Could Someone Explain The Difference Between Congressional Declaration of War and What Happened With Iraq?

Dr. Paul answers this question for you in The Revolution: A Manifesto:

Now didn’t Congress authorize the war in Iraq after all? No, and certainly not in a manner consistent with the Constitution. Congress has no constitutional authority to delegate to the president the decision regarding whether to use military force. That power was consciously and for good reason put in the hands of the people’s elected representatives in the legislature.

Louis Fisher, one of the nation’s experts on the subject of presidential war powers, described what happened this way: “The resolution helped bring pressure on the Security Council to send inspectors into Iraq to search for weapons of mass destruction. They found nothing. As to whether war should or should not occur, the committee washed its hands. By passing legislation that allowed the president to make that decision, Congress transferred a primary constitutional duty from the legislative branch to the executive branch. That is precisely what the Framers fought against.”

We have been under martial law since the "Civil War" so the president can do basically whatever he wants. In light of what we see going on around us, do you think this idea sounds too far fetched? How else are they getting away with it?!?

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is to take away the Commander in Chief roll from the President except "in times of Declared War". Take away his ability to send troops whereever, whenever and we get rid of all the BS.

Not only did Congress play semantics and call it "Authorization of Force" in stead of war (even though they are the same thing), they also voted to enforce a UN resolution. Why are we using our resources to take action on what an international body says? An easy way to destroy one country by being outvoted by other countries.

The "Use of Force" authorization is very different from a Declaration of War. In hindsight, I don't think you would have wanted to give Bush a declaration.

Here is why. Under a formal Declaration of War, the reserves and National Guard can be put on active duty until 6 months after the formal end of the war. As it is now, the Guard and Reserves cannot be activated for more than 24 months on a single deployment. And thus the PENTAGON knows we're not in a declared war.

Also, a formal declaration gives the government the power to take over industry and do a whole lot of not so liberty friendly things.

not in a purely literal reading of the Constitution. There was no formal declaration of war; clearly a power that rests solely with Congress and not with the president. The fact that Congress continues to fund the effort is, in a legal sense, the same thing (and has been so interpreted) as if a formal declaration of war had taken place.

Be advised that I personally do *not* support that statement. I am drawing on the attitude of the U.S. Supreme Court as in Holtzman v. Schlesinger, 414 U.S. 1304 (1973).

A New York congresswoman (Elizabeth Holtzman) and 5 Air Force officers asked for an injunction to halt the bombing of Cambodia based on the absence of a formal declaration of war. A U.S. District Court actually granted the injunction and ordered a halt. A federal appeals court vacated the injunction. Justice Marshall refused to overturn the appeals court ruling, so the petitioners went to William O. Douglas in Washington (the court was not in session at the time) and, after a hearing in Yakima, Douglas reinstated the injunction against bombing. The government went back to Marshall who, after conducting a telephone poll of the other judges, overruled Douglas and reinstated the appellate court's vacating of the injunction. No bombing missions were delayed. Douglas went ballistic when Marshall overruled him. As long as Congress continues to fund the military action, the Court will treat that as if the Congress had actually made a formal declaration of war and they will not enforce the very plain literal wording of the Constitution.

Best regards.

affirmation: President Paul 2008

I continue to learn so much on the DP. Thanks, Michael, and thank you to all the brilliant posters who continuously educate and inform so many:) peace....

is perception. Actual war powers legality via loopholes may be debatable, but I think what Ron Paul understands is the power of perception (as in politics is perception) and that's why he advised declaring war, even intending to vote against his own bill. For the most part, unfortunately, most people only understand simple political concepts. A formal declaration of war imprints the seriousness of an event in the minds of people. This in turn makes them question the need to actually go to war. Can you imagine easy acceptance of Congress actually proclaiming "we the people have decided to go to war with Iraq!" when they had not attacked us? It somehow sounds much more clear, unsettling, and serious than foggy "enforcement of UN resolutions". Formally declared wars are likely to end faster for this reason, as public sentiment will be against it. As Dr. Paul says "Fight it. Win it. And get it over with."

