United States: House vote results to declare war 1812-1942

Article One, Section Eight, Clause 11 of the United States Constitution (known as the War Powers Clause) grants Congress the power to declare war. At the Constitutional Convention in 1787, the general sentiment among the delegates was that no one man (i.e. the President) should have the sole power to take the country to war. Despite this, the exact wording of the clause is fairly ambiguous, leaving the process of engaging in conflict or war open to interpretation. Some even argue that the president's title as Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States gives them special privileges to authorize military involvement when deemed necessary, and this has been a point of contention for decades.

Declarations and approval of war

The United States has been involved in over 100 wars or conflicts since declaring independence, but has declared war against foreign nations on just 11 occasions, pertaining to five separate wars. Germany is the only country that the United States has formally declared war on more than once (although declarations of war applied to Austria and Hungary during both world wars). The U.S. has been involved in several major conflicts since WWII, and most military actions were approved by Congress in some capacity, but not via formal declaration - President Johnson's decision to engage in the Vietnam War was almost unanimously approved by Congress through the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, while resolutions titled Authorized Use of Military Force (AUMFs) have been used to approve military action in Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, and across East Africa. Technically, the Korean War was never formally recognized as a war in the United States as military involvement was conducted through the United Nations, which does not have the authority to declare war itself.

Reasons for not declaring war

The Cold War is largely seen as the tipping point where presidents took greater autonomy when deciding on military matters. The need for discretion and the desire to avoid the time, administrative, and financial constraints from involving Congress (or international organizations such as the UN or NATO) meant that presidents repeatedly ordered military action in foreign conflicts without Congress' approval. Following Nixon's secret bombing of Cambodia during the Vietnam War, Congress then passed the War Powers Resolution in 1973, in an attempt to curb this authority, however this resolution is widely considered to have had little effect. Formal acknowledgement of a war is considered a politically costly move for members of Congress, whereas failure to declare war is not. A politician's vote for or against a declaration of war could be used by political opponents in the next election cycle if their decision is in opposition to public opinion.