Lawsuit: Iraq war requires formal declaration. (Insider Report).Six congressmen, along with several U.S. soldiers and parents of soldiers, filed a lawsuit in a federal court in Boston on February 13th. Their suit seeks to bar President Bush from attacking Iraq without Congress formally declaring war. According to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. a United Press International report, John Bonifaz Citing Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, which states only Congress has the power to declare war, the lawsuit asserts that the congressional resolution on Iraq passed in October 2002 "did not declare war and unlawfully ceded the decision to Bush." "The president is not a king," plaintiff Charles Richardson stressed. "If he wants to launch a military invasion against Iraq, he must first seek a declaration of war from the United States Congress. Our Constitution demands nothing less." While U.S. District Judge Joseph Tauro agreed to hold an expedited hearing on February 20th on the injunction request, past precedents seem to indicate that this lawsuit will likely fail. As the Associated Press reported on February 14th, "Congress has not formally declared war since World War II," pointing out that the War Powers Act War Powers Act (Nov. 7, 1973) Law passed by the U.S. Congress over the veto of Pres. Richard Nixon. The act restrained the president's ability to commit U.S. forces overseas by requiring the executive branch to consult with and report to Congress before involving U.S. of 1973 only required that the president seek congressional approval "before or shortly after ordering military action abroad." But precedents created by presidential usurpation Usurpation Adonijah presumptuously assumed David’s throne before Solomon’s investiture. [O.T.: I Kings 1:5–10] Anschluss Nazi takeover of Austria (1938). [Eur. Hist. , or congressional abdication abdication, in a political sense, renunciation of high public office, usually by a monarch. Some abdications have been purely voluntary and resulted in no loss of prestige. , do not supersede To obliterate, replace, make void, or useless. Supersede means to take the place of, as by reason of superior worth or right. A recently enacted statute that repeals an older law is said to supersede the prior legislation. the Constitution. Interestingly, with a Republican president in the White House, the six congressmen who joined in filing the lawsuit come from the political left, such as Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.) and John Conyers (D-Mich.). A similar lawsuit was filed against President George Bush (the elder) before the Persian Gulf War Persian Gulf War or Gulf War (1990–91) International conflict triggered by Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in August 1990. Though justified by Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein on grounds that Kuwait was historically part of Iraq, the invasion was presumed to be . But a federal judge rejected it on the grounds that the president "had not clearly committed the country to a course of action," and that the 54 congressmen filing the suit only represented 10 percent of Congress, which was far from a majority. |
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