When crisis requires American troops to deploy on American soil, the country depends on a rich and evolving body of law to establish clear lines of authority, safeguard civil liberties, and protect its democratic institutions and traditions. Since the attacks of 9/11, the governing law has changed rapidly even as domestic threats-from terror attacks, extreme weather, and pandemics-mount. Soldiers on the Home Front is the first book to systematically analyze the domestic role of the military as it is shaped by law, surveying America's history of judicial decisions, constitutional provisions, statutes, regulations, military orders, and martial law to ask what we must learn and do before the next crisis. America's military is uniquely able to save lives and restore order in situations that overwhelm civilian institutions. Yet the U.S. military has also been called in for more coercive duties at home: breaking strikes, quelling riots, and enforcing federal laws in the face of state resistance. It has spied on and overseen the imprisonment of American citizens during wars, Red scares, and other emergencies. And while the fears of the Republic's founders that a strong army could undermine democracy have not been realized, history is replete with reasons for concern. At a time when the military's domestic footprint is expanding, Banks and Dycus offer a thorough analysis of the relevant law and history to challenge all the stakeholders-within and outside the military-to critically assess the past in order to establish best practices for the crises to come.

The ideal model of national security decision making, whereby the legislative branch authorizes action to protect national security and the executive branch takes it, has broken down due to the speed and unpredictability of foreign crises and the president's monopoly on foreign intelligence. In response, Congress has ceded the initiative to the president, and then utilized the power of the purse to ratify or restrict what the president has done. This power, by necessity and preference, has become the central congressional tool for participating in national security policy. Inevitably attacks on policy are transformed into attacks on the making and effects of appropriations. In National Security Law and the Power of the Purse, William C. Banks and Peter Raven-Hansen offer a compelling discussion of the constitutional and statutory questions raised by these attacks and in the process suggest answers to these recurring questions. They look at the early history of the power of the purse in national security affairs to illustrate that appropriations for national security have historically played a special substantive role in controlling executive uses of the war power. The authors use this history as a basis for exploring the mechanics and scope of the power of the purse in contemporary national security, presenting Vietnam War appropriations and the Boland Amendments as case studies. National Security Law and the Power of the Purse offers a sophisticated and provocative primer on the power of the purse in national security law. It is essential reading for scholars and students of law and government, public administration, and national security and foreign affairs.