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Civil War In The U.S. Foreign Relations Law: A Dress Rehearsal For Modern Transformations, The The Use And Misuse Of History In U.S. Foreign Relations Law, Thomas H. Lee

Faculty Scholarship

The first of the four U.S. foreign relations law insights of the Prize Cases that this Article will discuss is the notion that international law provides a basis for the President's exercise of military force in a manner neither specifically enumerated in the Constitution nor preauthorized by congressional enactments. The specific military action was the proclamation of a naval blockade that applied not only to active Confederate belligerents but also to loyal U.S. citizens residing in seceding or soon-to-secede states and to foreign neutral citizens. The second insight is the notion that federal constitutional law protections for U.S. citizens, such …