Interesting statement. Then why did Congress enact the War Powers Resolution in 1973?
Anyway, you're not clearly reading these posts.
I'm saying that there is no legal definition for anything called "a state of war," and certainly there is no actual "state of war" without a formal Declaration Of War from Congress.
Authorizations Of Force are not Declarations Of War, and you guys know it. Stop pretending they're the same thing, they are most certainly not.
Then what are they? They are not identical, but with the exception of not invoking broad DOMESTIC powers - such as triggering about 150 emergency provisions in the law, such as the right to impose censorship, to expedite licensing for nuclear facilities, and to control communications - the authorization is effectively the same.
Interesting statement. Then why did Congress enact the War Powers Resolution in 1973?
Because they felt like it. BTW, no later President has ever acknowledged the authority of that Act. They have always been very clear to abide by it as an official courtesy rather than legal obligation. Its Constitutionality is questionable - though all that is aside from the previous point.
Hamilton wrote that war "between two nations is completely produced by the act of one -it requires no concurrent act of the other. . . [W]hen a foreign nation declares, or openly and avowedly makes war upon the United States, they are then by the very fact, already at war, and any declaration on the part of Congress is nugatory: it is at least unnecessary."
Thomas Jefferson noted similarly while he was President.