Obama’s War

In ordering air and naval strikes on a country that neither threatened nor attacked the United States, did President Obama commit an impeachable act?

So it would seem. For the framers of the Constitution were precise. The power to declare war is entrusted solely to Congress.

From King William’s War to Queen Anne’s War to King George’s War to the Seven Years’ War, the colonists had had their fill of royal wars. To no principle were they more committed than that the power to declare war must be separate from the power to wage it.

And Obama usurped that power.

His defenders argue that under the War Powers Act he can wage war for 60 days before going to Congress. But that applies only if the president is responding to an attack or has determined that the nation is under imminent threat.

Before George H.W. Bush went to war to liberate Kuwait and George W. Bush took us to war against Iraq, each went to Congress and got roll-call votes authorizing those war.