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Michal Benari
Summer Intern, Manhattan Institute's Center for Legal Policy
A third federal appeals court declared President Obama's recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), a 5-member board which referees labor-management disputes and oversees union elections, to be unconstitutional, on the grounds that the Senate was not officially in recess during the extended holiday break in January 2012 when these three contentious vacancies were filled. The significance of the ruling was depicted on Wednesday, as the Fourth Circuit refused to enforce two NLRB decisions, together with the dissent in federal appeals courts in both Philadelphia and the District of Columbia. Subsequently, the U.S. Supreme Court has granted cert. to hear the D.C. case.
Significantly however, Obama may have achieved a political resolution to this legal dispute, as the president has nominated two new NLRB appointees to replace those opposed by the Senate Republicans, namely union lawyer Richard Griffin and Deputy Labor Secretary Sharon Block, to be replaced by former AFL-CIO lawyer Nancy Schiffer and Kent Hirozawa. Obama has thereby (tactically) cleared the way for a confirmation vote next week and perhaps rendered the Supreme Court's appraisal moot.
Crucially, this was not the only controversy to preoccupy the Senate this week, as the appointment of Richard Cordray as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, was confirmed on Tuesday afternoon with a vote of 66 in favor and 34 opposed. Cordray's appointment too occurred during the questioned January recess of 2012. Moreover, a series of compromises are to proceed this week, as it is reported that Senate Republicans will allow votes to proceed for President Obama's top choices to run the Labor Department, Environmental Protection Agency, and Export-Import Bank of the United States.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid [D-Nev] said "I think we get what we want, they get what they want. Not a bad deal."
Please visit our past discussions on recess appointments for a history of the arguments that preceded this latest compromise.
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