The Constitution vs. the Commander-in-Chief: The Duty to Disobey Unlawful Orders

Source: CounterPunch
by John W Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead

“Every military servicemember’s oath is a pledge to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. It is not an oath to a politician. It is not an oath to a party. And it is not an oath to the police state. Yet what happens when those same men and women are being told—by their own government—that obedience to power and loyalty to a political leader come before allegiance to the Constitution they swore to uphold? That question isn’t hypothetical. It is the moral line now being tested in real time, and it goes to the heart of what kind of country we are: do we live in a constitutional republic governed by the rule of law, or in a militarized police state where ‘legality’ is whatever the person with the most power and the biggest army say it is?” (12/04/25)

https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/12/04/the-constitution-vs-the-commander-in-chief-the-duty-to-disobey-unlawful-orders/