Who Makes Foreign Policy?
http://www.antiwar.com/paul/?articleid=10147
by Rep. Ron Paul
The Iraq Study Group released its report [.pdf]
http://www.antiwar.com/ISG.pdf
last week, giving the president several recommendations
to consider in prosecuting the war. Similarly, the
incoming Democratic leaders in Congress promise to
urge the president to take a new course in Iraq.
Meanwhile, one newly elected member of Congress was
asked on national television about the Iraq war. She
responded by saying she had no real opinion, and that
foreign policy was "up to the president."
In each instance, it is assumed that the president will
make Iraq policy. I'm not talking about the details of
actual military operations in Iraq; I'm talking about
the broader policy questions of how long our troops
will stay, how many will stay, and how victory will be
defined.
The media, Congress, and the American public all seem
to have accepted something that is patently untrue:
namely, that foreign policy is the domain of the
president and not Congress. This is absolutely not the
case and directly contrary to what our Founding Fathers
wanted.
The role of the president as commander in chief is to
direct our armed forces in carrying out policies
established by the American people through their
representatives in Congress. He is not authorized to
make those policies. He is an administrator, not a
policy maker. Foreign policy, like all federal policy,
must be made by Congress. To allow otherwise is to act
in contravention of the Constitution.
Library of Congress scholar Louis Fisher, writing in
The Oxford Companion to American Military History,
summarizes presidential war power:
"The president's authority was carefully constrained.
The power to repel sudden attacks represented an
emergency measure that allowed the president, when
Congress was not in session, to take actions necessary
to repel sudden attacks either against the mainland of
the United States or against American troops abroad.
It did not authorize the president to take the country
into full-scale war or mount an offensive attack
against another nation."
But it's not simply the decision to wage war that is
left to Congress. Consider also the words of James
Madison:
"Those who are to conduct a war cannot in the nature
of things, be proper or safe judges, whether a war
ought to be commenced, continued, or concluded. They
are barred from the latter functions by a great
principle in free government, analogous to that which
separates the sword from the purse, or the power of
executing from the power of enacting laws." (Emphasis
added.)
So Congress is charged not only with deciding when to
go to war, but also how to conduct - and bring to a
conclusion - properly declared wars. Of course the
administration has some role to play in making
treaties, and the State Department should pursue
beneficial diplomacy. But the notion that presidents
should establish our broader foreign policy is
dangerous and wrong. No single individual should be
entrusted with the awesome responsibility of deciding
when to send our troops abroad, how to employ them
once abroad, and when to bring them home. This is why
the Founders wanted Congress, the body most directly
accountable to the public, to make critical decisions
about war and peace.
It is shameful that Congress ceded so much of its
proper authority over foreign policy to successive
presidents during the 20th century, especially when
it failed to declare war in Korea, Vietnam, Kosovo,
and Iraq. It's puzzling that Congress is so willing
to give away one of its most important powers, when
most members from both parties work incessantly to
expand the role of Congress in domestic matters. By
transferring its role in foreign policy to the
president, Congress not only violates the Constitution,
but also disenfranchises the American electorate.
http://www.antiwar.com/paul/?articleid=10147
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