Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

From Presidential Wars to American Hegemony:The Constitution After 9/11

  • Chapter
The Presidency and the Challenge of Democracy

Part of the book series: The Evolving American Presidency Series ((EAP))

Abstract

The use of military force by President George W. Bush against Iraq poses a threat to constitutional government, civil liberties, and national security (both here and abroad). It represents the culmination over the past 50 years of unilateral presidential wars accompanied by few checks from Congress or the judiciary. Academics, the media, and the general public have shown little understanding of constitutional limits and little interest in keeping the president within legal bounds. The current Iraq War reflects the ideological efforts of neoconservatives who have promoted, in recent decades, a far-reaching military agenda to assure American hegemony (the term they prefer) in world affairs. Their detailed plans, kept largely on the shelf, were activated with a rush after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
eBook
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Notes

  1. Louis Fisher, Military Tribunals and Presidential Power:American Revolution to the War on Terroris (Lawrence:University Press of Kansas, 2005).

    Google Scholar 

  2. See William Michael Treanor, “Fame, the Founding, and the Power to Declare War,” Cornell Law Revie 82 (1997):695

    Google Scholar 

  3. Benjamin Fletcher Wright, ed., The Federalis (Cambridge, MA:Harvard University Press, 1961), 101.

    Google Scholar 

  4. Michael R. Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge:The Johnson White House Tapes, 1963–196 (New York:Touchstone, 1998 edn.), 88, 95, 213–14, 370, 380.

    Google Scholar 

  5. H. R. McMaster, Dereliction of Duty:Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Lies That Led to Vietna (New York:HarperPerennial, 1998), 333–4.

    Google Scholar 

  6. Gaillard Hunt, ed., The Writings of James Madiso, vol. 6 (New York:G. P. Putnam’s, 1900–1910), 174.

    Google Scholar 

  7. John C. Fitzpatrick ed., The Writings of George Washingto, vol. 33 (Washington, DC:Government Printing Office, 1931–1944), 73.

    Google Scholar 

  8. Clarence Edwin Carter, ed., The Territorial Papers of the United State, vol. 4 (Washington, DC:National Archives and Records Service, General Services Administration, 1972), 389.

    Google Scholar 

  9. James D. Richardson, ed., A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the President, vol. 1 (New York:Bureau of National Literature, 1897–1925), 315.

    Google Scholar 

  10. Edward S. Corwin, “The President’s Power,” New Republi, January 29, 1951, 16.

    Google Scholar 

  11. Weissman v. Metropolitan Life Ins. C., 112 F. Supp. 420, 425 (S.D. Cal. 1953); Gagliomella v. Metropolitan Life Ins. C., 122 F. Supp. 246 (D. Mass. 1954); Carius v. New York Life Insurance C., 124 F. Supp. 388 (D. Ill. 1954); Western Reserve Life Ins. Co. v. Meadow, 261 S.W. 2nd 554 (Tex. 1953).

    Google Scholar 

  12. “Military Situation in the Far East” (Part 3), hearings before the Senate Committees on Armed Services and Foreign Relations, 82nd Cong., 1st Sess. (1951), 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Henry Steele Commager, “Presidential Power:The Issue Analyzed,” New York Time, January 14, 1951, 11.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., “Presidential Powers:Taft Statement on Troops Opposed, Actions of Past Presidents Cited,” New York Time, January 9, 1951, 28.

    Google Scholar 

  15. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Imperial Presidenc (Boston:Houghton Mifflin Co., 1973), 139.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. and Alfred de Grazia, Congress and the Presidenc (Washington, DC:American Enterprise Institute, 1967), 27–8.

    Google Scholar 

  17. Richard E. Neustadt, Presidential Powe (New York:Signet Book, 1964 paperback ed.), 23.

    Google Scholar 

  18. Neal Devins and Louis Fisher, “The Steel Seizure Case:One of a Kind?” Constitutional Commentar 19 (2000):67–71.

    Google Scholar 

  19. Richard E. Neustadt, Presidential Power and the Modern Presidents:The Politics of Leadership from Roosevelt to Reaga (New York:Free Press, 1990), x. Pages 3–163 reprint, without change, the 1960 edition of Presidential Powe.

    Google Scholar 

  20. For example, Andrew J. Bacevich, American Empir (Cambridge:Harvard University Press, 2002); Anonymous, Imperial Hubris:Why the West Is Losing the War on Terroris (Washington, DC:Brassey’s Inc., 2004); Chalmers Johnson, The Sorrows of Empire:Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republi (New York:Metropolitan Books, 2004); Carl Boggs, Imperial Delusions:American Militarism and Endless Wa (Lanham, MD:Rowman & Littlefield, 2005).

    Google Scholar 

  21. James Mann, Rise of the Vulcans:The History of Bush’s War Cabine (New York:Viking, 2004), 190.

    Google Scholar 

  22. Lawrence F. Kaplan and William Kristol, The War Over Iraq:Saddam’s Tyranny and America’s Missio (San Francisco:Encounter Books, 2003), 112.

    Google Scholar 

  23. George H. Nash, The Conservative Intellectual Movement in Americ (Wilmington, DE:Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 1998), 75–87.

