# Bill introduced to limit the president's war powers **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 30, 2007, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619 "2007-10-30T19:41:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![toadspittle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c0e974/32.png) [@toadspittle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toadspittle)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/21 "2007-10-31T17:08:24Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] Now, if they want to stop the war outright with legislation they may need a veto-proof majority. But they don’t need that to end the war, they only need what they already have, control of Congress. All they had to do is refuse to sign off on funding for the war and the war would end, they’ve signed off on said funding since taking power. Thus the Dems really can’t argue they’re serious about ending the war, because they had a chance and they could have done it. Only they can approve spending, they approved further spending on the war. [/QUOTE] I agree. They gave Bush everything he asked for in the budget. They clearly are not that interested in stopping the war. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/22 "2007-10-31T17:17:53Z")
Isn’t this ultimately something that requires a Constitutional Amendment? It seems the Executive Branch likes to determine its powers rather broadly and so far seem to mostly get away with it. Frontline recently had an interesting show on this called Cheney’s Law. > [@](#): > > For three decades Vice President Dick Cheney conducted a secretive, behind-closed-doors campaign to give the president virtually unlimited wartime power. Finally, in the aftermath of 9/11, the Justice Department and the White House made a number of controversial legal decisions. Orchestrated by Cheney and his lawyer David Addington, the department interpreted executive power in an expansive and extraordinary way, granting President George W. Bush the power to detain, interrogate, torture, wiretap and spy – without congressional approval or judicial review. > > SOURCE: [Watch The Full Program Online (video) | Cheney's Law | FRONTLINE | PBS](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/cheney/view/) (you can actually watch the whole show online at that link) ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/23 "2007-10-31T17:24:01Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] I suggest you educate yourself before continuing in this debate. If you don’t think Congress gave Bush full authorization for the use of military force against Iraq then you’ve either been asleep for the past four years or you’re simply lying… [/QUOTE] Boy, I bet that felt _good_, huh? Did you really think I had no such awareness? There is a point whereat fact is not truth. This is one of those. Yes, indeed, such a resolution exists, passed with all due solemn pimp and circumstance. But it was all a lie, wasn’t it, **Martin**? A resolution obtained by lies and half-truths, for a alleged purpose entirely divorced from the reality of its ends, is a lie. Whether it is a fact or not is the merest nitpick, it is a gossamer negligee over a poxed and leprous Shanghai whore. Just for a comparison, just to gauge my derangement against a more worthy opinion, did you believe him? When he swore up and down that the purpose of the resolution was to bolster his credibility, to shore up his position, so that he might more forcefully negotiate and thus bring the matter to a peaceful resolution, did you believe him? I thought he was lying through his teeth, and said so here (my Boswell can verify that, if you need). How about you? What did you think? Did your chest fill with pride when Colin Powell gave his presentation, swollen with manly _gravitas_? When they said they were sure, totally sure, that Saddam was mere months away from nukes, did you believe him? I didn’t. (You will recall, since the facts are right at your fingertips, that it was nukes to begin with, when that goalpost proved shaky, they moved it to “WMD”, and even that was a lie. You do recall this, yes?) And if the answer is “yes”, which of us, then, has been “asleep”? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/24 "2007-10-31T17:46:04Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] The Mexican-American War was one of the most important wars in American history, and I think many Americans fail to appreciate that. It was naked aggression, but it won us so much land that there’s no way a reasonable person could be anything but happy that we started and won that war. [/QUOTE] It’s like with the extermination/displacement of the Indians: The guilt of the crime is on our ancestors while we enjoy the fruits. No (white) American can fail to be happy with the result, but neither could any one seriously, credibly argue we should do the same if we had it to do over again – nor that we should ever again take an opportunity, however ripe and rich, to collectively win great wealth by force. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/25 "2007-10-31T18:59:44Z")
