which provides the procedure the President is following in the Libya incursion.

     
      You are also overlooking that the Constitution says  "Congress shall have power to ... declare War". The earlier draft used the phrase "make war" but the founding fathers decided the president might have to act suddenly and could not wait for Congress to declare war. In fact, four of the five times Congress has actually declared war, they did so after hostilities had begun.

   
     Now where does the Constitution say that only Congress
can take action to avert a humanitarian crisis, or to enforce a UN resolution?

         According to the President, we are are merely taking out Libyan air defenses, we will be active only for a few days, and then we will hand over the job to the allies. That does not sound like a declaration of war to me. Instead, this is merely an "introduction of military forces" into Libya within the meaning of the WPRA; after receiving notice, Congress has the power to terminate the involvement in the specified time if its chooses to do so.





-- Modified on 3/23/2011 5:25:18 PM