    Google Scholar 

  24. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Vital Center:The Politics of Freedo (New York:De Capo Press, 1988), xxii.

    Google Scholar 

  25. Leo Strauss, Natural Right and Histor (Chicago:University of Chicago Press, 1953).

    Google Scholar 

  26. Leo Strauss, “An Epilogue,” in Herbert J. Storing, ed., Essays on the Scientific Study of Politic (New York:Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1962), 307.

    Google Scholar 

  27. Herbert J. Storing, “The Achievement of Leo Strauss,” National Revie, December 7, 1973, 1348–9.

    Google Scholar 

  28. Shadia B. Drury, Leo Strauss and the American Righ (New York:St. Martin’s Press, 1999), 2–17.

    Google Scholar 

  29. Ibid., 97–136. For a collection of essays by Straussians, see Kenneth L. Deutsch and John A. Murley, eds., Leo Strauss, the Straussians, and the American Regim (Lanham, MD:Rowman & Littlefield, 1999).

    Google Scholar 

  30. Anne Norton, Leo Strauss and the Politics of American Empir (New Haven:Yale University Press, 2004), 6–18; John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge, The Right Nation:Conservative Power in Americ (New York:Penguin Press, 2004), 200–7; Mann, Rise of the Vulcan, 22–9; Elizabeth Drew, “The Neocons in Power,” New York Review of Book, June 12, 2003, 20–2.

    Google Scholar 

  31. Bernard Susser, “Leo Strauss:the Ancient as Modern,” Political Studie 36 (1988):499.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Leo Strauss, Thoughts on Machiavell (Glencoe, IL:Free Press, 1958), 9, 12, 13. He calls Machiavelli “an evil man,” “immoral and irreligious,” “diabolical,” and “a devil.”

    Google Scholar 

  33. Hwa Yol Jung, “Leo Strauss’s Conception of Political Philosophy:A Critique,” Review of Politic 29 (1967):492.

    Google Scholar 

  34. John Ehrman, The Rise of Neoconservatism:Intellectuals and Foreign Affairs, 1945–199 (New Haven:Yale University Press, 1995), 190.

    Google Scholar 

  35. Gary Dorrien, The Neoconservative Mind:Politics, Culture, and the War of Ideolog (Philadelphia:Temple University Press, 1993), ix.

    Google Scholar 

  36. Allan Bloom, The Closing of the American Min (New York:Simon & Schuster, 1987), 67. See also pages 25ff, 34, and 141ff.

    Google Scholar 

  37. See two recent books by Tariq Ali:The Clash of Fundamentalisms:Crusades, Jihads and Modernit (London:Verso, 2003), and Bush in Babylon:The Recolonisation of Ira (London:Verso, 2003).

    Google Scholar 

  38. Joshua Muravchik, Exporting Democracy:Fulfilling America’s Destin (Washington, DC:AEI Press, 1992 ed.).

    Google Scholar 

  39. Norman Podhoretz, “Making the World Safe for Communism,” Commentar, April 1976, 35.

    Google Scholar 

  40. L. Gordon Crovitz, “How Ronald Reagan Weakened the Presidency,” Commentar, September 1988, 25.

    Google Scholar 

  41. See L. Gordon Crovitz and Jeremy A. Rabkin, eds., The Fettered Presidency:Legal Constraints on the Executive Branc (Washington, DC:American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1989); Terry Eastland, Energy in the Executive:The Case for the Strong Presidenc (New York:Free Press, 1992).

    Google Scholar 

  42. “The American Congress,” The Public Interes 100, Summer 1990; Gordon S. Jones and John A. Marini, eds., The Imperial Congres (New York:Pharos Books, 1988).

    Google Scholar 

  43. Joseph M. Bessette, The Mild Voice of Reason:Deliberative Democracy and American National Governmen (Chicago:University Press of Chicago, 1994).

    Google Scholar 

  44. Friedrich A. von Hayek, The Road to Serfdo (Chicago, IL:University of Chicago Press, 1994), 69–79.

    Google Scholar 

  45. Friedrich. A. von Hayek, “Why I Am Not a Conservative,” in Frank S. Meyer, ed., What Is Conservatism (New York:Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964), 88–103. For conservatives who wrote positively about Congress, see James Burnham, Congress and the American Traditio (Chicago:Henry Regnery Co., 1959) and Alfred de Grazia, ed., Congress:The First Branch of Governmen (Garden City, NY:Anchor Books, 1967).

    Google Scholar 

  46. Willmoore Kendall, “The Two Majorities,” Midwest Journal of Political Scienc 4 (1960):317–45, The Conservative Affirmatio (Chicago:Henry Regnery Co., 1963), 21–49.

    Google Scholar 

  47. Irving Kristol, Neoconservatism:The Autobiography of an Ide (Chicago:Elephant Paperbacks, 1999), 365.

    Google Scholar 

  48. Irving Kristol, “The Future of American Jewry,” Commentar, August 1991, 24–5.

    Google Scholar 

  49. Irving Kristol, Reflections of a Neoconservativ (New York:Basic Books, 1983), xiii.

    Google Scholar 

  50. Michael A. Ledeen, “A Republican Contract with the World,” Weekly Standar, May 13, 1996, 25; see Julie Kosterlitz, “The Neoconservative Moment,” National Journa, May 17, 2003, 1542.

