It would be a shame if the Legislative Branch benches itself during crucial times
The legislative branch, the First Branch of the American government, has long stood silent, letting the executive branch ran amok despite major public embarrassments like the Watergate. Consider that
The equilibrium of government, in the view of the Constitution’s Framers, rested on a stated assumption that each branch would fight fiercely to expand its authority but just as fiercely resist encroachment from another branch.
When Congress cowed from their duty to inspect and instruct the president, when they caved from the White House’s pressure, they created minute precedents, which over time, would morph into epic constitutional crisis.
The issue at hand: Can Congress rein in the president’s assertion that Congress should stay out of “micromanaging” the war. This is a direct challenge, all but saying aloud, of the White House daring the Capitol Hill institution of stepping up to the challenge. Legislative members who are doing so, dissenting passionately, are at risk looking unpatriotic.
Nonsense, penned Fred Wabash in the Post, “that Congress would refuse to fight seemed unimaginable” to the Founders.
But Congress must, Wabash wrote. “War is a shared responsibility. The records of the 1787 convention at which the Constitution was drafted unquestionably demonstrate that. An early version of Article I, for example, gave Congress the power to ‘make war.’” Even if it doesn’t, as the current and final version now sits, the Constitution’s
Article I gives Congress not merely the power of the purse. It vests in the House and Senate the authority to “declare war,” to “make rules concerning captures on land and water,” to “provide for the common defense,” to “raise and support Armies,” and to “make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces.”
In addition, the Senate advises and consents on important military appointments, which is why Lt. Gen. David Petraeus was on Capitol Hill last week for confirmation as the general in command of U.S. forces in Iraq.
President Bush is correct when he said he is “the decider.” But if the implication here is that he is the only decider, then he encroached on Congress’s co-authority, via Article I, to co-conduct the war. And by reaffirming his constitutional role as the “commander in chief,” it would be an epic mistake to think that the phrase meant more than the top leader of the military, not the nation, not above Congress, or the Supreme Court.
The Framers were fully aware of the urge for any president to enlarge his authority at the cost of Congress. Thus, the established his authority in the second clause, Article II, after Congress’s Article I. Perhaps in the 2012 DNC they will get it together. If you don’t have plans perhaps you should grab a short term rental in Charlotte.
Change in 2012
It would be a shame if the Legislative Branch benches itself during crucial times
The legislative branch, the First Branch of the American government, has long stood silent, letting the executive branch ran amok despite major public embarrassments like the Watergate. Consider that
The equilibrium of government, in the view of the Constitution’s Framers, rested on a stated assumption that each branch would fight fiercely to expand its authority but just as fiercely resist encroachment from another branch.
When Congress cowed from their duty to inspect and instruct the president, when they caved from the White House’s pressure, they created minute precedents, which over time, would morph into epic constitutional crisis.
The issue at hand: Can Congress rein in the president’s assertion that Congress should stay out of “micromanaging” the war. This is a direct challenge, all but saying aloud, of the White House daring the Capitol Hill institution of stepping up to the challenge. Legislative members who are doing so, dissenting passionately, are at risk looking unpatriotic.
Nonsense, penned Fred Wabash in the Post, “that Congress would refuse to fight seemed unimaginable” to the Founders.
But Congress must, Wabash wrote. “War is a shared responsibility. The records of the 1787 convention at which the Constitution was drafted unquestionably demonstrate that. An early version of Article I, for example, gave Congress the power to ‘make war.’” Even if it doesn’t, as the current and final version now sits, the Constitution’s
Article I gives Congress not merely the power of the purse. It vests in the House and Senate the authority to “declare war,” to “make rules concerning captures on land and water,” to “provide for the common defense,” to “raise and support Armies,” and to “make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces.”
In addition, the Senate advises and consents on important military appointments, which is why Lt. Gen. David Petraeus was on Capitol Hill last week for confirmation as the general in command of U.S. forces in Iraq.
President Bush is correct when he said he is “the decider.” But if the implication here is that he is the only decider, then he encroached on Congress’s co-authority, via Article I, to co-conduct the war. And by reaffirming his constitutional role as the “commander in chief,” it would be an epic mistake to think that the phrase meant more than the top leader of the military, not the nation, not above Congress, or the Supreme Court.
The Framers were fully aware of the urge for any president to enlarge his authority at the cost of Congress. Thus, the established his authority in the second clause, Article II, after Congress’s Article I. Perhaps in the 2012 DNC they will get it together. If you don’t have plans perhaps you should grab a short term rental in Charlotte.