Getting into the Act

When President Reagan and Congress jousted last week over the question of their respective roles in Lebanon, they focused attention on a much debated, little understood piece of legislation: the War Powers Resolution. Passed in 1973, when the Viet Nam War was raging, the act was intended to limit a President's ability to wage undeclared war without congressional consent.

The resolution has two provisions. First, when U.S. forces "equipped for combat" are deployed abroad on anything other than routine training exercises, the President must inform Congress of that fact within 48 hours. Second, if troops are sent to situations where "imminent involvement in hostilities" is likely, the President must notify Congress within 48 hours. In this case, however, notification starts an imaginary clock running. Unless Congress declares war or authorizes the deployment to continue, the resolution requires the President to withdraw the forces within 60 days (the period can be extended to 90 days by presidential fiat). If he fails to act, the resolution also empowers Congress to force a pullout by passing a "concurrent resolution," which cannot be vetoed by the President.

Which of those two key parts of the law applies to the Lebanon deployment? If, as the White House maintains, the Marines were merely "equipped for combat" when fighting took place near their positions on Aug. 28, then the President complied with the law fully on Aug. 30, when he sent Congress a letter to that effect. But many Congressmen, pointing to the mounting Marine casualties and the recent decision to award the troops combat pay, assert that the soldiers faced "imminent involvement in hostilities." If so, then the law requires congressional approval in some form if the Marines are to be allowed to remain beyond Oct. 26 (or Nov. 27, provided Reagan opts for an extension).

Congress evidently lost the power to order the troops out earlier by "concurrent resolution" when the Supreme Court last June declared that such "legislative vetoes" were unconstitutional. Last week, when Senate Minority Leader Robert Byrd of West Virginia introduced compromise legislation regarding the Marine deployment, it was in the form of a "joint resolution," meaning that it requires the President's signature to become law. Apparently unaffected by the court's ruling, however, is the requirement that the troops be withdrawn if Congress fails to approve their mission within 60 (or 90) days. Congressional leaders are determined to see that provision obeyed. "We've made our point clear," Byrd announced. "Congress intends to be involved."

The debate over the President's power to send in the Marines without congressional approval is nearly as old as the Republic. The Constitution is ambiguous on the matter. On the one hand, it designates the President as Commander in Chief of all U.S. military forces. On the other, it gives Congress the power to "declare war" and "raise armies." In practice, Presidents have traditionally enjoyed wide latitude in sending U.S. troops into dangerous situations, and Congress has rarely complained. But in the early 1970s, many legislators were troubled that Presidents Johnson and Nixon had been able to send hundreds of thousands of American troops into combat in Viet Nam without a formal declaration of war. When the Watergate scandal broke, Congress was emboldened to put limits on such presidential prerogatives and to assert its own power.

The War Powers Resolution has occasionally been honored--as in 1980, when Jimmy Carter notified Congress of the attempt to rescue the U.S. hostages in Tehran, though his message came shortly after the mission had failed. But in the decade since the resolution's passage, there have been relatively few occasions on which its effectiveness could be tested, and no situations as complicated and potentially momentous as the present dilemma in Lebanon. This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.