    Google Scholar 

  51. James Nuechterlein, “Neoconservatism & Irving Kristol,” Commentar, August 1984, 45.

    Google Scholar 

  52. William Kristol and Robert Kagan, “Toward a Neo-Reaganite Foreign Policy,” Foreign Affair 75 (1996):18, 19.

    Google Scholar 

  53. “A Clean Break:A New Strategy for Securing the Realm,” June 1996 report for the Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies, Jerusalem; <www. israeleconomy.org/strat1.htm.>. Accessed October 1, 2004; Micklethwait and Wooldridge, The Right Natio, 204.

    Google Scholar 

  54. Micklethwait and Wooldridge, The Right Natio, 215. For a thoughtful and informed analysis of the belief that Jewish neocons provoked the Iraq War to help Israel, see Joshua Muravchik, “The Neoconservative Cabal,” Commentar, September 2003, 26–33.

    Google Scholar 

  55. Gershom Goremberg, The End of Days:Fundamentalism and the Struggle for the Temple Moun (New York:Oxford University Press, 2002 edn.), 5–6.

    Google Scholar 

  56. David Wurmser, Tyranny’s Ally:America’s Failure to Defeat Saddam Hussei (Washington, DC:AEI Press, 1999), 116.

    Google Scholar 

  57. Robert Kagan and William Kristol, eds., Present Dangers:Crisis and Opportunity in American Foreign and Defense Polic (San Francisco:Encounter Books, 2000), 6.

    Google Scholar 

  58. Project for the New American Century, “Rebuilding America’s Defense:Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New Century” (September 2000), ii.

    Google Scholar 

  59. The National Security Strategy of the United States of America, introductory remarks by President Bush (September 2002), 1.

    Google Scholar 

  60. Mark Lilla, “The Closing of the Straussian Mind,” New York Review of Book, November 4, 2004, 58.

    Google Scholar 

  61. Carnes Lord, The Modern Prince:What Leaders Need to Know No (New Haven:Yale University Press, 2003), 5.

    Google Scholar 

  62. Kaplan and Kristol, The War Over Ira, 98.

    Google Scholar 

  63. Francis Fukuyama, “The Neoconservative Moment,” The National Interes, Summer 2004, 60. For Krauthammer’s rebuttal, see “In Defense of Democratic Realism,” The National Interes (Fall 2004), 15–25.

    Google Scholar 

  64. Francis Fukuyama, State-Building:Governance and World Order in the 21st Centur (Ithaca:Cornell University Press, 2004), 38–9.

    Google Scholar 

  65. Richard Lowry, “What Went Wrong?” National Revie, October 25, 2004, 42.

    Google Scholar 

  66. Eliot A. Cohen, Supreme Command:Soldiers, Statesmen, and Leadership in Wartim (New York:Free Press, 2002).

    Google Scholar 

  67. John P. Burke and Fred I. Greenstein, How Presidents Test Reality:Decisions on Vietnam, 1954 and 196 (New York:Russell Sage Foundation, 1989).

    Google Scholar 

  68. Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan, Execution:The Discipline of Getting Things Don (New York:Crown Business, 2002), 22, 67.

    Google Scholar 

  69. Michael R. Gordon, “The Strategy to Secure Iraq Did Not Foresee a 2nd War,” New York Time, October 19, 2004, A10.

    Google Scholar 

  70. James Fallows, “Blind Into Baghdad,” The Atlantic Monthl, January/February 2004, 58.

    Google Scholar 

  71. Ibid., 60. See also Thomas E. Ricks, “Army Historian Cites Lack of Postwar Plan,” Washington Pos, December 25, 2004, A1.

    Google Scholar 

  72. Walter Pincus and Dana Priest, “Bush Orders the CIA to Hire More Spies,” Washington Pos, November 24, 2004, A4.

    Google Scholar 

  73. David Wise, The Politics of Lying:Government Deception, Secrecy, and Power (New York:Random House, 1973, 346.

    Google Scholar 

  74. Louis Fisher, American Constitutional La, 6th ed. (Durham:Carolina Academic Press, 2005), 75–114, 288–9, 296–301.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors
  1. Louis Fisher
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Loyola Marymount University, USA

    Michael A. Genovese (Professor of Political Science and Loyola Chair of Leadership Studies, and is director of the Institute for Leadership Studies) (Professor of Political Science and Loyola Chair of Leadership Studies, and is director of the Institute for Leadership Studies)

  2. Chapman University in Orange, California, USA

    Lori Cox Han (Professor and Chair of Political Science) (Professor and Chair of Political Science)

Copyright information

© 2006 Michael A. Genovese and Lori Cox Han

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Fisher, L. (2006). From Presidential Wars to American Hegemony:The Constitution After 9/11. In: Genovese, M.A., Han, L.C. (eds) The Presidency and the Challenge of Democracy. The Evolving American Presidency Series. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230600744_2

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation