I was born during the Korean War; the first major war a President of the United States took this country into without asking Congress. It was not the last. Not even close.
Over my lifetime, the power of the Presidency has increased incrementally to the point that it exceeds what the framers of the Constitution intended and may even go beyond the parameters stated in the Constitution of the United States, the document under which our country is governed. This increase in unwarranted power has led to the executive branch’s increasing abuse and disregard of the laws by which we are governed, leading to the situation we have today.
This is partly the result of agreements and understandings between Congress and the executive branch that have led Congress to relinquish power to the executive branch over the years. Take tariffs. The Constitution gives Congress, and Congress alone, the power to tax. A tariff is a tax. Congress handed that power off anyway, and this February the Supreme Court had to slap a President’s hand for stretching it past anything Congress ever gave him (1).
It also stems from the premise that elected representatives no longer represent the people, but follow the party they belong to. Don’t believe me? In 2025, 85.3 percent of the roll call votes in Congress were party-line votes. The highest since anyone started counting, in 1953 (2). That’s not representation. That’s a team jersey.
The Constitution’s distribution of power is deliberate, with the understanding that no individual should be able to dictate the workings of government with impunity. That would lead to disastrous results for the people of the United States, or of any other country.
Because of partisan politics (Ugh! What an ugly concept.), Congress and other government institutions are becoming increasingly ineffective, to the point of impotence.
War on One Man’s Say-So
Taking this country to war on one man’s say-so is only one of many in the increasing abuse of power by the executive branch, but it is certainly the most disastrous and futile, leading to the loss and grief of so many of our countrymen and women. That is the reason I single it out here.
The Constitution could not be plainer. Congress declares war. The President commands the troops after Congress decides to fight. Congress last declared war in World War II. Every war since? Somebody else’s decision.
Then came the War Powers Act. Congress passed it in 1973, over President Nixon’s veto, to stop exactly this (3). It failed. Today the President of the United States can single-handedly start a war. An undeclared war. A rose is a rose by any other name, and so is war.
Korea, 1950. The North invades the South with Stalin’s blessing and China’s promise of support. That was reason enough to act, and the United Nations asked for help. But Truman never asked Congress. He called it a “police action” and told congressional leaders he simply acted as Commander in Chief (4). Every President since has stood on that precedent.
Vietnam, 1964. President Johnson tells the country North Vietnamese boats attacked U.S. ships a second time in the Gulf of Tonkin. Congress hands him a blank check within days. The National Security Agency’s own historian later concluded that the second attack never happened (5). It never happened. More than 58,000 U.S. service members died for it (6).
Presidents of both parties treat the War Powers Act like a suggestion. Well over a hundred reports have gone to Congress under that law. Exactly one admitted to the kind of hostilities that start its 60-day clock (3). One.
2001. Days after September 11, Congress passes 60 words authorizing force against those responsible. No expiration date. Presidents of both parties have used those 60 words to send forces into at least 22 countries, against groups that didn’t even exist in 2001. Those 60 words are still the law today (7).
2026. Yet another war, initiated by a President solely on his say-so as Commander in Chief. In February, the United States went to war with Iran. Congress never approved it. In June, for the first time since 1973, both the House and the Senate voted to tell a President to stop. It made no legal difference. The White House calls the War Powers Act unconstitutional and not binding (8). As of this fall, the war is still going: a naval blockade and months of airstrikes. In September, the Senate voted down another resolution to end it (9). That same month, more than 60 percent of voters told pollsters the war was the wrong decision (10). So whom exactly is Congress representing?
For what reason?
Because of the actions of presidents past, and some recently, our brothers and sisters have died in unjust wars or been disfigured, losing limbs and God knows what else, by the thousands and thousands. More than 7,000 U.S. service members have been killed in the wars after September 11. More than 8,000 U.S. contractors (11). And at least four times as many of those troops and veterans have died by suicide as died in combat (12). War, by definition, is a form of insanity. These wars have been wars of futility. They have done little to change the world or the course it is set on. Those who benefited were the arms dealers and the undertakers. Up to half of the $14 trillion the Pentagon spent after 9/11 went to for-profit defense contractors (13).