[QUOTE=Ravenman] Perhaps you can show me the authorization for Korea. Or Kosovo. Or Panama. Or Somalia. Or Lebanon. Or Libya. Or the No-Fly Zones which existed over Iraq for 11 years. Or Grenada. Or Haiti. Or the Boxer Rebellion. Or the multitude of interventions in Central America. I could go on. [/QUOTE] I think we’re discussing separate things here. Many of these conflicts had plenty of authorization - Korea was funded by emergency appropriation four times during the conflict, and our continuing deployment there has met with congressional approval in a similar fashion. Kosovo likewise was funded by emergency appropriation, and in this fashion Congress assented. THe same is true for most of these conflicts. What you are talking about is prior authorization - which does not seem to be a constitutional requirement. Indeed, even the War Powers Act, whose constitutionality is much debated, doesn’t require this - only that Congress give its assent in a certain limited time. And funding has traditionally meant assent here. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/26 "2007-10-31T19:12:21Z")
[QUOTE=Mr. Moto] Many of these conflicts had plenty of authorization - Korea was funded by emergency appropriation four times during the conflict, and our continuing deployment there has met with congressional approval in a similar fashion. Kosovo likewise was funded by emergency appropriation, and in this fashion Congress assented. THe same is true for most of these conflicts. What you are talking about is prior authorization - which does not seem to be a constitutional requirement. Indeed, even the War Powers Act, whose constitutionality is much debated, doesn’t require this - only that Congress give its assent in a certain limited time. And funding has traditionally meant assent here. [/QUOTE] The bill we’re debating refers to prior authorization. And I don’t think the War Powers Act is constitutional: just because a war is small doesn’t relieve the Constitutional requirement that Congress maintain control over the power of deciding war or peace, except in ex extremis. As far as funding meaning consent, we’re talking about two separate issues here: the Constitutional power of Congress over the power to declare war and the Constitutional power over the purse. Just because Congress funds the Department of Justice doesn’t mean that wiretapping is legal. Placing the burden on Congress to cut off funds to anything it disapproves of – rather than maintaining the responsibility of the Executive Branch to faithfully execute the laws – undermines the rule of law to a degree only limited by the audacity of the White House, whether it is in the hands of a Democrat or Republican. In any case, Martin challenged me to point out the war that was not authorized by Congress. Korea is that war, no matter how much money was appropriated for it. I pose the question again: Why shouldn’t Congress get to vote before the President can begin a war of choice? That’s essentially what the bill is proposing. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/27 "2007-10-31T19:41:08Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] It’s like with the extermination/displacement of the Indians: The guilt of the crime is on our ancestors while we enjoy the fruits. No (white) American can fail to be happy with the result, but neither could any one seriously, credibly argue we should do the same if we had it to do over again – nor that we should ever again take an opportunity, however ripe and rich, to collectively win great wealth by force. [/QUOTE] Oh, felix culpa? But, if it’s not too much of a hijack, how could no one “credibly argue we should do the same if we had it to do over againnor that we should ever again take an opportunity, however ripe and rich, to collectively win great wealth by force”? If the weath is great enough, and the risks are small enough, then why not? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/28 "2007-10-31T19:58:07Z")
[QUOTE=Captain Amazing] Oh, felix culpa? But, if it’s not too much of a hijack, how could no one “credibly argue we should do the same if we had it to do over againnor that we should ever again take an opportunity, however ripe and rich, to collectively win great wealth by force”? If the weath is great enough, and the risks are small enough, then why not? [/QUOTE] Same reason you shouldn’t mug that blind lady who just cashed her Social Security check. We’re not just talking _malum in prohiborum_ (which is always iffy WRT international relations), we’re talking _malum in se._ The U.S. never had any more (or less) right to the Philippines than Saddam Hussein to Kuwait. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/29 "2007-10-31T20:17:25Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] Same reason you shouldn’t mug that blind lady who just cashed her Social Security check. We’re not just talking _malum in prohiborum_ (which is always iffy WRT international relations), we’re talking _malum in se._ The U.S. never had any more (or less) right to the Philippines than Saddam Hussein to Kuwait. [/QUOTE] We had as much right to the Philippines as the Spanish or the Tagalog did. Both of them came in and took the land from their predecessors. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/30 "2007-10-31T20:30:10Z")
