Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s indifference to the Constitution and American law, and his disdain for what he calls “tepid legality” as the governing standard for the use of U.S. military power, places him at sharp odds with those who founded this nation and held the office of the presidency.

John Quincy Adams, after serving as secretary of state and president, said, “The war power is strictly constitutional.” Adams, like his predecessors in the nation’s highest office, fully understood that the president’s authority over foreign relations was no less circumscribed than domestic powers allocated by the Constitution.

See Full Page