URGENT: On February 19, the Arizona Senate passed the “Defend the Guard Act” (SB 1121) by a 16-12 vote. The bill now heads to the House for consideration. Please contact your state representatives, and urge them to support SB 1121.
Arizona lawmakers are seeking to enact legislation nullifying unconstitutional federal deployments of the Arizona National Guard.
House Bill 2181 (HB 2181) and Senate Bill 1121 (SB 1121) are both titled the “Defend the Guard Act.” HB 2181 is sponsored by Representative Alexander Kolodin (R-Scottsdale) and cosponsored by nine other representatives and four senators, while SB 1121 is sponsored by Senator Wendy Rogers (R-Tempe) and cosponsored by 15 other senators and five representatives.
These bills would prevent combat deployments of the Arizona National Guard by the federal government in the absence of a congressional declaration of war or another constitutional reason in accordance with Article I, Section 8, Clause 15, of the U.S. Constitution.
In the bills’ legislative findings, they declare:
Although the United States Congress has not declared war in over seventy years, the United States has since gone to war repeatedly at the whim of the executive branch.
When unconstitutional actions are taken by the federal government, it is the proper role of the states themselves to take action to remedy the situation as outlined in the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions of 1798.
According to the Tenth Amendment Center, over 650,000 National Guard troops have been sent to foreign conflicts since 2001, and 45% of the total U.S. forces sent to Iraq and Afghanistan have been National Guard or Reserve troops.
Virtually all overseas military conflicts that the U.S. has participated in after World War II have been under the auspices of enforcing United Nations resolutions. The role of the U.S. is not to win these wars, but rather to enforce the will of the United Nations (e.g. promoting “peace”), hence the stalemate outcome of the Korean War, the Communist victory in Vietnam, and the Taliban reconquest of Afghanistan.
Despite billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars going to fund these wars, the millions of U.S. troops that have been deployed to them, and thousands of American servicemen that have died because of them, the U.S. has not been permitted to win any of these wars. In fact, these endless, foreign, undeclared wars have more to do with promoting globalist UN policies and goals than they have anything to do with protecting the mainland security of the United States and the freedoms of the American people.
Ultimately, the long-term and permanent solution to this problem is to completely terminate U.S. membership from the United Nations and all of its affiliate bodies, including NATO. The ultimate way to get out of these endless, undeclared wars is for the United States to get out of the United Nations!
If Arizona and other states prohibit unconstitutional National Guard deployments, the federal government’s participation in these foreign conflicts (the majority of which do not pertain to U.S. national security) would be severely hampered, therefore limiting the federal government’s ability to further entangle the U.S. in any undeclared wars overseas.
Such a limitation on the federal government’s ability to carry out an internationalist and interventionist foreign policy would be consistent with the wisdom of the Founding Fathers. In his 1796 Farewell Address, President George Washington affirmed, “It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world.” President Thomas Jefferson reiterated the same policy in his first inaugural address, advocating for “peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none.”
HB 2181 and SB 1121 are also an excellent application of Article VI of the U.S. Constitution, which states “[t]his Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof … shall be the supreme Law of the Land.”
Since the federal government’s engagement in endless, foreign, undeclared wars violates the U.S. Constitution, it cannot be considered “in Pursuance thereof” and, thus, is not “the supreme Law of the Land.”
Because of this, state legislatures have a duty to rein in unconstitutional wars and robustly enforce the Constitution and only those laws and actions “in Pursuance thereof.”
Urge your state representative and senator to stop unconstitutional foreign wars and defend the Arizona National Guard by supporting and passing the “Defend the Guard Act” (HB 2181 and SB 1121).
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