Adjourn And Appoint! We Can’t Wait – For Recess Appointments

But President Obama has been reluctant to use his Presidential power to make recess appointments. In 2010, after waiting 14 months, President Obama finally, finally, finally, finally, finally made just a few recess appointements to get the government operating,

Here is what is going on. President Obama is way behind in nominating people to vacant posts and judgeships. On top of this the Republicans have used the filibuster to block many of the candidates that Obama has nominated. In the case of the Labor Board there were only two people left serving on the 5-member Board when 3 are required to make rulings, and some 600 cases have backed up.

… Such use of legitimate power to make the government operate as it should is also known as “governing.” Until today he has refused to use this power to get the government operating. Today he finally, finally, finally, finally put 15 people into positions where they can start getting their agencies operating.

Even that small gesture made a big difference to working Americans, which I wrote about in NLRB Success Shows Value Of Recess Appointments,

A government agency is blocked from functioning by obstructionist, party-over-country, Republican Senators. The President makes recess appointments to get government functioning again and the agency starts doing its job. The result: working people are protected. Today the NLRB issued modest new guidelines for union elections that will clear up many, many problems faced by employees.

… The Constitutional purpose of recess appointments is to keep government functioning. When vacancies are left unfilled it hurts all of us. But even though there are a large number of unfilled positions, many blocked by Senate Republicans, President Obama has made very few recess appointments. The result is a a public increasingly frustrated by the hobbled government.

President Bush made 171 recess appointments, Clinton 139. Bush used this power to appoint extremist ideologues, Clinton to get around Republican obstruction.

President Obama has been reluctant to govern make recess appointments because he does not want to upset the Republican opposition. He has made less than 40 such appointments so far.

The Constitutional Solution: Adjourn And Appoint

The NLRB, judges and other appointments are all being blocked by Republican filibusters. This is not politics, this is not bipartisanship, this is intentional obstruction to keep the government from operating. The Constitution foresaw this, and the President has a responsibility to apply the Constitution to do something about this. The Constitution gives the President the executive power. The President is supposed to do that job and use this power to get things done.

The Constitution is clear:

Article II Section 2: 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.

Article II Section 3: …he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper;

If the House and Senate disagree on adjournment, the President can adjourn them. And when they are adjourned he can make recess appointments.

We can’t wait. We have an extraordinary situation here, where one of the parties, as a political strategy, is obstructing for the purpose of preventing the government from operating. It is the duty of the President to keep the government operating.

Mr. President, the next time the Congress recesses without recessing, adjourn them and appoint the necessary NLRB members, judges, etc to get this government back in operation for We, the People.

This post originally appeared at Campaign for America’s Future (CAF) at their Blog for OurFuture. I am a Fellow with CAF.

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