The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation Part 28

SOURCE AND SCOPE

Three different views regarding the source of the war power found expression in the early years of the Const.i.tution and continued to vie for supremacy for nearly a century and a half. Writing in The Federalist,[1203] Hamilton elaborated the theory that the war power is an aggregate of the particular powers granted by article I, section 8.

Not many years later, in 1795, the argument was advanced that the war power of the National Government is an attribute of sovereignty and hence not dependent upon the affirmative grants of the written Const.i.tution.[1204] Chief Justice Marshall appears to have taken a still different view, namely that the power to wage war is implied from the power to declare it. In McCulloch _v._ Maryland[1205] he listed the power "to declare _and conduct_ a war"[1206] as one of the "enumerated powers" from which the authority to charter the Bank of the United States was deduced. During the era of the Civil War the two latter theories were both given countenance by the Supreme Court. Speaking for four Justices in Ex Parte Milligan, Chief Justice Chase described the power to declare war as "necessarily" extending "to all legislation essential to the prosecution of war with vigor and success, except such as interferes with the command of the forces and conduct of campaigns."[1207] In another case, adopting the terminology used by Lincoln in his Message to Congress on July 4, 1861,[1208] the Court referred to "the war power" as a single unified power.[1209]

AN INHERENT POWER

Thereafter we find the phrase, "the war power," being used by both Chief Justice White[1210] and Chief Justice Hughes,[1211] the former declaring the power to be "complete and undivided."[1212] Not until 1936 however did the Court explain the logical basis for imputing such an inherent power to the Federal Government. In United States _v._ Curtiss-Wright Export Corp.,[1213] the reasons for this conclusion were stated by Justice Sutherland as follows: "As a result of the separation from Great Britain by the colonies acting as a unit, the powers of external sovereignty pa.s.sed from the Crown not to the colonies severally, but to the colonies in their collective and corporate capacity as the United States of America. Even before the Declaration, the colonies were a unit in foreign affairs, acting through a common agency--namely the Continental Congress, composed of delegates from the thirteen colonies.

That agency exercised the powers of war and peace, raised an army, created a navy, and finally adopted the Declaration of Independence.

* * * It results that the investment of the Federal Government with the powers of external sovereignty did not depend upon the affirmative grants of the Const.i.tution. The power to declare and wage war, to conclude peace, to make treaties, to maintain diplomatic relations with other sovereignties, if they had never been mentioned in the Const.i.tution, would have vested in the Federal Government as necessary concomitants of nationality."[1214]

A COMPLEXUS OF GRANTED POWERS

In the more recent case of Lichter _v._ United States,[1215] on the other hand, the Court speaks of the "war powers" of Congress. Upholding the Renegotiation Act, it declared that: "In view of this power 'To raise and support Armies, * * *' and the power granted in the same Article of the Const.i.tution 'to make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, * * *' the only question remaining is whether the Renegotiation Act was a law 'necessary and proper for carrying into Execution' the war powers of Congress and especially its power to support armies."[1216] In a footnote it listed the Preamble, the necessary and proper clause, the provisions authorizing Congress to lay taxes and provide for the common defense, to declare war, and to provide and maintain a navy, together with the clause designating the President as Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, as being "among the many other provisions implementing the Congress and the President with powers to meet the varied demands of war, * * *"[1217]

