional matters allowing the law to be
ignored.)
One of the major reasons is that the Congress ha...


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