President Trump is waging or threatening to wage several presidential wars, ostensibly violating the Constitution, which specifies that only Congress, not the president, has the power to declare war, but the president controls the armed forces.

The president is waging war or threatening to wage war “without the authority of a Congressional war declaration,” says Senator Rand Paul (R-Kentucky). “This is an act of war,” Rand recently said in discussing the US invasion of Venezuela. The same arguments are now made as the US wars on Iran.

While Paul and Iranian war critics seem to have the Constitution on their side, Trump has history on his. Imperial presidents—both Republican and Democrat—have sidestepped Congress’s war powers for over a century. Since World War II (and often before in many cases), presidents make war without a war declaration, often ignoring Congress.

President Truman—the author of the Truman Doctrine that pledged US military aid for any country battling communism—plunged the United States into the Korean War without a declaration of war. A few months into the Korean War—in a speech to the Senate on June 28th, 1950, Senator Robert Taft (R-Ohio)—complained “that it should be noted that there has been no pretense of consulting the Congress. No resolution has ever been introduced asking for the approval of Congress for use of American forces in Korea.”

How Do Presidents Do It?

One part of the imperial presidency is presidents wage war and ignore or give little attention to Congress, which can always........

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