Is America’s war with Iran legal?

In the wake of America’s attacks on Iran over the last few days, a question growing more in volume than clarity is whether President Trump exceeded his authority in going to war with Iran. Votes are scheduled for this week in both the Senate and the House to try to reclaim some of that authority, but neither measure is expected to pass. Where that power truly resides, though, is more complicated than it may seem.

Why it matters: The remnants of Iran’s regime have no hope of defeating the US and Israel militarily. They may, however, be able to sign a peace agreement that leaves them in power if they can hold out long enough for the conditions of engagement to change. Congress telling President Trump and the Pentagon that they have to find a quick exit would be the most likely source of such a change. 

The backstory: Did Trump cross a line?

Early Saturday morning, President Trump released an eight-minute video informing the nation that America was now at war with Iran. Dubbed Operation Epic Fury, the joint attacks with Israel killed 48 of Iran’s leaders, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on the first day. And President Trump warned yesterday that the “big wave” is yet to come. 

But while the attacks have been successful thus far, as of this writing, six US military service members have been killed as well. President Trump also warned that this could happen, and their loss stands as a tragic reminder of why war should never be taken lightly. Just because no one died in the previous strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities last year, or in the capture of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, doesn’t mean those attacks weren’t dangerous as well. 

That danger is a big reason why Abraham Lincoln—then a first-term congressman—said at the close of the Mexican-American War:

The provision of the Constitution giving the war-making power to Congress, was dictated, as I understand it, by the following reasons. Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object. This, our Convention understood to be the most oppressive of all Kingly oppressions; and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us.

It didn’t take long for members of Congress on both sides of the aisle—alongside many in the general public—to conclude that President Trump had crossed that line in attacking Iran. 

But are they right? Is this war illegal, or was the president acting within his power to put American forces in harm’s way in an effort to remove the threat of an unpredictable and unstable Iran? 

The answer is not as simple as I thought it would be when I started researching for this newsletter, and understanding why is crucial to both how we got into this war and what the exit plan might look like.

“When the real thing arrives”

As President Lincoln described, the founders of our nation were understandably wary of giving any one person the kind of power over others that they’d just rebelled against in the American Revolution. However, they also understood that the president needed the authority to command the nation’s military in times of war or in the event of an attack. So, they came up with a solution: Congress was given the power to declare war in Article 1 of the Constitution, while the president retained the authority in Article 2 to prosecute that war once it began. 

However, as Isaac Saul put it, “Talking about war is easy when it’s hypothetical. It’s a lot harder when the real thing arrives.” As the world shrank over the subsequent decades, America’s presidents came to understand the truth of that statement and, as a result, grew increasingly willing to push the boundaries of what constituted defense in ways that looked an awful lot like war. 

From James Polk and Ulysses Grant in the mid-1800s to Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt a century later, presidents began sending American troops into battle well before Congress officially granted them the right to do so. Generally speaking, neither the House nor the Senate put up much of a fight until the Vietnam War became so untenable that they were able to cobble together a veto-proof majority and pass the War Powers Resolution in 1973. 

When you hear members of Congress talk about how the President has to go through them for approval before launching attacks like those currently decimating Iran, Article 1—reinforced by the War Powers Resolution—is typically the legal argument given. The problem is that neither is as clear-cut as they often describe. 

What does the law actually require?

Normally, when the executive and legislative branches can’t agree on something, they turn to the courts. However, the courts have essentially decided this fight doesn’t involve them. Consequently, they’ve left it to Congress and the president to decide how to interpret the division of war powers.

As a result, precedent has often played a deciding role in how both branches of the government proceed. And precedent—especially over the last thirty years—goes decisively in the president’s favor.

You can argue it shouldn’t be that way—and, to be honest, there’s a lot to that argument. But the reality is that the Executive branch’s definition of war as a prolonged military engagement that carries significant risk to US personnel over a substantial period of time has often carried the day. Couple that definition with a broad and loosely defined understanding of what constitutes national defense, and presidents are often able to find enough leeway to justify skipping Congress and going straight to the fighting. 

