- Recess appointment
A recess appointment occurs when the
President of the United States fills a vacant federal position during a recess of theUnited States Senate . The appointment must be approved by the Senate by the end of the next session (which in current practice is roughly a calendar year), or the position becomes vacant again. Recess appointments are authorized by : "The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session."Legitimacy of intrasession appointments
According to Henry B. Hogue, of the Government and Finance Division of the Congressional Reference Service, [ [http://www.senate.gov/reference/resources/pdf/RS21308.pdf"Recess Appointments Frequently Asked Questions", Congressional Research Service] ]
It has been argued that as the clause was originally understood, it was expected that if the Senate was in session when an office became vacant, the president would make a standard advice-and-consent appointment at that time. [ [http://poseidon01.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=676067083085096094123025069119066078034050019023060074029022107088103020030127091099032060018032059046053098111084016018125102066027021040019070027115098023092070078041003088025077083104120072028068&EXT=pdf"The Original Meaning of the Recess Appointments Clause" "UCLA Law Review" Volume 52, Number 5(June 2005), pp. 1487-1578 ] ] The argument further maintains that recess appointments were only to be made during intersession recesses, which during the early days of the country lasted between six and nine months, and were thereforerequired to prevent important offices from remaining unfilled for long periods. The current interpretation, this view holds, allows appointments to be made during recesses too brief to justify bypassing the Senate.
Historically, presidents tended to make recess appointments when the Senate was adjourned for lengthy periods. Since
World War II , presidents have sometimes made recess appointments when Senate opposition appeared strong, hoping that the appointee might prove himself or herself in office and allow opposition to dissipate. Most recently, however, as partisanship onCapitol Hill has grown, recess appointments have tended to solidify opposition to the appointee.Examples and use
Presidents since
George Washington have made recess appointments. Washington appointedSouth Carolina judgeJohn Rutledge asChief Justice of the United States during a congressional recess in 1795. Because of Rutledge's political views and occasional mental illness, however, the Senate rejected his nomination, and his appointment lapsed. Rutledge subsequently attemptedsuicide .On
August 11 ,1902 , PresidentTheodore Roosevelt namedOliver Wendell Holmes Jr. to theUnited States Supreme Court through a recess appointment. He was subsequently confirmed by the Senate onDecember 4 ,1902 . Roosevelt made several recess appointments during a one-day recess of the Senate.Fact|date=May 2008New Jersey judgeWilliam J. Brennan was appointed to the United States Supreme Court by PresidentDwight D. Eisenhower in 1956 through a recess appointment. This was done in part with an eye on the presidential campaign that year; Eisenhower was running for reelection, and his advisors thought it would be politically advantageous to place a northeastern Catholic on the court. Brennan was promptly confirmed when the Senate came back into session. Eisenhower made two other recess appointments.Ronald Reagan made 243 recess appointments during his two terms in office;George H. W. Bush made 77 during his single term, most notablyLawrence Eagleburger forU.S. Secretary of State in1992 , who had in effect filled that role afterJames Baker resigned.President
Bill Clinton made a recess appointment ofBill Lann Lee as Assistant Attorney General forcivil rights , when it became clear that Lee's strong support ofaffirmative action would lead to Senate opposition. Similarly, when the Senate did not vote on his nomination ofJames Hormel to be Ambassador toLuxembourg , Clinton made a recess appointment. Many people felt that the Senate's inaction was because Hormel was openlygay , and when he was appointed, became the first openly gay U.S. ambassador. Clinton made a total of 140 recess appointments over his two terms. On one of the last days of his presidency, Clinton used the recess appointment power to placeRoger L. Gregory on theUnited States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit . Gregory was the first African-American to serve on that court.Developments under Bush
Controversial recess appointments
President
George W. Bush appointed two judges during Senate recesses, William Pryor and Charles Pickering to U.S. courts of appeals after their nominations werefilibuster ed by Senate Democrats. Judge Pickering, who Bush appointed to the Fifth Circuit, withdrew his name from consideration for renomination and retired when his recess appointment expired. Judge Pryor was subsequently confirmed by the Senate for a lifetime appointment to the Eleventh Circuit. In his first six years in office, Bush has made 167 recess appointments.On
August 1 ,2005 , Bush made a recess appointment of John Bolton, to serve as U.S. representative to theUnited Nations . [ [http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/08/01/bolton.appointment "Sidestepping Senate, Bush sends Bolton to U.N." at CNN] ] Bolton had also been the subject of a Senatefilibuster . The filibuster concerned documents that theWhite House refused to release, which Democrats suggested may contain proof of Bolton's abusive treatment and coercion of staff members or of his improper use ofNational Security Agency communications intercepts regarding U.S. citizens. Having failed to win Senate confirmation, he resigned his office in December 2006 concurrently with the adjournment of the 109th Congress. [ [http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/04/world/05boltoncnd.html "Bolton to Leave Post as U.S. Envoy to U.N." at NY Times] ]On
April 4 ,2007 , during the Easter recess of Congress, Bush announced three recess appointments. The first wasSam Fox to serve as U.S. Ambassador toBelgium . [ [http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/04/20070404-4.html Personnel announcement at the White House website] ] Fox's appointment had been thwarted in Congress because he had donated $50,000 to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth during the 2004 presidential campaign, a group whose advertisements many Democrats blamed for John Kerry's loss. [ [http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/04/04/bush.ambassador.ap/index.html "Swift Boat donor's appointment sidesteps Congress" at CNN] ]The second appointment announced that day was
Susan Dudley to head theOffice of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) at theOffice of Management and Budget .The third recess appointment on
April 4 wasAndrew G. Biggs to serve as Deputy Commissioner of theSocial Security Administration . [ [http://www.ssa.gov/org/ssaorg.htm#COMM organizational chart at SSA website] ] Biggs was investigated by Senate Democrats in 2005, while serving as Assistant Commissioner for the Social Security Administration, concerning whether he violated a federal ban on congressional lobbying by federal employees when he edited the prepared testimony for a lobbyist appearing before a Democratic Policy Committee Social Security hearing as alleged by John Stanton in "Congress Daily". [ [http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0505/051905cdam1.htm "Senate Dems target SSA official for promoting Bush plan" at GovExec.com] ]Prevention of further recess appointments
Starting in 2007,
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has prevented further recess appointments by President Bush. A compromise was worked out for the August break, and Bush did not make any recess appointments. However, no agreement was reached for the two-week Thanksgiving break in November 2007, and as a result, Reid decided to keep the Senate in session by having pro forma sessions every three days. Prior to this, there had been speculation thatJames Holsinger would receive a recess appointment as U.S. surgeon general. [ [http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/11/16/politics/politico/thecrypt/main3516002.shtml "Reid To Bush: No Recess Appointments Wanted" at CBSNews.com] ] The Senate was also kept in session over the Christmas break as well as during 2008 breaks. [ [http://thomas.loc.gov/home/ds/s1102.html Days in Session Calendars U.S. Senate - 110th Congress 2nd Session] ] It appears likely that Bush will be unable to make any further recess appointments during his presidency.References
ee also
*
Advice and consent
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.