[QUOTE=Captain Amazing] We had as much right to the Philippines as the Spanish or the Tagalog did. Both of them came in and took the land from their predecessors. [/QUOTE] And we took all our territory from the Indians, long, long time ago; that would not make it any less of a crime and a wrong for any other power to try to take California or Montana from the U.S. (A possession like Puerto Rico would be a different matter, for different reasons, which should be fairly obvious to you.) ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/31 "2007-10-31T20:40:00Z")
I’d support a bill that would mandate withdrawal of any U.S. forces committed to a foreign conflict within 72 hours, in the absence of a Congressional declaration of war. True, Congress currently has the power to declare war and approve war funding. It’s way too easy for Congress to turn over its responsibilities to the executive branch and then squeal in ineffectual protest afterwards. Let’s see our bold representatives put their names on an actual vote to wage war - then maybe we’ll see a bit more realization of what that actually means. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/32 "2007-10-31T20:40:07Z")
Our record as regards our bald theft of the Phillipines is shameful. We allied ourselves with a native insurrection against the Spanish, making fulsome promises of our support for an independent Phillipines, and then betrayed them the instant we had control. And we pressed that advantage with savagery. I recommend (once again) Twain’s essay _In Defense of General Funston_, along with several others expressing his heartsick dismay at America betraying its revolutionary heritage in favor of imperialism. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/33 "2007-10-31T20:40:09Z")
**BG** – of course you realize that there’s only two excuses for colonialism: first, we must educate the savages so they’ll have a better life, and second, everyone else was engaging in conquest, so we had to keep up. At least **Captain Amazing** is avoiding the first argument for the moment. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/34 "2007-10-31T20:58:58Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] And we took all our territory from the Indians, long, long time ago; that would not make it any less of a crime and a wrong for any other power to try to take California or Montana from the U.S. (A possession like Puerto Rico would be a different matter, for different reasons, which should be fairly obvious to you.) [/QUOTE] Help me out. First, why would it be wrong for another power to try to take California or Montana from the US? And, second, if it is wrong, why would it be ok to take Puerto Rico from the US? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/35 "2007-10-31T21:09:07Z")
[QUOTE=Captain Amazing] Help me out. First, why would it be wrong for another power to try to take California or Montana from the US? And, second, if it is wrong, why would it be ok to take Puerto Rico from the US? [/QUOTE] It would not necessarily be OK, especially not if done by force. The difference is: Hawaii, despite its Asian majority, is indisputably part of the American nation – the American **ethnocultural** nation. Puerto Rico, after more than a century of American political rule, is not, and never will be. I consider Puerto Rican independence, at least, a negotiable point for that reason – unlike Hawaiian independence. And if some new Pan-Caribbean Federation were to form and claim PR as part of its “natural” territory, I would at least be willing to hear what they have to say. (But keep your hands off the Florida Keys!) As for taking California from the U.S.: Well, it’s like the Argentines taking the Falklands/Malvinas from Britain. Maybe the Brits held the islands by right in the first place and maybe they didn’t; but the islands and their people had been British, and self-identified as British, for centuries, and had no fellow-feeling with the Argentines. After a very long time has passed, and in the absence of any **present** injustice, nations ought to be willing to accept a status quo, or we’ll forever be dealing with “historical claims” that overlap in every direction. I once heard an Armenian give a lecture where he showed a map of “historic Armenia,” including large parts of what are now Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijain, Iraq and Iran, with the strong implication that all that remains Armenian territory by right. And I’ve seen maps of a projected state of Kurdistan that include a great deal of that “Armenian” territory. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/36 "2007-10-31T21:15:49Z")
From the 1922 classic [_Public Opinion,_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Opinion) by Walter Lippmann: > [@](#): > > Now it happened in one nation that the war party which was in control of the foreign office, the high command, and most of the press, had claims on the territory of several of its neighbors. These claims were called the Greater Ruritania by the cultivated classes who regarded Kipling, Treitschke, and Maurice Barres as one hundred percent Ruritanian. But the grandiose idea aroused no enthusiasm abroad. So holding this finest flower of the Ruritanian genius, as their poet laureate said, to their hearts, Ruritania’s statesmen went forth to divide and conquer. They divided the claim into sectors. For each piece they invoked that stereotype which some one or more of their allies found it difficult to resist, because