Alert Summary
Members of the West Virginia Legislature are seeking to HB 2155 to nullify unconstitutional federal deployments of the West Virginia National Guard.
Take Action NowContact your Representative
Please help stop unconstitutional foreign wars — and enact HB 2155 — by contacting your state legislators. Urge them to faithfully abide by the U.S. Constitution and to reject all laws or actions that violate them.
Clicking this button will take you to a page where you can send a pre-written letter, call your officials, and/or send video messages.
Members of the West Virginia Legislature are seeking to enact legislation nullifying unconstitutional federal deployments of the West Virginia National Guard.
House Bill 2155 (HB 2155), titled the “Defend the Guard Act,” is sponsored by Delegate Pat McGeehan (R-Chester). It would prevent combat deployments of the West Virginia 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, Clauses 11 and 15, of the U.S. Constitution.
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. If West Virginia and other states prohibit unconstitutional National Guard deployments, the federal government’s participation in these foreign conflicts 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.”
Importance
HB 2155 is 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, undeclared wars — subversion going back decades — violates the U.S. Constitution, it cannot be considered “in Pursuance thereof” and, thus, is not “the supreme Law of the Land.” Unfortunately, over the last several decades, thousands of unconstitutional laws on the federal, state, and even local levels have been created and enforced.
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.” HB 2155 is an excellent model for other states to follow.
Urge your state delegate and senator to support HB 2155 and to push back against all other unconstitutional laws at every level of government.
Although we provide a way to easily email legislators, we know from long experience that it takes a lot more interaction with your legislators to get your point across than that provided by emails alone.
That's why we provide an easy way not only to email them, but to contact them by phone, tweet, and even video message them.