A DECLARATION OF WAR, WHEN REQUIRED

In the first draft of the Const.i.tution presented to the Convention of 1787 by its Committee of Detail Congress was empowered "to make war."[1218] On the floor of the Convention according to Madison's Journal "Mr. Madison and Mr. Gerry, moved to insert '_declare_' striking out '_make_' war; leaving to the Executive the power to repel sudden attacks"[1219] and their motion was adopted. When the Bey of Tripoli declared war upon the United States in 1801 a sharp debate was precipitated as to whether a formal declaration of war by Congress was requisite to create the legal status of war. Jefferson sent a squadron of frigates to the Mediterranean to protect our commerce but its mission was limited to defense in the narrowest sense of the term. After one of the vessels in this squadron had been engaged by, and had defeated, a Tripolitan cruiser, the latter was permitted to return home. Jefferson defended this course in a message to Congress saying, "Unauthorized by the Const.i.tution, without the sanction of Congress, to go beyond the line of defence, the vessel being disabled from committing further hostilities, was liberated with its crew."[1220] Hamilton promptly espoused a different interpretation of the power given to Congress to declare war. "It is the peculiar and exclusive province of Congress," he declared "_when the nation is at peace_ to change that state into a state of war; whether from calculations of policy, or from provocations, or injuries received; in other words, it belongs to Congress only _to go to War_. But when a foreign nation declares or openly and avowedly makes war upon the United States, they are then by the very fact _already at war_, and any declaration on the part of Congress is nugatory; it is at least unnecessary."[1221] Apparently Congress shared the view that a formal declaration of war was unnecessary. It enacted a statute which authorized the President to instruct the commanders of armed vessels of the United States to "seize and make prize of all vessels, goods and effects, belonging to the Bey of Tripoli, * * *; and also to cause to be done all such other acts of precaution or hostility as _the state of war_ will justify, * * *"[1222]

THE PRIZE CASES, 1863

Sixty years later the Supreme Court, in sustaining the blockade of the Southern ports which Lincoln had inst.i.tuted in April 1861, at a time when Congress was not in session, adopted virtually the same line of reasoning as Hamilton had advanced. "This greatest of civil wars" said the Court "was not gradually developed * * * it * * * sprung forth suddenly from the parent brain, a Minerva in the full panoply of _war_.

The President was bound to meet it in the shape it presented itself, without waiting for Congress to baptize it with a name; and no name given to it by him or them could change the fact."[1223] This doctrine was sharply challenged by a powerful minority of the Court on the ground that while the President could unquestionably adopt such measures as the statutes permitted for the enforcement of the laws against insurgents, Congress alone could stamp an insurrection with the character of war and thereby authorize the legal consequences which ensue a state of war.[1224] Inasmuch as the Court finally conceded that the blockade had been retroactively sanctioned by Congress, that part of its opinion dealing with the power of the President, acting alone, was really _obiter_. But a similar opinion was voiced by Chief Justice Chase on behalf of a unanimous Court, after the war was over. In Freeborn _v._ The "Protector,"[1225] it became necessary to ascertain the exact dates on which the war began and ended in order to determine whether the statute of limitation had run against the a.s.serted claim. To answer this question the Chief Justice said that "it is necessary, therefore, to refer to some public act of the political departments of the government to fix the dates; and, for obvious reasons, those of the executive department, which may be, and, in fact, was, at the commencement of hostilities, obliged to act during the recess of Congress, must be taken. The proclamation of intended blockade by the President may therefore be a.s.sumed as marking the first of these dates, and the proclamation that the war had closed, as marking the second."[1226]

The Power To Raise and Maintain Armed Forces

PURPOSE OF SPECIFIC GRANTS

The clauses of the Const.i.tution which give Congress authority "to raise and support armies, to provide and maintain a navy" and so forth, were not inserted for the purpose of endowing the National Government with power to do these things, but rather to designate the department of government which should exercise such powers. Moreover, they permit Congress to take measures essential to the national defense in time of peace as well as during a period of actual conflict. That these provisions grew out of the conviction that the Executive should be deprived of the "sole power of raising and regulating fleets and armies"

which Blackstone attributed to the King under the British Const.i.tution,[1227] was emphasized by Story in his Commentaries. He wrote: "Our notions, indeed, of the dangers of standing armies, in time of peace, are derived in a great measure from the principles and examples of our English ancestors. In England, the King possessed the power of raising armies in the time of peace according to his own good pleasure. And this prerogative was justly esteemed dangerous to the public liberties. Upon the revolution of 1688, Parliament wisely insisted upon a bill of rights, which should furnish an adequate security for the future. But how was this done? Not by prohibiting standing armies altogether in time of peace; but (as has been already seen) by prohibiting them _without the consent of Parliament_. This is the very proposition contained in the Const.i.tution; for Congress can alone raise armies; and may put them down, whenever they choose."[1228]

