Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) criticized U.S.-led strikes on Yemen, saying they were “an unacceptable violation of the Constitution.”
“Article 1 requires that military action be authorized by Congress,” Jayapal added in her post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, late Thursday.
Other Democrats, including Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), also criticized the strikes.
I guess I meant that those standing authorizations should not exist, as they effectively abdicate a power the Constitution outlined for Congress, transferring it to the President. They erode the checks and balances.
That’s an argument for Congress revoking it though, not for it being illegal.
To that end, I mostly do agree actually. It’s not a good idea for the President to have such vast unilateral military powers without prior Congressional oversight, but again, this was all done by Congress to begin with. They can repeal it at any time.
I’d argue that an unconstitutional law is itself illegal, and thus does not render an unconstitutional action legal. That said, I’m sure I’d lose any argument on the constitutionality of the war power granted by Congress to the President.
The truth is, our Constitution was written in a time when the world moved much more slowly. It’s unfortunately no longer practical to expect it to work in a world as fast paced as ours is today. We need a full rewrite, but I do not trust anyone to rewrite it.