CrossPosted on
Dailykos:
Many people have called the conflict in Iraq an "Illegal War". Usually they mean that the justifications used to sell this War to Congress were fabricated and have since proven to be incorrect - and that the President had a responsibility under the Iraq War Resolution (HJ. 141) to ensure that the allegations of connections to Al Qaeda, WMD's and Nuclear aspirations were true prior to the beginning of hostilities.
But I've come to wonder, should the President have ever been given such responsiblities and power at all? Essentially The President Declared the War, instead of Congress - and that is Unconstitutional.
Maybe what needs to happen to end the War, is simply overturn the Resolution that authorized it.
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It seems to me that there may be legal means to challenge the legitimacy of
HJ 141 on the basis that it's Presidential Determination Section (#3(b) above) directly violates the War Power Clause of the Constitution by shifting Congressional Powers from the Legislative to the Executive branches. IMO what should have happened was that the President should have been given a "Sense of the Congress" Resolution supporting an initial use of force only after presenting his determination to Congress (or only with a 30-day leash as noted in the War Powers Resolution of 1973). His determination would have had to include a full and detailed report to Congress on the status the entire list of grievances against Iraq before being allowed to continue into prolonged War, or else any current action should have been stopped after the closing of the 30-day "police action" window.
Congress should have made the determination and declaration of War only after receiving reports from UN Inspectors, IAEA and ISG substantiating the claims against Saddam.
No, President should be granted the sole power to take us to War, yet that is exactly what happened here.
Vyan
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