THE TIME LIMIT ON APPROPRIATIONS FOR THE ARMY

Prompted by the fear of standing armies to which Story alluded, the framers inserted the limitation that "no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years." In 1904 the question arose whether this provision would be violated if the Government contracted to pay a royalty for use of a patent in constructing guns and other equipment where the payments were likely to continue for more than two years. Solicitor-General Hoyt ruled that such a contract would be lawful; that the appropriations limited by the Const.i.tution "are those only which are to raise and support armies in the strict sense of the word 'support,' and that the inhibition of that clause does not extend to appropriations for the various means which an army may use in military operations, or which are deemed necessary for the common defense, * * *"[1229] Relying on this earlier opinion, Attorney General Clark ruled in 1948 that there was "no legal objection to a request to the Congress to appropriate funds to the Air Force for the procurement of aircraft and aeronautical equipment to remain available until expended."[1230]

ESTABLISHMENT OF THE AIR FORCE

By the National Security Act of 1947[1231] there was established within the National Military Establishment "an executive department to be known as the Department of the Air Force" which was made coordinate with the Departments of the Army and the Navy. Shortly after the pa.s.sage of this Act a Joint Resolution was offered in the House of Representatives, proposing an amendment to the Const.i.tution whereby Congress would be authorized to "provide and maintain an Air Force and to make rules for the government and regulation thereof," and the President would be designated as Commander in Chief of the Air Force.[1232] Apparently in the belief that the broad sweep of the war power warranted the creation of the Air Force, without a const.i.tutional amendment, Congress took no action on this proposal.

CONSCRIPTION

The const.i.tutions adopted during the Revolutionary War by at least nine of the States sanctioned compulsory military service.[1233] Towards the end of the War of 1812, conscription of men for the army was proposed by James Monroe, then Secretary of War, but opposition developed and peace came before the bill could be enacted.[1234] In 1863 a compulsory draft law was adopted and put into operation without being challenged in the federal courts.[1235] Not so the Selective Service Act of 1917. This measure was attacked on the grounds that it tended to deprive the States of the right to "a well-regulated militia," that the only power of Congress to exact compulsory service was the power to provide for calling forth the militia for the three purposes specified in the Const.i.tution, which did not comprehend service abroad, and finally that the compulsory draft imposed involuntary servitude in violation of the Thirteenth Amendment. The Supreme Court rejected all of these contentions. It held that the powers of the States with respect to the militia were exercised in subordination to the paramount power of the National Government to raise and support armies, and that the power of Congress to mobilize an army was distinct from its authority to provide for calling the militia and was not qualified or in any wise limited thereby.[1236] Before the United States entered the first World War, the Court had antic.i.p.ated the objection that compulsory military service would violate the Thirteenth Amendment and had answered it in the following words: "It introduced no novel doctrine with respect of services always treated as exceptional, and certainly was not intended to interdict enforcement of those duties which individuals owe to the State, such as services in the army, militia, on the jury, etc. The great purpose in view was liberty under the protection of effective government, not the destruction of the latter by depriving it of essential powers."[1237] Accordingly, in the Selective Draft Law Cases[1238] it dismissed the objection under that amendment as a contention that was "refuted by its mere statement."[1239]

CARE OF ARMED FORCES

Congress has a plenary and exclusive power to determine the age at which a soldier or seaman shall be received, the compensation he shall be allowed and the service to which he shall be a.s.signed. This power may be exerted to supersede parents' control of minor sons who are needed for military service. Where the statute which required the consent of parents for enlistment of a minor son did not permit such consent to be qualified, their attempt to impose a condition that the son carry war risk insurance for the benefit of his mother was not binding on the Government.[1240] Since the possession of government insurance payable to the person of his choice, is calculated to enhance the morale of the serviceman, Congress may permit him to designate any beneficiary he desires, irrespective of State law, and may exempt the proceeds from the claims of creditors.[1241] To safeguard the health and welfare of the armed forces, Congress may authorize the suppression of houses of ill fame in the vicinity of the places where such forces are stationed.[1242]

