Channels, Spring 2019

Page 40 Wilt • The President, Foreign Policy Senator John Calhoun tried to resist the stampede in Congress to rush blindly and mechanically toward a declaration of war…Other senators echoed Calhoun’s sentiments. Senator John Middleton Clayton ‘condemned’ the conduct of President Polk: ‘I do not see on what principle it can be shown that the President, without consulting Congress and obtaining its sanction for the procedure, has a right to send an army to take up a position, where, as it must have been foreseen, the inevitable consequence would be war.’ 36 Polk was also challenged on the constitutional front in an impassioned speech by Senator Henry Clay on the Senate floor. However, Congress was not able to prevent the Mexican- American War outbreak, nor were they able to break off the consequences of such a war, which included the border dispute settling of the Rio Grande, and the annexation of California. Overall, Polk’s expansion of presidential powers in the arena of foreign policy and military powers were subtle, yet noticeable, as Manifest Destiny became the hallmark of his Administration’s foreign policy objectives. Yet, out of this war came an important consideration in terms of the Supreme Court. In Fleming v. Page , the Supreme Court ruled the following: “As Commander in Chief, he [the president] is authorized to direct the movements of the naval and military forces placed by law at his command, and to employ them in the manner he may deem most effectual to harass and conquer and subdue the enemy.” 37 Fisher, here, notes the Court’s precedent: “The power of Commander in Chief, necessarily broad, must adhere to the policy declared by Congress in law.” 38 The next significant presidential expansion came during the American Civil War. During the Civil War. President Lincoln had to be constitutionally prudent, yet shrewd at the same time. With belligerent states in the South, President Lincoln and his Secretary of State, William Seward, maintained one goal concerning the Civil War’s foreign policy: maintain European neutrality throughout the entirety of the war. Led by delegate Charles Francis Adams of the Adams’ presidential family tree, Lincoln and Seward pressed Adams to achieve their goal: Lincoln and Seward emphasized that the conflict in America was a domestic proposition, and they warned against any form of outside involvement, whether mediation, arbitration, armistice military force, or simply the or simply the offering of good offices for peace talks. Recognition of the South, Seward proclaimed to Times of London correspondent William H. Russell, meant a war with the Union that would ‘wrap the world in fire’. 39 President Lincoln continued to pursue this policy while simultaneously expanding the powers of the presidency in foreign affairs through the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus . This controversial decision, though technically constitutional in light of the southern states’ rebellion, made its way to the Supreme Court on the account of a citizen in the North who was not a member 36 Fisher, Presidential War Power , 41 37 Fleming v. Page, 50 U.S. (9 How.) 603, 615 (1850). 38 Fisher, Presidential War Power , 42. 39 Zeiler, Thomas W., and Robert J. McMahon. Guide to U.S. Foreign Policy: A Diplomatic History . CQ Press, 2012.