Voting on Trump's "Emergency"

The Democrats in the house and senate plan to vote on cancelling Trump’s declaration of a national emergency to construct part of a wall between the US and Mexico  without legislation allowing and funding it. Republicans who care about the constitution, the separation of powers, and limited government should vote with them. The issue is clear enough that it will be reasonable to wonder whether the Republicans who vote with the president really care about these things or only talk about them to gull voters who do care.  Trump’s opponents are right on this issue, and he is wrong. He proposed legislation to build his wall, and the congress failed to appropriate money for it. That should have been the end of it. Whether he was right or wrong in wanting the money is irrelevant. 

 However rejecting this “emergency”  is not enough. Congress should  repeal the laws giving presidents any general power to declare something  to be an emergency and then to act pretty much as they like to respond to it. Legislators could then pass new laws giving presidents authority to respond to specific categories of threats such as actual or imminent attacks on the United States, major epidemics, and so on. 

Those in congress who rightly oppose Trump on this should admit that the congress  opened the door for it and then clean things up. For as things stand now, Trump probably had formal legal authority for what he did even though it went beyond the  funny business on emergencies from other presidents.