Waxman and Ramsey on Delegating War Power
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 22 January 2024
⏱️ 54 minutes
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Summary
There is much debate among academics and policy experts over the power the Constitution affords to the president and Congress to initiate military conflicts. But as Michael Ramsey and Matthew Waxman, law professors at the University of San Diego and Columbia, respectively, point out in a recent law review article, this focus misses the mark. In fact, the most salient constitutional war powers question—in our current era dominated by authorizations for the use of military force—is not whether the president has the unilateral authority to start large-scale conflicts. Rather, it is the scope of Congress’s authority to delegate its war-initiation power to the president. This question is particularly timely as the Supreme Court appears growingly skeptical of significant delegations of congressional power to the executive branch.
Matt Gluck, Research Fellow at Lawfare, spoke with Waxman and Ramsey about their article. They discussed the authors' findings about the history of war power delegations from the Founding era to the present, what these findings might mean if Congress takes a more assertive role in the war powers context, and why these constitutional questions matter if courts are likely to be hesitant to rule on war powers delegation questions.
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| 1:01.0 | Search skills for life. If you want to go back to a world in which the president doesn't have a lot of unilateral power to take the country |
| 1:16.8 | to war. |
| 1:17.8 | The Congress holds that power. |
| 1:19.8 | Well then you're kind of peeling back this layer that's been laid over the delegation issue. |
| 1:27.0 | I'm Matt Gluck, Research Fellow at Law Fair, and this is the Law Fair |
| 1:32.0 | podcast January 22 22, 2024. |
| 1:36.1 | There is much debate among academics and policy experts over the power of the Constitution |
| 1:41.4 | affords to the President and Congress to initiate military |
| 1:45.1 | conflicts. But as Michael Ramsey and Matthew Waxman, law professors at the University |
| 1:50.9 | of San Diego and Columbia, Columbia respectively point out in a recent law review article |
| 1:56.0 | this focus misses the mark in fact the most salient constitutional war powers question in our current era dominated by authorizations |
| 2:05.1 | for the use of military force is not whether the president has the unilateral authority to start |
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