If you go back and listen to President Trump’s initial address with those definitions in mind, several things stand out:

• His long history of Iran’s attacks against the United States 
• The threat posed by both their nuclear aspirations and their ballistic missile systems
• Taking every possible step to minimize the danger for American troops
• The promise that we’re not sticking around to micromanage a regime change

Each of those points speaks in defense of President Trump’s right to launch the attacks on Iran without going through Congress first to do so. Moreover, while Iran does not appear to have posed an imminent threat to the United States or our allies, the latest reports are that they were closer to reaching that point than many suspected. 

Why attack so soon?

While Iran was unlikely to attack US assets in the Middle East if left alone, Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently revealed that part of the president’s urgency was born of a planned Israeli action that would have likely triggered attacks on American bases in the region. However, President Trump appeared to contradict Rubio’s statement earlier today in claiming that he believed Iran would attack first if they didn’t, adding that “I might have forced their [Israel’s] hand.” 

Either way, it appears that both Israel and the Trump administration were done waiting, so the allies decided to attack together rather than independently. And they may have had good reason to do so.

China, for example, had already begun resupplying them with fuel for their ballistic missiles and was prepared to sell them supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles that could target American carriers in the Persian Gulf. Couple that news with claims from Israeli intelligence—hopefully verified by American intelligence—that Iran was months away from new underground sites in which they could hide their ballistic missile and nuclear programs, and attacking now makes sense. 

So, while the War Powers Resolution required President Trump to give an account to the nation’s legislators within forty-eight hours and gives him sixty days to have things wrapped up, there’s really nothing that’s legally binding on him to change his approach until then. 

Some members of Congress—along with a fair portion of the general population—may not like it but until the legislature does something to either change or clarify the laws, presidents from both parties are likely to continue using these powers in whatever ways they deem best. That could change if American boots hit Iranian soil—something both President Trump and Defense Secretary Hegseth have cautioned is possible—but for now, enough of the House and Senate seem willing to go along with the White House to allow that recent precedent of deference to stand.

And there’s a lesson in that approach that could be far more relevant to your life and mine than what is going on in Iran. 

Spiritual application: What makes your ears itch?

Relying on precedent in politics is often a necessary evil when applying a nearly 250-year-old document to today’s problems. However, it can be tempting to take the same approach with Scripture. 

And even though the Bible is far older than the Constitution, it is the “living and active” word of God, “breathed out” by the Lord and “profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (Hebrews 4:12, 2 Timothy 3:16–17). 

Moreover, if you are a Christian, then you have unlimited access to the Spirit who inspired and authored that word. He stands ready to help you understand it and apply God’s teachings to your life. 

The problem is that the Lord doesn’t always tell us what we want to hear. When that happens, the temptation can be strong to let our “itching ears” lead us to rely instead on teachers who ask less of us or to trade the full truth for a watered-down version of the gospel (2 Timothy 4:3). 

To be fair, such temptations are hardly a modern invention. From Genesis to Revelation, Scripture is filled with stories of people who choose lies over a life dedicated to the Lord. And most of us are prone to make this mistake in some way. 

So, what makes your ears itch? Do you know where you’re most prone to mistake lies for truth? 

Take some time right now to pray and ask the Holy Spirit to help you know where you’re most vulnerable to this sin. Then ask him to help you become more aware of the various ways in which Satan tempts you toward those mistakes. 

This side of heaven, we’ll never reach the point where we don’t need to be wary of those temptations. But knowing where you’re most prone to fail is a crucial step in the right direction. 

Will you take that step today?   

God is good

As the war in Iran has progressed, the nation’s burgeoning Christian population has often struggled to keep in touch with one another and with believers outside the country. However, hopes are high that a change in government could mean less persecution and more fertile ground for the gospel. 

Kingdom impact

The underground church, even in the midst of severe persecution, is one of the fastest-growing Christian movements in the world with hundreds of thousands of believers praying for the day when they can practice their faith in the open.

Prayer point

Will you join me in praying for that day to come? Will you also pray that the believers there will be protected from American and Israeli bombs as well as from their own government? And will you pray that they will follow the Holy Spirit’s guidance in continuing to share the gospel, even in the midst of war? 

Christianity Today has more on the story