Congressman Paul has stated that membership in the WTO is unconstitutional, which is to say illegal. The Constitution grants Congress, and Congress alone, the authority to regulate trade. Congress cannot cede that authority to the WTO or any other international body, nor can the President legally sign any treaty that purports to do so. When Congress in essence transfers its authority over trade matters to the WTO, it acts illegally.
Congressman Paul has introduced legislation to remove the US from the WTO and has continuously argued that such membership is illegal and should be negated. He asserts that Congress has submitted to European and global interests in taxes and trade at the expense of American interests.
WTO is Not Free Trade
In March of 2000, Congressman Paul spoke on the House floor about recent actions by the World Trade Organization. He notes that no nation can maintain it's sovereignty while submitting to an international organization.
Withdrawing Approval of WTO Agreement
In June of 2000, Congressman Paul introduced legislation to withdraw the approval of the agreement to join the WTO. The videos below show the discussion on the matter.
The Revolution
Congressman Paul's book "The Revolution" deals with the WTO. That section of the book is available through audible books and is vocalized in the video below.
The WTO has given us the worst of both worlds. We've sacrificed national sovereignty by changing our domestic laws at the behest of an international body and yet we still face trade wars over a variety of products. If anything, the WTO makes trade relations worse by providing our foreign competitors with a collective means to attack US trade interests.
And let us not forget, that the Constitution grants Congress, and Congress alone, the authority to regulate trade and craft tax laws. Congress cannot cede that authority to the WTO or to any other international body. Nor can the President legally sign any treaty that proports to do so. Our founders never intended for America to become entangled in global trade schemes, and they certainly never intended to have our domestic laws overwritten by international bureaucrats.
Bowing and Scraping
In February of 2005, Congressman Paul used his "Texas Talk" to discuss the World Trade Organization and his belief that the US should not be involved in the organization.
Bowing and Scraping for the WTO February 28, 2005
The World Trade Organization, which the United States joined in 1994, has been disastrous for American sovereignty. A tax bill passed last year provides a vivid example of just how blatantly Congress is surrendering our sovereignty to quasi-governmental bodies like the WTO. For years, high-tax Europe has objected to how we tax American companies on their overseas earnings. The EU took its dispute to the WTO grievance board, which voted in favor of the Europeans. The WTO ruling was clear: Congress must change American law to comply with European rules.
Make no mistake about it: WTO ministers tell Congress to change American laws, and Congress complies. In fact, congressional leaders obediently scrambled to make sure the corporate tax bill passed before a WTO deadline. Thousands and thousands of bills languish in committees, yet a bill ordered by the WTO was pushed to the front of the line. Americans should expect to see more of the laws we live under being dictated by international bodies.
Later this year, all European Union countries will unify their food supplement laws to conform with rules established by a United Nations commission. This commission, called Codex Alimentarius, calls for strict control of dietary supplements. Under the Codex rules, Europeans will need a doctor’s prescription to obtain even basic vitamins. Thanks to the WTO, Americans may find their supplements similarly restricted in an attempt to harmonize the regulatory playing field between the U.S. and Europe. After all, this is the new reality in the WTO era: no nation may enjoy an “unfair” trade or regulatory environment.
This affront to our national sovereignty was of course predictable when we joined the WTO. A Congressional Research Service report was quite clear about the consequences of our membership: “As a member of the WTO, the United States does commit to act in accordance with the rules of the multi-lateral body. It is legally obligated to insure that national laws do not conflict with WTO rules.”
Our membership in the WTO is unconstitutional, which is to say illegal. The Constitution grants Congress, and Congress alone, the authority to regulate trade. Congress cannot cede that authority to the WTO or any other international body, nor can the President legally sign any treaty that purports to do so. When Congress in essence transfers its authority over trade matters to the WTO, it acts illegally. Fortunately, Congress has an opportunity this year to withdraw our membership in the WTO.
When the U.S. first joined the organization in 1994, a rushed lame-duck Congress inserted a 5 year review clause to garner some last-minute votes. This clause allows members of Congress to bring a resolution every 5 years calling for a vote on our continued membership. I plan to join with other House colleagues this year in demanding withdrawal from the WTO. Our sovereignty is a precious national asset, and the American people are tired of watching Congress sell out one constitutional principle after another.
Does the WTO Serve Our Interest
In May of 2005, Congressman Paul used his "Texas Talk" to address the WTO and noting a seminar where he put forth the case against the US to be a part of the WTO.
Does the WTO Serve Our Interests? May 16, 2005
Last week I had an opportunity to present the case against US membership in the World Trade Organization at a seminar in Washington. Later this summer Congress will have a similar opportunity to raise objections about the WTO when several colleagues and I bring a resolution to the House floor seeking the wholesale withdrawal of the US from the organization. The World Trade Organization by its own admission is not just about trade. According to the WTO website, liberalizing trade actually takes a back seat to its more activist ambitions, such as “development”-- a euphemism for wealth-transfers from rich nations to poor nations. Likewise, their own website promises that, “In the WTO, commercial interests do not take priority over environmental protection.”
In 1994 the WTO created the Trade and Environment Committee to bring “environmental and sustainable development issues into the mainstream of WTO work.” What does this mean? It would not take much imagination to tie any environmental issue to trade and thus invite WTO meddling. What about the Kyoto Accords, the international agreement that aims to solve the supposed problem of global warming? Clearly the Kyoto Accords, to which the United States has not agreed, will affect world trade. Will this be an open door for the WTO to act as enforcer toward the United States and other countries that refuse to sign Kyoto?
Two leading UN observers, Henry Lamb of Sovereignty International and Cathie Adams of Texas Eagle Forum, have reported that the WTO is widely recognized as the enforcement tool of choice for the Kyoto treaty. Even Newt Gingrich, a supporter of American membership in the WTO, recognized in 1994 that far more than trade rules were at stake: I am just saying that we need to be honest about the fact that we are transferring from the United States at a practical level significant authority to a new organization.
This is a transformational moment. I would feel better if the people who favor this would just be honest about the scale of change.... This is not just another trade agreement. This is adopting something which twice, once in the 1940s and once in the 1950s, the U.S. Congress rejected. I am not even saying that we should reject it; I, in fact, lean toward it. But I think we have to be very careful, because it is a very big transfer of power.
In reality, the WTO is the third leg of the globalists’ plan for a one-world, centrally-managed economic system. The intention behind the creation of the WTO was to have a third institution to handle the trade side of international economic cooperation, joining two institutions created by Bretton Woods, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. For the United States to give up any bit of its sovereignty to these unelected and unaccountable organizations is economic suicide. International organizations can never “manage” trade better than it naturally occurs in a true free market of goods and services.
At best, WTO acts as a meddling middleman, taking a cut for unnecessary services provided. At worst, it forces the United States to change its domestic laws in ways that seriously harm our economy and our sovereignty. Economist Murray Rothbard said it best: You don’t need a treaty to have free trade. Governments and quasi-government bodies like the WTO can only politicize and interfere with the natural flow of goods and services across borders. When we cede even a fraction of our sovereignty to an organization like the WTO, we can hardly hope to become more prosperous or more free.
Sponsored and Cosponsored Legislation
This representative has not been identified as sponsoring or cosponsoring significant legislation related to this title.
