“Nowhere is there an authority to declare war on an ideology, no matter how abhorrent we consider that ideology to be.”
Another demonstrate of how Paul supports claim to be ‘constitutionalists’ but lack a basic understanding of the Constitution.
There are two problems with your line of argument. First of all the Constitutional argument. The Congressional Power to declare war is a plenary power, one without limit. Congress can declare war in any way it wishes and against any one it wishes. Consequently, the argument that the actions of Congress are unconstitutional collapse.
Second, the practical argument. By treaty, the US has agreed not to issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal. Check out the Hague and Geneva Conventions of the early 1900.
Congress has limitless power? BS.
The Constitution gives Congress explicitly enumerated powers, not unlimited plenary powers.
If Congress had endless power, then why would the Framers have bothered to list its powers in the Constitution, one by one?
Since the beings of the Republic, arguments have been made, and accepted, that some actions of Congress exceed their delegated powers and are unconstitutional.
ROFLMAO!
(wiping tears of laughter)
I've given outside sources for almost every post. You, on the other hand have offered.....(crickets) and still have the audacity to consider me constitutionally ignorant?
Your knowledge is obviously not as extensive as your arrogance.
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There are two problems with your line of argument. First of all the Constitutional argument. The Congressional Power to declare war is a plenary power, one without limit.
BZZT! The power to declare war is still restrained by the Constitution:
It merits particular attention in this place, that the laws of the Confederacy, as to the ENUMERATED and LEGITIMATE objects of its jurisdiction, will become the SUPREME LAW of the land; to the observance of which all officers, legislative, executive, and judicial, in each State, will be bound by the sanctity of an oath. Thus the legislatures, courts, and magistrates, of the respective members, will be incorporated into the operations of the national government AS FAR AS ITS JUST AND CONSTITUTIONAL AUTHORITY EXTENDS; and will be rendered auxiliary to the enforcement of its laws.
FEDERALIST No. 27
(The Idea of Restraining the Legislative Authority in Regard to the Common Defense Considered)
Alexander Hamilton
Hamilton says the other clauses limit the authority to declare war.
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The terms of article eighth are still more identical: "All charges of war and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common defense or general welfare, and allowed by the United States in Congress, shall be defrayed out of a common treasury," etc. A similar language again occurs in article ninth. Construe either of these articles by the rules which would justify the construction put on the new Constitution, and they vest in the existing Congress a power to legislate in all cases whatsoever. But what would have been thought of that assembly, if, attaching themselves to these general expressions, and disregarding the specifications which ascertain and limit their import, they had exercised an unlimited power of providing for the common defense and general welfare? I appeal to the objectors themselves, whether they would in that case have employed the same reasoning in justification of Congress as they now make use of against the convention. How difficult it is for error to escape its own condemnation!
FEDERALIST No. 41
General View of the Powers Conferred by The Constitution
James Madison
Madison's statement show the declaratory (general) clauses in the Constitution cannot be applied with out also considering the restrictive (specification) clauses of the Constitution.
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Second, the practical argument. By treaty, the US has agreed not to issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal. Check out the Hague and Geneva Conventions of the early 1900.
§ 1171. But the express power "to grant letters of marque and reprisal" may not have been thought wholly unnecessary, because it is often a measure of peace, to prevent the necessity of a resort to war. Thus, individuals of a nation sometimes suffer from the depredations of foreign potentates; and yet it may not be deemed either expedient or necessary to redress such grievances by a general declaration of war. Under such circumstances the law of nations authorizes the sovereign of the injured individual to grant him this mode of redress, whenever justice is denied to him by the state, to which the party, who has done the injury, belongs. In this case the letters of marque and reprisal (words used as synonymous, the latter (reprisal) signifying, a taking in return, the former (letters of marque) the passing the frontiers in order to such taking,) contain an authority to seize the bodies or goods of the subjects of the offending state, wherever they may be found, until satisfaction is made for the injury.
Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution.
Congress has no authority to dispense of any individual's right of any nature.
The right to reprisal, or remedy of injury, is the right of every freeborn person.
Congress cannot, by law abridge that right, whether by contract, treaty. convention, declaration or resolution.
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As opinions without substantiation are just 'hot air', please provide SOURCES for your assertions in the future.
Such as verifiable documentation of your assertion that the authority to declare war is a 'plenary' power of Congress.