Court: Obama Appointments to Labor Panel Are Unconstitutional

Fox news ^ | January 25, 203 | Staff

[lbryce]

President Obama violated the Constitution when he bypassed the Senate to fill vacancies on a labor relations panel, a federal appeals court panel ruled Friday.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said that Obama did not have the power to make three recess appointments last year to the National Labor Relations Board.

The unanimous decision is an embarrassing setback for the president, who made the appointments after Senate Republicans spent months blocking his choices for an agency they contended was biased in favor of unions.

The ruling also throws into question Obama's recess appointment of Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Cordray's appointment, also made under the recess circumstance, has been challenged in a separate case.

Obama claims he acted properly in the case of the NLRB appointments because the Senate was away for the holidays on a 20-day recess. But the three-judge panel ruled that the Senate technically stayed in session when it was gaveled in and out every few days for so-called "pro forma" sessions.

GOP lawmakers used the tactic -- as Democrats have in the past as well -- to specifically to prevent the president from using his recess power. GOP lawmakers contend the labor board has been too pro-union in its decisions. They had also vigorously opposed the nomination of Cordray.

The Obama administration is expected to appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, but if it stands, it means hundreds of decisions issued by the board over more than a year are invalid. It also would leave the five-member labor board with just one validly appointed member, effectively shutting it down. The board is allowed to issue decisions only when it has at least three sitting members.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/01/25/court-obama-appointments-are-unconstitutional/?test=latestnews#ixzz2J0bN6V00

[AtlasStalled]

Does the Constitution apply to the President? Because I’m sure if Obama knew that he’d have complied. I’m pretty sure that when he took the oath of office swearing to uphold and faithfully execute the Constitution he thought it was only precatory.

[DAC21]

So can the Regime take this to the SCOTUS so that Holder can whip out the Roberts with Goats pictures and make this all go away?

[unixfox]

Finally someone has called him out on something.

If a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it does it matter?

That's what we have here. NOTHING will happen to this usurper. NOTHING!

[LiveFreeOrDie2001]

“...THE ONE declares that in the interests of the People, he must become our President for Life.”

I am truly concerned he would try this; with a lot of sheeple demanding it...

[Wisconsinlady]

what is to stop him from appointing them as new czars?

[Cboldt]

-- IIRC it was Democrats that pioneered the trick to prevent a President, which one I don't recall, nor who it was they were trying to prevent from being appointed. --

The younger Bush, and it was to prevent recess appointments of judges.

This ruling goes beyond the appointment during pro forma sessions (a senatorial sham, IMO, to pretend they are "at work" when they aren't, and don't intend to be), by holding that a recess starts when the senate adjourns sine die (it does that exactly one time per year), and ends when the next session is gaveled to order. This ruling also holds that in order for a recess appointment to be valid, the vacancy has to happen, occur, start, begin, during that interval when the senate is in recess.

This ruling, applied to Bush recess appointments, would find them unconstitutional, too.