From: (Peter Stickney)
Date: 8/16/2004 9:17 AM Central Daylight Time
Message-id:

In article ,
(B2431) writes:
From: (Peter Stickney)



Howard, that's nonsense. There is no such thing as a formal
Declaration of War. There never has been.

Better read the Constitution where it says only Congress has the authority
to
declare war. They have done this exactly six times: Revolution, 1812,
Mexican,
Civil, Spanish-American, WW1 and WW2.

Uhm, nobody has said that they aren't the authority.

Actually I was responding to a fool who said no one had the Constitutional
authourity since there was no mention in the Constitution.

But people miss
teh point on just what a Declaration of War is. The short version is
this. If Congress passes a law stating that the President (Executive)
has the authority to use force on somebody, that's a Declaration of
War. If they vote money to support these operations, that's a
declaration that a State of War exists. If somebody else declares war
on us, in whatever colorful way their culture or personality dictates,
then a State of War exists. You don't have to say "This is a
Declaration of War", and file it with the Hague. You state that
there's a perceived need to use force on somebody, and that it's
O.K. with you.

And, uhm, I'd brush up on some history, too - Y'see, the United States
Congress, with the powers it has, didn't exist until the 1790s.

Please note I corrected myself in a later post.

snip

You also seem to ahve missed the Barbary Coast War, as well, when we
de3cided that since we couldn't affort to bribe the
Pirates/Governments in what is now Libya, we'd whack them, instead.
(As in the Shores of Tripoli).

No declaration of war. They voted funds.


As for formal declarations nations/states have been doing just that for a
few
millenia.

Usually my marching/sailing/flying over the borders of somebody's
country, and whacking the crap out of it.

I'm sure you have done that many times.

--
Pete Stickney

Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired