Alexander Hamilton Quotes

Under our Constitution the Congress alone has the power to declare war.

I wish the press were paying more attention to the erosion of the Constitution and the slippery slope that we're getting into, by giving up the right of the Congress to talk about when and how and where we go to war.

The constitution vests the power of declaring war in Congress; therefore no offensive expedition of importance can be undertaken until after they shall have deliberated upon the subject and authorized such a measure.

The respective powers of the President and Congress of the United States, in the case of war with foreign powers are yet undetermined. Perhaps they can never be defined.

The Congress decides when to make war and the President decides how to make war.

I question the Constitutional authority of the President to conscript unwilling Americans and send them abroad without a declaration of war by the Congress.

The power to make war is vested in Congress and not in the President. Congress has no constitutional authority to grant such authority to the president.

President’s don’t have the authority to go to war.

The Constitution is clear, Article I, Section 8, power vetted in Congress to declare war. If you go back to the founding documents of this nation, the decision of going to war was to be made by people closest to the ground - the elected officials - to make those decisions.

The framers understood that the momentous decision to go to war requires the informed consent of the American people, expressed through their elected representatives.

U.S. Constitution declares rather unambiguously that Congress has the responsibility to “declare war.

Declarations of war have never been a constitutional requirement for military action abroad.

No power but Congress can declare war, but what is the value of this constitutional provision, if the President of his own authority may make such military movements as must bring on war?

When the President decides to go to war, he no longer needs a declaration of war from congress.

The power to declare war, including the power of judging the causes of war, is fully and exclusively vested in the legislature.

The Constitution is very clear on the - on the declaration of war or reacting to international crimes - crimes against nations. It is the role of Congress to debate and authorize this before the President acts precipitously.

Without the authority of Congress, the President cannot fire a hostile gun in any case except to repel the attacks of the enemy.

The way I read the Constitution,. the Congress is paid a salary to determine whether we should go to war ... Therefore, I don't think Congress is earning its money.

Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion … and you allow him to make war at pleasure. … If today he thinks it necessary to invade Canada to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may see no probability he would say to you, “Be silent!, I see if you don’t.”

Every American war has brought a struggle between Congress and the Executive over war powers. The Constitution is somewhat annoyingly ambiguous on the point declaring that the President is Commander in Chief but empowering Congress to provide for the common defense, declare war, and raise and support armies.

There is going to be no involvement of America in war unless it is the result of the Constitutional process that is placed upon Congress to declare it.

The congressional role in declaring war is especially important not when the United States is the victim of an attack, but when the United States is planning to wage war abroad.

Congress has created and funded a huge peacetime military that has substantial abilities to wage offensive operations, and it has not placed restrictions on the use of that military or the funds to support it, because it would rather let the president take the political risks in deciding on war. If Congress wanted to play a role in restricting war, it could - it simply does not want to. But we should not mistake a failure of political will for a violation of the Constitution.

We in America should see that no man is ever given, no matter how gradually or how noble and excellent the man, the power to put this country into a war which is now being prepared and brought closer each day with all the pre-meditation of a long planned murder. For when you give power to an executive you do not know who will be filling that position when the time of crisis comes.

Was the Vietnam conflict a war which should have, as a matter of constitutional law, required a declaration of war by Congress?