“There’s No Time to Wait for Congress”
I can hear the argument already. In today’s world, missiles fly in minutes. A President can’t sit on his hands waiting for Congress to catch up with an ongoing situation.
That argument does not hold water.
The framers saw it coming. At the Constitutional Convention in 1787, they deliberately changed Congress’s power to “make” war into the power to “declare” war, leaving the President the power to repel sudden attacks (14). Repel. Defense, not offense.
The War Powers Act says the same thing. A President may send our troops into hostilities in only three cases: a declaration of war, a specific authorization from Congress, or a national emergency created by an attack on the United States, its territories, or its armed forces (15). An attack on us. Not a war of choice.
When this country is truly attacked, Congress doesn’t dawdle. The day after Pearl Harbor, Congress declared war. Three days after September 11, it passed an authorization to use force (7). Speed was never the problem. Asking was.
So yes, if the United States is attacked, the President must respond, and respond fast. But a rapid response to an attack cannot be stretched into a license to start offensive wars. If a President does act first, the engagement must be limited, and it must stay within the parameters of the War Powers Act. That act should be revised and given teeth, so that its limits mean something.
The Oath
Every member of our military swears to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. I swore that oath myself when I joined the Navy. The Constitution comes first. Obeying the President comes after, and only according to regulations and military law (16).
The Constitution gives the power to make war to Congress. A war Congress never authorized is a war outside the Constitution. In my view, the orders that sent our troops into these undeclared wars, past and present, are unlawful orders. The military’s own rulebook says an order contrary to the Constitution is not lawful (17).
So why do our troops follow them? Because military law presumes that any order to perform a military duty is lawful, and anyone who disobeys does so at his own peril. In time of war, willfully disobeying an officer’s lawful command can be punished by death (17). And understand this: it is a presumption. Nothing more. It is not a ruling that the order is lawful. It is simply a decision about who carries the risk, and the answer is the soldier.
Who could take that risk off the soldier’s back? Not the courts. In 2016, an Army captain named Nathan Smith sued President Obama, arguing that fighting a war against ISIS that Congress never authorized violated his oath to defend the Constitution. The judge threw it out. His oath, she ruled, gave him no standing to sue, and whether the war was legal was a question for Congress and the President, not the courts (18). She also pointed out that Congress kept paying for that war, which she treated as Congress going along with it (19). That same judge now has a lawsuit challenging the war with Iran on her docket (20).
Not Congress either. Congress could end any war by cutting off the money. It almost never does.
So the President gives the order. The courts look the other way. Congress pays the bill. And a 19-year-old sworn to defend the Constitution is left holding a buck nobody else will take, with a court-martial waiting if he guesses wrong.
The Buck Stops Where?
Harry Truman kept a sign on his desk: “The buck stops here.” Funny thing, coming from the man who set this precedent. Today Congress passes the buck to the President, and the President passes it to no one.
As President, I will not seek power; that is not the President’s purpose. I will [excoriate] and call shame on a Congress that puts the doctrine of a political party before the needs of the people. I hope I can shame them into doing the job for which they were elected: to represent the people of this country. I will limit the powers of the Presidency to what the Constitution states and expect Congress to do its job rather than passing the responsibility to the executive branch.
But I cannot do squat without the active support of the people of our country. Foolish though I may be, I am not an idiot. I know that, at this point, this less-than-a-campaign of mine has about as chance of succeeding as an ice cube in Hell. I need a savvy campaign manager, a treasurer, and a running mate, if only as a stand-in to meet election requirements. I can be reached at: gtsmith74@outlook.com
Notes
(1) Supreme Court of the United States, Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, No. 24-1287 (February 20, 2026).
