All the Power He Needs
Eastland, Terry
All the Power He Needs With the U.S. under attack, Bush is free to respond. BY TERRY EASTLAND HAS ANYONE NOTICED that we are not having a discussion about war powers? No one is talking much about...
...since Tuesday, of course, we have been in category (3), with the "acts of war," as Bush called the attacks that day, occuring on our property and being directed against our people and our military...
...The fact that we are in category (3) explains why there is so little talk about the War Powers Resolution...
...The point of seeking the resolution was not legal but polit-ical—to show the world that the American government is united in its resolve...
...1846 (the Mexican-American War...
...Note that American Airlines flight 77 was steered into the Pentagon, not the Education Department...
...But whatever the merits of doing that might be, no one has said that the president may not make war against those responsible for the "acts of war" unless Congress declares war...
...The power to declare war is, of course, a legislative power, explicitly provided for in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution...
...As it happened, on Friday by a vote of 98 to 0 the Senate did pass a resolution authorizing the use of force against terrorists and the nations that harbor them...
...and 1941 (World War II...
...declared war five times: in 1812 (the War of 1812...
...The framers of the resolution included the "attack" exception to its application because otherwise it Terry Eastland is publisher of THE WEEKLY STANDARD...
...And the reason no one has said that is the same reason the War Powers Resolution is not a major topic: The executive power encompasses the authority to command the military in the nation's defense...
...The president had asked for the resolution, but in doing so he made clear that under the Constitution he already had sufficient authority to go to war...
...This was the understanding well expressed by a Framer writing under the pseudonym "Marcus...
...Under the Constitution, the executive power includes the authority to defend the nation...
...The almost complete silence on these matters constitutes recognition that it was for such a time as this—when the nation is under attack—that the Framers created the presidency...
...1898 (the Spanish-American War...
...The House was expected to follow suit over the weekend...
...Not even the framers of the War Powers Resolution dared reject it...
...Under the resolution, the president may not introduce the military into hostile situations without (1) a declaration of war,(2) specific statutory authorization, or(3) an attack upon the United states or its armed forces...
...Marcus was James Iredell, a future Supreme Court justice, and he stated the common understanding in the form of a question: "What sort of a government must that be, which, upon the most certain intelligence that hostilities were meditated against it, could take no method for its defense till after a formal declaration of war, or the enemy's standard was actually upon the shore...
...Passed in 1973 over President Nixon's veto, the War Powers Resolution marked an attempt on the part of a Democratic Congress to control presidential warmaking in the wake of the Vietnam war...
...That the "government," which is to say the president, has the inherent authority to make war in the most compelling circumstance imagin-able—when the nation is about to be attacked or, as now, is under attack— has been accepted ever since...
...Since Tuesday there have been numerous calls for Congress to declare war...
...The burden of conducting the war is Bush's, and the interest all Americans have in seeing him do well stems not from a desire to secure oil supplies, engage in nation-building, or enforce international peace—to mention some recent war goals—but to counter an evil that threatens us all...
...And it is at this time that George W. Bush must become what he doubtless never expected to be—a war president...
...Congress has Years from now, the only question that will matter about Bush is how well he performed as the war president that the events of September 11, 2001, so plainly demanded...
...would have been unconstitutional on its face...
...Indeed, that mythical state of nature in which individual rights are insecure is no longer so mythical: Any of us could have been among the thousands who were murdered, and any of us might still be among those targeted the next time...
...1917 (World War I...
...No one is talking much about the War Powers Resolution, nor is anyone proposing that President Bush may not initiate military action unless congress formally declares war...
...Years from now, the only question that will matter about Bush is how well he performed as the war president that the events of September 11, 2001, so plainly demanded...
...No statute—neither one declaring war nor one merely "authorizing" the use of force—is needed to provide power the president already has...
Vol. 7 • September 2001 • No. 2
