The Real Problem With ‘Politicizing the Military’

If President Donald Trump has done nothing else in his troubled, turbulent tenure, he has sensitized us anew to concerns about the politicization of the military ­— along with the diplomatic corps, the intelligence community, and the law enforcement community. As much as the subject demands our attention, it has largely escaped the level of scrutiny and understanding it deserves. Few among us understand the subject, much less why it is important. Trying to define it is even harder. As Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart famously said in a 1964 opinion of pornography, “I know it when I see it,” but that standard seems obscenely inadequate with regard to this important democratic precept.

Here’s a question for starters: Does the U.S. military belong to the president? The answer is unconditionally no. Ours being a system of governance based on popular sovereignty — rule of, by, and for the people — the military, especially a professional, full-time, paid one, belongs to the people it is charged with representing.

Can the president then do whatever he wants with the military? The answer is again no, but conditionally so. Our chosen form of government, representative democracy, is built of constitutionally empowered, co equal institutions charged with checking and balancing one another.