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Recent legislation proposed by Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D–NY), the Military Justice Improvement and Increasing Prevention Act, if passed, would strip the authority to decide whether to prosecute sexual assaults and other serious crimes such as murder and manslaughter from commanders and give it to military prosecutors.REF
Since the founding of the American military, commanders, who are not lawyers, have had the authority to refer charges to courts-martial in order to enforce good order and discipline. Those commanders are advised by military lawyers, but the decision to send a case to a court-martial is theirs alone.