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Lawsuits Against Undeclared Wars and the Draft: What Parents Won and Lost in Court

Courts have mostly refused to decide whether a war is lawful. Parents should know that going in. They should also know that lawsuits put facts under oath and on the public record, and that record is what the next group of parents reads.

The cases​

  • Massachusetts v. Laird (1970). A state asked the Supreme Court to rule on the Vietnam war's legality. The Court declined, 6–3 (Wikipedia). See Massachusetts v. Laird.
  • Doe v. Bush (1st Cir. 2003). Soldiers, parents of soldiers, and members of Congress sued to stop the Iraq invasion without a declaration of war. The court dismissed it for failing "to raise a sufficiently clear constitutional issue" (Wikipedia). The invasion began the next day. See Military Families Speak Out.
  • Rostker v. Goldberg (1981). The Supreme Court upheld male-only draft registration, 6–3 (Wikipedia).
  • National Coalition for Men v. Selective Service System. Won in a Texas district court in 2019, reversed on appeal; the Supreme Court declined to hear it (Wikipedia). The same group reported in August 2026 that Selective Service withdrew its implementing rule for automatic registration on 23 July 2026 with no public explanation, while the December deadline stands (NCFM).

The Iran war began on 28 February 2026 with no declaration and no authorization. The administration's legal position, per a State Department opinion reviewed by Snopes, is that the United States acted "at the request of and in the collective self-defense of its Israeli ally, as well as in the exercise of the United States' own inherent right of self-defense" (Snopes, 30 April 2026). Representative Ted Lieu wrote that a ground invasion "would also be brazenly illegal without Congressional authorization" (repost, 21 June 2026). A Japanese political group argued that Article 51 of the UN Charter "permits the exercise of collective self-defense, not the authorization of preemptive strikes" (Issuikai statement, 8 March 2026).

Why sue if courts decline?​

Because the record outlives the ruling. The Iraq plaintiffs lost; the Senate later found the weapons case unsupported. Their filings are part of how Americans now know the Iraq war was sold on false claims. A 2026 suit over the Iran war, or over automatic registration, would force the government to put its reasons in writing.

Sources​

Status: Ted Lieu: Alive.

Last Updated: 2026-09-26

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