Law Commons^™

Plausible Absurdities And Practical Formalities: The Recess Appointments Clause In Theory And Practice, David Frisof

Michigan Law Review

The recent controversy surrounding President Obama’s recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau while the Senate was holding pro forma sessions illustrates the need to reach a new understanding of the Recess Appointments Clause of the Constitution. For the Recess Appointments Clause to be functional, it must fulfill two essential constitutional purposes: it must act as a fulcrum in the separation of powers, and it must ensure the continued exercise of the executive power. Achieving this functionality depends not only on the formal constructions of the Clause but also on the ways in …

Brief Of Political Scientists And Historians As Amici Curiae In Support Of Respondent, National Labor Relations Board, Petitioner V. Noel Canning, No. 12-1281, United States Supreme Court (Nov. 25, 2013), David F. Forte, Hadley P. Arkes, Joseph M. Bessette, Nelson Lund, Jeremy A. Rabkin, Ralph A. Rossum

Law Faculty Briefs and Court Documents

The Recess Appointments Clause does not permit the unilateral appointments to the NLRB made by the President in this case. Those appointments - made during a three-day “intra-session” break when the Senate was meeting pro forma - are unique in the history of the Republic. They are also the culmination of unnecessary and inappropriate Executive overreaching. This overreaching has undermined a valuable Senate prerogative in a manner unfathomable to the Founders and inconsistent with the design of the Constitution.

The primary purpose of this brief is to show that adhering to the original meaning of the Recess Appointments Clause has …

The Constitutionality Of An Executive Spending Plan, Paul E. Salamanca

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Operation of government in the absence of appropriations has become relatively common in the United States, particularly when projected expenses exceed projected revenue, making adoption of a budget a difficult task for the legislature. This Article focuses on the budget crisis in the Commonwealth of Kentucky from 2002 through 2003. In Part I, this Article recapitulates the history of the spending plan, including the action filed in Franklin Circuit Court to affirm its constitutionality. In Part II, this Article discusses certain theoretical, historical, and legal principles that inform analysis of the plan. In Part III, it considers certain deviations and …

The Constitution, The White House, And The Military Hiv Ban: A New Threshold For Presidential Non-Defense Of Statutes, Chrysanthe Gussis

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The President's constitutional duty to 'take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed" implies that the President is entrusted with the responsibility to defend those laws against court challenges. On occasion, however, Presidents faced with legislation that they deem unconstitutional have declined to defend that legislation against legal challenges. On February 10, 1996, President Clinton declined to defend a provision included in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1996 that required discharge from the military of all HIV-positive servicemembers because he believed that the provision violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. This Note explores whether …

Independent Counsel And The Constitution, Harold H. Bruff

Publications

No abstract provided.