WASHINGTON, 2 March 2007 — James A. Baker III and Lee Hamilton -— who didn’t have much luck persuading the Bush administration to follow their advice in the Iraq Study Group -— are trying again.
This time they are forming a commission that will examine how the constitution allocates the powers of beginning, conducting, and ending war.
The dispute over the authority to wage war has historically divided presidents, members of Congress and scholars. Throughout the years, the White House gradually has assumed increased control of US war-making, which has been questioned again due to the harsh debate in the new Democratic-controlled Congress over President Bush’s troop buildup in Iraq.
Both former Secretary of State James Baker, and former Rep. Lee Hamilton, D-Ind., headed the Iraq Study Group that made recommendations last December to the Bush administration on Iraq war policy.
That panel, which was authorized by Congress, received extensive coverage as Bush was considering how to reshape the US role in Iraq. Its findings were embraced by many members of both parties. But Bush ended up deciding to send extra troops to the war zone — essentially ignoring its recommendation that the US remove its combat troops by early next year.
The newly-created National War Powers Commission panel, a private, bipartisan panel organized by the University of Virginia’s Miller Center of Public Affairs, is expected to hold its first meeting April 3-4.
Others in the 12-person panel include former Secretary of State Warren Christopher, who served the Clinton administration; former Attorney General Edwin Meese, who was also on the Iraq Study Group; and Brent Scowcroft, a former National Security adviser.
The commission was created to make bipartisan recommendations on how Congress and the president can jointly implement war powers. “The constitution lays out a shared responsibility between Congress and the president,” Lisa Todorovich, the Miller Center’s assistant director for communications, told reporters. “However, there has been no definitive process ... [to determine] how we start [war], how we conduct it and how we end it.”
Todorovich added that the purpose of the panel “is not only to study [these issues] but to come up with some solid recommendations.”
Debates over separation of powers and the uncertainty they often generate can impair relations among the branches of government, cast doubt on the legitimacy of government action, and prevent focused attention on policy. Armed conflicts with non-state actors and other non-traditional “wars,” as well as the courts’ involvement in war powers questions, make the Commission’s work relevant, she said.
“Few matters are more important to our nation than how we make decisions of war and peace,” said former Virginia Gov. Gerald Baliles, director of the Miller Center. “But war powers questions have bedeviled a host of presidents, members of Congress, and judges for more than two hundred years.”
The commission intends to produce a report making recommendations to assist presidents, congressmen, courts, and other policymakers in addressing war powers issues. When they are issued, the commission’s recommendations will be entirely prospective in nature and not applicable to the present presidential administration or present Congress, said Todorovich.