(2) CQ Roll Call, “Vote Studies: 2025 Sets New Mark for Partisanship on Capitol Hill,” March 5, 2026, https://rollcall.com/2026/03/05/vote-studies-2025-sets-new-mark-for-partisanship-on-capitol-hill/.
(3) Congressional Research Service, War Powers Resolution: Presidential Compliance, RL33532, https://www.everycrsreport.com/files/20120830_RL33532_bb10ee7eb51b4e30823ce1f971b99661d56897c8.html.
(4) Bill of Rights Institute, “Truman Intervenes in Korea,” https://billofrightsinstitute.org/essays/truman-intervenes-in-korea.
(5) National Security Archive, “Tonkin Gulf Intelligence ‘Skewed’ According to Official History and Intercepts,” December 1, 2005, https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB132/press20051201.htm.
(6) National Archives and Records Administration, “Vietnam War U.S. Military Fatal Casualty Statistics,” https://www.archives.gov/research/vietnam-war/casualty-statistics.
(7) National Constitution Center, “Looking Back: Authorizing Military Force After the 9/11 Attacks,” Constitution Daily, https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/looking-back-authorizing-military-force-after-the-9-11-attacks.
(8) Khaleej Times, “US Senate Passes War Powers Resolution to Halt Iran War, Rebuking Trump,” June 24, 2026, https://www.khaleejtimes.com/world/americas/us-senate-passes-war-powers-resolution-to-halt-iran-war-rebuking-trump-2.
(9) Scripps News, “Iranian-American Group Sues Trump, Claiming Iran War Is Unconstitutional Without Congressional Approval,” September 2026, https://www.scrippsnews.com/us-news/iran-war/iranian-american-group-sues-trump-claiming-iran-war-is-unconstitutional-without-congressional-approval.
(10) Al Jazeera, “US Voter Opposition to War on Iran Grows to New Highs: Poll,” September 18, 2026 (reporting Fox News poll), https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/18/us-voter-opposition-to-war-on-iran-grows-to-new-highs-poll.
(11) Boston Globe, “The Costs of Post-9/11 Wars Exceed $8 Trillion for US,” September 1, 2021, https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/09/01/metro/costs-post-911-wars-exceed-8-trillion-us.
(12) Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, Brown University, Costs of War Project, “Summary of Findings,” https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/papers/summary.
(13) Associated Press, “Study Says Nearly Half of Defense Spending for 9/11 Wars Went to Private Contractors,” PBS NewsHour, September 13, 2021, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/study-says-nearly-half-of-defense-spending-for-9-11-wars-went-to-private-contractors.
(14) James Madison, Notes of Debates in the Federal Convention of 1787, August 17, 1787, The Avalon Project, Yale Law School, https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/debates_817.asp.
(15) War Powers Resolution, 50 U.S.C. § 1541(c), https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title50-section1541&num=0&edition=prelim.
(16) Enlistment oath, 10 U.S.C. § 502, https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title10-section502&num=0&edition=prelim.
(17) Manual for Courts-Martial, United States (2019 ed.), Part IV, paragraph 16 (Article 90, willfully disobeying superior commissioned officer) and paragraph 18 (Article 92, failure to obey order or regulation), https://sites.duke.edu/lawfire/files/2023/03/Extdictates2019-MCM-Final-20190108.pdf; https://jsc.defense.gov/Portals/99/Documents/Arts9293Jun15.pdf.
(18) Smith v. Obama, 217 F. Supp. 3d 283 (D.D.C. 2016), Memorandum Opinion, November 21, 2016, https://www.justsecurity.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Smith-Opinion-dismissing-case.pdf.
(19) Courthouse News Service, “Court Rejects Challenge to War Against Islamic State,” November 2016, https://www.courthousenews.com/court-rejects-challenge-to-war-against-islamic-state/.
(20) National Iranian American Council Action v. Trump, No. 1:26-cv-03331 (D.D.C., filed September 24, 2026), Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse, https://clearinghouse.net/case/48494/.