that ally had claims for which it hoped to find approval by the use of this same stereotype. > > The first sector happened to be a mountainous region inhabited by alien peasants. Ruritania demanded it to complete her natural geographical frontier. If you fixed your attention long enough on the ineffable value of what is natural, those alien peasants just dissolved into fog, and only the slope of the mountains was visible. The next sector was inhabited by Ruritanians, and on the principle that no people ought to live under alien rule, they were re-annexed. Then came a city of considerable commercial importance, not inhabited by Ruritanians. But until the Eighteenth Century it had been part of Ruritania, and on the principle of Historic Right it was annexed. Farther on there was a splendid mineral deposit owned by aliens and worked by aliens. On the principle of reparation for damage it was annexed. Beyond this there was a territory inhabited 97% by aliens, constituting the natural geographical frontier of another nation, never historically a part of Ruritania. But one of the provinces which had been federated into Ruritania had formerly traded in those markets, and the upper class culture was Ruritanian. On the principle of cultural superiority and the necessity of defending civilization, the lands were claimed. Finally, there was a port wholly disconnected from Ruritania geographically, ethnically, economically, historically, traditionally. It was demanded on the ground that it was needed for national defense. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/37 "2007-10-31T23:52:01Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] The difference is: Hawaii, despite its Asian majority, is indisputably part of the American nation – the American **ethnocultural** nation. Puerto Rico, after more than a century of American political rule, is not, and never will be. [/quote] Just two quick notes on that. First, you’re making ethnocultural identity the basis for statehood, or at least that having a unique ethnocultural idenity gives someone the right to statehood. Also, saying “is not, and never will be” is premature. Cultural identities can change over time. To use your example, Hawaii wasn’t part of “the American nation” when we first annexed it. Or, look at what’s happening in Tibet now. Through a combination of Chinese suppression of Tibetan culture as well as migration of ethnic Chinese, Tibet is pretty rapidly becoming Sinocized. I don’t think something like that will happen in Puerto Rico, but who knows. > [@](#): > > As for taking California from the U.S.: Well, it’s like the Argentines taking the Falklands/Malvinas from Britain. Maybe the Brits held the islands by right in the first place and maybe they didn’t; but the islands and their people had been British, and self-identified as British, for centuries, and had no fellow-feeling with the Argentines. After a very long time has passed, and in the absence of any **present** injustice, nations ought to be willing to accept a status quo, or we’ll forever be dealing with “historical claims” that overlap in every direction. I once heard an Armenian give a lecture where he showed a map of “historic Armenia,” including large parts of what are now Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijain, Iraq and Iran, with the strong implication that all that remains Armenian territory by right. And I’ve seen maps of a projected state of Kurdistan that include a great deal of that “Armenian” territory. Those are all good practical reasons for avoiding conquest, but none of them are moral reasons. Part of the problem is the idea of a “right” to territory. Countries exist because they’re strong enough to hold the territory they have, either through millitary strength, economic strength, or even more abstract reasons, like ideology. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2007, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/38 "2007-10-31T23:56:11Z")
Damn. I forgot justification number three for colonialism: if God didn’t want countries to be conquered, he would have made the natives more powerful. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2007, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/39 "2007-11-01T01:45:25Z")
Didn’t want us to eat animals, shouldn’t have made them out of meat! ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2007, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619/40 "2007-11-01T02:38:07Z")
[QUOTE=Captain Amazing] Those are all good practical reasons for avoiding conquest, but none of them are moral reasons. Part of the problem is the idea of a “right” to territory. Countries exist because they’re strong enough to hold the territory they have, either through millitary strength, economic strength, or even more abstract reasons, like ideology. [/QUOTE] And that blind lady has a claim to her Social Security money based on a set of social, moral and legal conventions and the protection of the government. That doesn’t mean her “right” to it is imaginary, nor that it’s all right for you to take it away if you are stronger than she and (since she is blind and probably can’t ID you) run little risk of getting caught. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-introduced-to-limit-the-presidents-war-powers/424619.md?page=3)