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Posted on 08/25/2015 2:14:51 PM PDT by Citizen Zed
The biggest casualty in the struggle against the Islamic State so far has been the American Constitution. One year into the battle, the president and Congress threaten to destroy all serious restraints against open-ended war-making by the commander-in-chief. President Obama waited for half a year before even submitting a draft resolution authorizing his initiative. But it is now obvious that the Republican-controlled Congress finds it politically convenient to stand on the sidelines and let Obama take the blame for the escalating instability. That leaves only the Supreme Court to halt this transformation of the president into a latter-day King George III.
As The Atlantic’s Garrett Epps rightly emphasizes, allowing the president to go unchallenged will produce a terrible precedent. As the rise and rise of Donald Trump suggests, future presidents may make aggressive use of their powers as commander in chief—and they will predictably point to Obama’s unilateral war on ISIS to justify their own military adventures.
Enter the Supreme Court. Since the justices would deny standing to the bipartisan group of legislators on Capitol Hill who have failed to convince their colleagues to take their constitutional responsibilities seriously, everybody has assumed that the Court will remain on the sidelines as Obama’s war continues. This is a mistake.
Existing case-law establishes that individual soldiers can go to court if they are ordered into a combat zone to fight a war that they believe is unconstitutional. During the closing years of the Vietnam War, two federal courts of appeal carefully considered, and unanimously affirmed, the standing of soldiers to bring such complaints. Neither court backed those challenges on the merits, but the facts surrounding Richard Nixon’s escalation in Vietnam raised very different issues from those raised by the ISIS campaign.
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
This is nonsense.
The congress and president have done this since before the Barbary Wars.
It’s been approved by the authors and ratifiers of the constitution and there is no higher authority.
Of course there’s no telling what the Supreme Court will do.
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Only Congress and a State can enter into War. A President has no authority in 'war', except in following the dictates of Congress.
Congress, the Pres and the rest should be removed from office.
I’d be more interested in knowing if they can force Congress to pay for it up front.
1) Any declaration of war should only be closed with a peace treaty. If there is no one left to sign a peace treaty, leave the state of war open, just in case they pop up again.
2) You can only declare war against a nation-state. Quasi-rebel terrorists don’t count when they’re in the sovereign territory of a nation. Feel free to declare war against that nation if you wish, see #1.
3) Do not go in to lose. No lawyers embedded in your troops, no ‘rules of engagement’ which might cause a soldier to hesitate in the field of battle. You don’t want soldiers wandering through that place, don’t declare states of war. See #2.
4) Foreign terrorists who target Americans have zero rights, never will have any rights, and may be destroyed by any means necessary. Traitors serving with foreign terrorists may optionally, at the president’s discretion, be granted a trial if captured peacefully or if the traitor turns themselves in. Any confusion, please see piracy.
It appears SCOTUS can do whatever it wants - just like Obie it is outta control and we have a paralyzed GOPE led Congress
Have hope then: the Supreme Court is as capable as you of ignoring the authors and ratifiers of the Constitution.
They care not what the Founders thought either.
What did I say that wasn’t in the Constitution?
Does anyone else remember it this way?
I sure don't.
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