eBook

War powers

Mariah Zeisberg

2013

Overview

Armed interventions in Libya, Haiti, Iraq, Vietnam, and Korea challenged the US president and Congress with a core question of constitutional interpretation: does the president, or Congress, have constitutional authority to take the country to war? War Powers argues that the Constitution doesn't offer a single legal answer to that question. But its structure and values indicate a vision of a well-functioning constitutional politics, one that enables the branches of government themselves to generate good answers to this question for the circumstances of their own times. Mariah Zeisberg shows that what matters is not that the branches enact the same constitutional settlement for all conditions, but instead how well they bring their distinctive governing capacities to bear on their interpretive work in context. Because the branches legitimately approach constitutional questions in different ways, interpretive conflicts between them can sometimes indicate a successful rather than deficient interpretive politics. Zeisberg argues for a set of distinctive constitutional standards for evaluating the branches and their relationship to one another, and she demonstrates how observers and officials can use those standards to evaluate the branches' constitutional politics. With cases ranging from the Mexican War and World War II to the Cold War, Cuban Missile Crisis, and Iran-Contra scandal, War Powers reinterprets central controversies of war powers scholarship and advances a new way of evaluating the constitutional behavior of officials outside of the judiciary.

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Subject: American Enterprise Institute / American Government / Anti-Federalism / Anti-imperialism / Baker v. Carr / Bipartisanship / Blockade / Boumediene v. Bush / Cambodia / Casus belli / Collective security / Constitutional / Constitutionality / Constitutions / Containment / Continuance / Contras / Declaration of war / Defensive war / Deliberation / Democratic peace theory / Dollar diplomacy / Embargo / Executive Branch / Foreign policy / Freedom of speech / Good Neighbor policy / Governance / History / Hostility / Imperial Presidency / Imperialism / Institution / Iran–Contra affair / Judiciary / Law / LAW / Constitutional / LAW / Military / Legislation / Legislative Branch / Legislator / Legislature / Liberalism / Lochner era / Louis Michael Seidman / Madman theory / McCulloch v. Maryland / Military / Monroe Doctrine / National Association for the Advancement of Colored People / National security / Non-interventionism / Original intent / Paul Brest / Peaceful coexistence / Police action / Political jurisprudence / Political Liberalism / POLITICAL SCIENCE / POLITICAL SCIENCE / Constitutions / POLITICAL SCIENCE / American Government / Executive Branch / POLITICAL SCIENCE / American Government / Legislative Branch / Politics / Power politics / Precedent / Precommitment / Public policy / Ratification / Reprisal / Roosevelt Corollary / Separation of powers / Separation of powers -- United States -- History / Slavery / Subversion / Superiority (short story) / Torture / Treaty / Two Treatises of Government / United States / United States Bill of Rights / Veto / War / War and emergency powers / War and emergency powers -- United States -- History / War of aggression / War Powers Resolution / Warfare / William Borah / World War II
• ISBN: 0691168032, 9780691168036, 0691157227, 9780691157221, 9781400846771, 1400846773