TRIAL AND PUNISHMENT OF OFFENSES

Under its power to make rules for the Government and regulation of the land and naval forces, Congress may provide for the trial and punishment of military and naval offenses in the manner practiced by civilized nations. This authority is independent of the judicial power conferred by article III.[1243] "Cases arising in the land and naval forces" are expressly excepted from the provision of the Fifth Amendment requiring presentment by a grand jury for capital or infamous and by implication they are also excepted from Amendment VI,[1244] which relates to the trial of criminal offenses. Also the Fifth Amendment's provision against double-jeopardy apparently does not apply to military courts.[1245] A statute which provided that offenses not specifically mentioned therein should be punished "according to the laws and customs of such cases at sea" was held sufficient to give a naval court-martial jurisdiction to try a seaman of the United States Navy for the unspecified offense of attempted desertion.[1246] In _habeas corpus_ proceedings a court can consider only whether the military tribunal had jurisdiction to act in the case under consideration.[1247] The acts of a court-martial, within the scope of its jurisdiction and duty, cannot be controlled or reviewed in the civil courts, by a writ of prohibition or otherwise.[1248]

War Legislation

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR LEGISLATION

The American Revolution affords many precedents for extensive and detailed regulation of the nation's economy in time of war. But since the resolves of Congress under the Articles of Confederation were in practical effect mere recommendations to the State legislatures, it was the action of the latter which made these policies effective. On November 22, 1777, for example, Congress recommended to the States that they take steps "to regulate and ascertain the price of labour, manufactures, [and] internal produce."[1249] A month later the same body further recommended "to the respective legislatures of the United States, forthwith to enact laws, appointing suitable persons to seize and take, for the use of the continental army of the said States, all woolen cloths, blankets, linens, shoes, stockings, hats, and other necessary articles of clothing, * * *"[1250] Responding to such appeals, or acting on their own initiative, the State legislatures enacted measure after measure which entrenched upon the normal life of the community very drastically. Laws were pa.s.sed forbidding the distillation of whiskey and other spirits in order to conserve grain supplies;[1251] fixing prices of labor and commodities, sometimes in greatest detail;[1252] levying requisitions upon the inhabitants for supplies needed by the army;[1253] and so on. In one instance a statute authorized the erection of an arms manufactory for the United States;[1254] in another, Negro Slaves were impressed for labor on fortifications.[1255] The fact that all this legislation came from the State legislatures whereas the war power was attributed to the "United States in Congress a.s.sembled" served to obscure the fact that the former was really an outgrowth of the latter.

CIVIL WAR LEGISLATION

The most pressing economic problem of the Civil War was that of finance.

When Congress found itself unable to raise money to pay the soldiers in the field, it authorized the issuance of Treasury notes which, although not redeemable in specie, were made legal tender in payment of private debts. Upon its first consideration of this measure, the Supreme Court held it unconst.i.tutional. It concluded that even if the circulation of such notes was facilitated by giving them the quality of legal tender, that result did not suffice to make the expedient an appropriate and plainly adapted means for the execution of the power to declare and carry on war.[1256] Three of the seven Justices then const.i.tuting the Court dissented from this decision,[1257] and it was reversed within a little more than a year, after two vacancies in the membership of the Court had been filled. One of the grounds relied upon by the new majority to sustain the statute was that the exigencies of war justified its enactment under the necessary and proper clause.[1258]

WORLD WAR I LEGISLATION

In meeting the strain which World War I put on our national resources of men and material, the economic activities of the people were directed or restricted by the Government on a scale previously unparalleled. The most sweeping measure of control was the Lever Food and Fuel Control Act,[1259] which authorized the President to regulate by license the importation, manufacture, storage, mining or distribution of necessaries; to requisition foods, feeds, and fuels; to take over and operate factories, packinghouses, pipelines, mines or other plants; to fix a minimum price for wheat; to limit, regulate or prohibit the use of food materials in the production of alcoholic beverages; and to fix the price of coal and c.o.ke and to regulate the production, sale and distribution thereof. Other statutes clothed him with power to determine priority in car service,[1260] to license trade with the enemy and his allies,[1261] and to take over and operate the rail and water transportation system,[1262] and the telephonic and telegraphic communication systems,[1263] of the country.