What continuing threat? When one looks to the “Whereas” clauses, the only possible factual threat “continuing” is Iraq’s past conduct in the First Gulf War [i.e., use of force action] and its “violating its obligations under the 1991 cease-fire and other United Nations Security Council resolutions . . . .” Facts were not enumerated in the text. There was no fact indicating a threat to the United States contained in the Resolution. The Resolution of 2002 makes the United States the U.N. enforcer.
On October 3, 2002, Rep. Ron Paul made a motion to declare war on Iraq during discussion on H.J. Res. 114. Then Chairman Henry Hyde (now deceased) rejected Rep. Paul’s motion:
There are things in the Constitution that have been overtaken by events, by time. Declaration of war is one of them. There are things no longer relevant to a modern society. Why declare war if you don’t have to? We are saying to the President, use your judgment. So, to demand that we declare war is to strengthen something to death. You have got a hammerlock on this situation, and it is not called for. Inappropriate, anachronistic, it isn’t done anymore.
There are those who claim the resolution is the same thing as a declaration of war. If a formal Declaration of War is the same thing as a “Use of Force Resolution,” then why would Rep. Hyde make this comment? Why wouldn’t Hyde simply tell Rep. Paul, “Ron, get over it; it’s the same thing.” If it’s the same thing, then why not declare war? The simple answer is that Hyde knew Congress must avoid declaring war or a state of hostilities because of Article 39 of the U.N. Charter. This article is now the repository of declarations: “The Security Council shall determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression . . . .”
But this isn’t all nor the crux of the matter. Hyde’s initial statement that the President was to use his judgment is most troubling. First, like Hyde and the rest of those who voted for it, the President deferred judgment on use of force to the Security Council. Deferring judgment isn’t the same thing as declaring a thing to exist, here a state of affairs. There was and is no need to declare war against Al Quaeda because this state of affairs already existed. Not so with Iraq.
What is it that the 2002 Resolution purported to make known? That the Security Council declared the state of hostility? That the Security Council gave “life and effect” to the use of force? What threat to “National Security” is the President defending us against? The Court in Boumediene v. Bush had the opportunity to clear this matter up but it chose not to.
Boumediene v. Bush
The flaw in both majority and dissenting opinions in Boumediene v. Bush is apparent. The majority presume a legal state of war with Iraq while the dissent juxtapose this state onto radical Islamic jihaadists. We are now embroiled in a religious crusade and a war that was never intended to be a religious war. This leads to further problems. Even Scalia’s dissent attempts to correct the Resolution of 2002 by reciting incident after incident where the United States was attacked by terrorists at large. As Scalia once said, he is not a textualist. If he were, he would have written that the Resolution of 2002 is defective because it fails to indicate that Congress believes the United States is in a state of hostility or partial state of war. He would have no trouble writing that the government has no personal jurisdiction over the detainees because no “enemy” has been established by “declaring” who that enemy is. Detaining “terrorists” is far more problematic than detaining the enemy. We know the enemy when war is declared because a declaration tells us who we are going after. Right now, the “enemy” is not simply Al Quaeda but any radical, transatlantic, fundamentalist jihadist Islamo-facist group in their own country. What does that mean exactly? What is the definition of a “terrorist”? How do we determine these extreme answers?
CONCLUSION
Raising the Constitution and its requirement to declare war is seen as archaic by those who find it problematic to follow it. In support, it is argued that because we’ve got it wrong for 60 years, there is no need to acknowledge the right path. Consider this analogy: Because we’ve had slaves for 60 years, outlawing slavery is now archaic. Absurd? It makes no sense unless it is acceptable to disregard the oath to preserve the Constitution. Since when did we arbitrarily find it right and pure to pick and choose parts of the Constitution that we should enforce? Words mean something. If not, the oath itself is meaningless. Worse, the Republic is meaningless.
When one purposefully ignores the oath and treats it with little imperative, as Rep. Hyde knowingly did, one makes the law political, subject to the arbitrary whims of elections. The will of the People, the source of authority to govern embodied in the Constitution, is simply ignored. While the Iraq war required a declaration, the war against Al Quaeda did not. I leave you with Doug Bandow’s nice summation:
But the U.S. Constitution, to which the president swears allegiance, refers not to the U.N. but rather to the American Congress. Article 1, Sec. 8 (11) states that “Congress shall have the power . . . to declare war.” As Alexander Hamilton indicated, the president is commander-in-chief, but he is to fulfill his responsibilities only within the framework established by the Constitution and subject to the control of Congress.
Of this, there simply is no doubt. Wrote James Madison in 1793, it is necessary to adhere to the “fundamental doctrine of the Constitution that the power to declare war is fully and exclusively vested in the legislature.” Modern supporters of the doctrine of president-as-Caesar make much of the fact that convention delegates changed Congress’ authority from “make” to “declare” war, but they did so, explained Madison, only to allow the president the authority to respond to a sudden attack. When Pierce Butler of South Carolina formally proposed giving the president the power to start war, Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts said that he “never expected to hear in a republic a motion to empower the executive to declare war.” Butler’s motion was quickly rejected.
The reasoning of the conferees in opposing Butler’s measure was simple. Explained Virginia’s George Mason, the president “is not safely to be entrusted with” the power to decide on war. Mason therefore favored “clogging rather than facilitating war.” James Wilson, though an advocate of a strong presidency, approvingly observed that the new constitutional system “will not hurry us into war.” Instead, “it is calculated to guard against it. It will not be in the power of a single man, or a single body of men, to involve us in such distress.” Similarly, Thomas Jefferson wrote: “We have already given . . . one effectual check to the dog of war by transferring the power of letting him loose.”
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Marshall, Ron Paul, Islam, bush, Constitution, Rules, resolution, Iraq, war, HJR 114, H.J. Res., 114, military, use of force, force, Declaration, Independence, talbot, seeman, grotius, U.N., United Nations, Charter, Article 39, Bin Laden, Fatwa, 1996, Barbary Pirates, tripoli, algiers, tunis, capture, enemy, Koran, Al Quaeda, Boumediene, scalia, security council, national security, afghanistan, henry hyde, radical, islamic, jihaad, fundamentalist, Joseph Story, John Marshall, commentaries, enumerated powers, 9/11, when did congress declare war on iraq? | N

