Revision & Exam Practice for the “legacy” A Level qualifications including:

• Edexcel (Unit 3C – Representative Processes in the USA, Unit 4C – Governing the USA)
• AQA (Unit 3A – The Politics of the USA, Unit 4A – The Government of the USA)
• OCR (F855 – US Government & Politics)

REVISE THE US CONGRESS

How to use these questions for revision and exam practice:

1. For long-answer or essay questions, plan a 4 paragraph response using the PEEACH paragraph structure (P=point, E=evidence, E=explain, A=argument, C=counter argument, H=how does this answer the question?)
2. Once you have completed your question, read the indicative content.
3. Using the essay criteria, colour code each criteria to show how successful you were at including this in your essay (red, amber or green)
4. There is also a space for you to add additional notes and/or examples that don’t appear in the indicative content, or add better explanations, or include additional, points from the indicative content.

To what extent does Congress still have a meaningful foreign policy role?

Indicative Content

The constitution sets out a clear role for Congress in foreign policy, and, amongst the powers it grants, are those to provide for the common defence, to declare war, to regulate commerce with foreign nations, to raise and support armies, to confirm ambassadors and to ratify treaties. Constitutionally then, Congress shares responsibility for foreign policy with the president, and this division sets up what has been termed an ‘invitation to struggle’ for control of foreign policy.

Arguments that Congress retains a meaningful foreign policy role include:

• Congress continues to control all financing of the armed forces and arguably brought the Vietnam War to an end through its withdrawal
• Congress’ power to declare war was reaffirmed by the passage of the War Powers Act
• congressional leaders sometimes attempt to run an alternative foreign policy to the president’s, e.g. the Helms Burton Act passed during the Clinton presidency, and the visit to Syria by Speaker Pelosi in 2007
• Congress can choose to withdraw ‘fast track’ trade authority from the president and has not currently granted it to President Obama
• significant presidential treaties have been rejected by the Senate, e.g. the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1999

Arguments that Congress no longer has a meaningful foreign policy role include:

• since World War Two, the executive branch has had responsibility for the tone and direction of foreign policy
• the president has a vast foreign policy bureaucracy to advise him and implement policy
• the president’s power as commander in chief means he can deploy armed forces without congressional authorisation, such as in the attacks on Libya in March 2011, and even in the face of an explicit refusal by Congress to authorise it, e.g. the Kosovo campaign in 1999
• congressional attempts to exercise the power of purse, e.g the Democratic Congress’s attempts in 2006-08 to impose a timeline for withdrawal from Iraq, usually end in failure
• congressional interventions, e.g. the repeated attempts to pass resolutions on the Armenian ‘genocide’, are often inimical to the national interest
• the president can bypass the Senate’s powers of ratification and confirmation