WORLD WAR II LEGISLATION

Several of these World War I measures were still on the statute books when World War II broke out. Moreover, in the period of preparation preceding the latter, Congress had enacted the Priorities Act of May 31, 1941[1264] which gave the President power to allocate any material where necessary to facilitate the defense effort. By the Second War Powers Act,[1265] pa.s.sed early in 1942, the authority to allocate materials was extended to facilities. These two acts furnished the statutory foundation for the extensive system of consumer rationing administered by the Office of Price Administration, as well as for the comprehensive control of industrial materials and output which was exercised by the War Production Board. Under the Emergency Price Control Act[1266] the Office of Price Administration regulated the price of almost all commodities, as well as the rentals for housing accommodations in scores of defense rental areas. The War Labor Disputes Act[1267] permitted the President to commandeer plants which were closed by strikes.

MOBILIZATION OF INDUSTRIAL RESOURCES

While the validity of several of the measures just reviewed was a.s.sailed on one const.i.tutional ground or another, the general power of Congress to regulate their subject matter in time of war was not disputed. Not until the Government sought to recover excessive profits realized on war contracts did the Supreme Court have occasion to affirm the broad authority of the National Government to mobilize the industrial resources of the nation in time of war. Using the power of Congress to conscript men for the armed forces as a measure of its power to regulate industry, the Court sustained the legislation, saying: "The Renegotiation Act was developed as a major wartime policy of Congress comparable to that of the Selective Service Act. The authority of Congress to authorize each of them sprang from its war powers. * * *

With the advent of * * * [global] warfare, mobilized property in the form of equipment and supplies became as essential as mobilized manpower. Mobilization of effort extended not only to the uniformed armed services but to the entire population. Both Acts were a form of mobilization. The language of the Const.i.tution authorizing such measures is broad rather than restrictive. * * * [It] * * * places emphasis upon the supporting as well as upon the raising of armies. The power of Congress as to both is inescapably express, not merely implied."[1268]

DELEGATION OF LEGISLATIVE POWER IN WARTIME

While insisting that, "in peace or in war it is essential that the Const.i.tution be scrupulously obeyed, and particularly that the respective branches of the Government keep within the powers a.s.signed to each,"[1269] the Supreme Court has recognized that in the conduct of a war delegations of power may be valid which would not be admissible in other circ.u.mstances. The cases in which this issue has been raised have been few in number. In one, the Selective Draft Law cases,[1270] the objection was dismissed without discussion. In a second, the price-fixing authority exercised by the Office of Price Administration during the second world war, was, on the issue of delegation of power, sustained by reference to peace time precedents.[1271] Where the war power has been the basis of decision, two different theories concerning its significance can be recognized. The first is that since the war power is an inherent power shared by the legislative and executive departments rather than an enumerated power granted to the former, Congress does not delegate _legislative_ power when it authorizes the President to exercise the war power in a prescribed manner. Opposed to this is the view that the right of Congress to delegate power to the President is limited in this as in other cases but that where the validity of the delegation depends upon whether or not too great a lat.i.tude of discretion has been conferred upon the Executive, the existence of a state of war is a factor to be considered in determining whether the delegation in the particular case is necessary and hence permissible.

The idea that a delegation of discretion in the exercise of the war power stands on a different footing than delegation of authority to levy a tax is implicit in Justice Bradley's opinion in Hamilton _v._ Dillin.[1272] The plaintiffs in that case contended that the sum they were required to pay for the privileges of buying cotton in the South was a tax, which, since it was imposed by the Secretary of the Treasury, was invalid because the taxing power was not susceptible of delegation to the Executive Department. To this argument the Court replied: "It is hardly necessary, under the view we have taken of the character of the regulations in question, * * *, to discuss the question of the const.i.tutionality of the act of July 13th, 1861, regarded as authorizing such regulations. * * *, the power of the Government to impose such conditions upon commercial intercourse with an enemy in time of war * * * does not belong to the same category as the power to levy and collect taxes, duties, and excises. It belongs to the war powers of the Government * * *."[1273]