Constitution Corner: Trade with Other Nations

By Douglas V. Gibbs

Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution authorizes Congress to raise and support armies. The budget for the Army cannot extend beyond two years. The delegates in the Constitutional Convention placed limitations on the term of the Army’s budget in order to protect the people against the federal government using the military force as a standing army against the people. Article I, Section 7, gives the House of Representatives the power of the purse strings, allowing the people through their representatives the opportunity to defund the Army if they felt it necessary no more than two years since the last budget approval. The Navy, however, has no such limits regarding budgeting. The Constitution simply says that the Congress has the power “to provide and maintain a Navy.” The importance of the Navy was primarily because the Navy was a necessary branch of service for protecting the trade routes with foreign trade partners.

Free Trade was encouraged, but the early leaders in American History were careful not to create trade agreements that would handcuff American interests. Congress was given the authority in Article I, Section 8 to regulate Commerce with foreign nations. Congressional participation, rather than negotiations only spearheaded by the President, served to protect the interests of the States, and We the People. Any agreement was also considered a treaty, and still required 3/4 ratification by the U.S. Senate.

Now, with an executive branch wielding expanded powers, the President of the United States has seized many of the authorities of Congress. With Fast Track in association with trade agreements, the President has been enabled to make decisions without Congress’s participation through amendments, and changes the approval from 3/4 ratification, to a simple majority up and down vote. Consolidating this much power into one individual, or one branch of government, is not consistent with the original principles and philosophies of those that participated in the construction of the United States Constitution.

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