USA is not supposed to go to war without a Declaration of War from congress. The Authorization to Use of Military force is the new way of going to war unconstituionally. This article essentially gives the president the power to declare war and "Mission Accomplished" all by himself. It is a relinquishment of a vital responsibility and it is sickening. It gives congress the ability to say "but I didn't realize, I just trusted the President" and then blame Bush for everything.

Our congress has no stones while our president is a delusional maniac. What a disgrace.

was to say that they supported the President and would follow his lead, giving him the consent to declare war if he felt it was necessary.

Sounds fairly similar to declaring war themselves, except for a couple problems. One, being that it was fairly cowardly to not man up and declare war themselves, taking the responsibility that the constitution and the people of America ceded to them, instead they were more worried about people blaming them if things went wrong.

The larger problem is, that it would be one thing if Congress was making a small decision and decided it didn't really matter what happened and gave power to the President. But this was a decision between going to war or not, thousands of American lives at stake and Congress basically says, it doesn't matter, it's a close call, you decide President. Since when is war ever a close decision, it's either essential that we go to war to protect Americans or it isn't.

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Alot of "interpretations" going on.

Basically, the Constitution does not permit the President to declare war.
It is the power of Congress to declare war.
Congress is not authorized to abdicate their power to declare war to the President, based on separation of powers grounds.

However, there has been a long history of "violations" in this regard, going all the way back to Jefferson and the Barbary pirates event.
It was argued that due to attacks, the state of war already existed, so Jefferson used his powers as Commander in Chief to return hostilities, without waiting for any Congressional declaration of war.
He knew there could be dissention about this, and actually sent the Navy out before telling the Congress. Congress basically assented and authorized the appropriations then.
Other presidents since then have used similar tactics to avoid the declaration of war by Congress.

constitutional authority, and a subset of that is how much money is to be spent, accounted for, and for how long. this brings up further question of constitutionality, since congress gave the president carte-blanche authority and an open check-book, allowing the fed to issue money instead of congress.

yeah yeah, congress has to "approve" the issue, but defacto does not account for it. its such a boondogle that the complicit congress just looks for another handout while they give the president his. there is not budget, no balance, no moral authority, nada.

bush has been the king puppet and congress his supporting actors. the nwo central bankers and oil tycoons meanwhile sit back and enjoy the show all the while watching america end - stuffing their pockets with ticket sale proceeds (inflation, oil, gas, healthcare and military industrial corporatism).

This is a big piece of Ron Paul's platform and I am digging deeper into some of the aspects that are important to us all. We need to be able to talk sense on this issue.

I have found some information and I will be posting it here shortly.

The argument was that the enemy is not Afghanistan or Iraq, it is the terrorists, who do not fight under a flag. Because the governments of Afghanistan and Iraq did not attack the US directly, no declaration of war could be made (no target, where as in WWII, Germany and Japan and Italy were clear and defined enemies.) Therefore, Congress could only approved funding and support for 'military action' in these regions.

Instead of arguing the legal issue of the declaration of war, I think it is smarter to discuss the morality of the war....or the lies.