09-08-2016, 07:22 AM
(09-07-2016, 10:36 PM)Copperfield Wrote: Article I, Section 8 calls on Congress to provide for a standing Navy (that is full-time) but specifically only allows for a maximum of two years of appropriations for a standing army. Note that there is no such mention of a time limit on either the US navy or militia. When the constitution was written there was a major distrust for standing armies (Bob has already been over this with you in greater detail). Indeed for great periods of time there hasn't been a standing army in the United States, usually being disbanded once a particular war was over. That all changed after the world wars and the United States became a military and economic empire (another reason standing armies are bad mmkay?). Hell Congress doesn't even bother deliberating on appropriations anymore. Nearly the entire process is done through the Pentagon and through the Armed Services committee.
Problem is, once you've more or less conquered the entire world you run out of bad guys to fight with all that army. No surprise that, in addition to record weapon sales to foreign nations and fomenting violence in resource rich nations, our government has started to turn its hostility inward eyeing its own citizens.
There is a parallel to the late Roman Republic, here. Rome did not have a standing army until it's increasingly large empire forced it to.
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