In 1973, Congress passed the War Powers Resolution over President Richard Nixon's veto, attempting to reassert legislative authority over the nation's ability to wage war. The showdown represented the culmination of decades of frustration over presidential war-making that had bypassed congressional approval, from Korea to Vietnam, and raised fundamental constitutional questions about the balance of power that remain unresolved more than fifty years later. The Constitution deliberately divided war powers between the executive and legislative branches. Congress held the power to declare war and control military funding, while the president served as commander in chief of the armed forces. The founders intended this division to prevent any single person from dragging the nation into conflict. But the Cold War and the rise of American global military c ...