{ "id": "R42329", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "number": "R42329", "active": true, "source": "EveryCRSReport.com, University of North Texas Libraries Government Documents Department", "versions": [ { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 464060, "date": "2017-09-07", "retrieved": "2018-05-10T12:36:56.153445", "title": "Recess Appointments Made by President Barack Obama", "summary": "Under the Constitution, the President and the Senate share the power to make appointments to high-level politically appointed positions in the federal government. The Constitution also empowers the President unilaterally to make a temporary appointment to such a position if it is vacant and the Senate is in recess. Such an appointment, termed a recess appointment, expires at the end of the following session of the Senate. This report identifies recess appointments by President Barack Obama. The report discusses these appointments in the context of recess appointment authorities and practices generally, and it provides related statistics. Congressional actions to prevent recess appointments are also discussed.\nPresident Obama made 32 recess appointments, all to full-time positions. During his presidency, President William J. Clinton made 139 recess appointments, 95 to full-time positions and 44 to part-time positions. President George W. Bush made 171 recess appointments, 99 to full-time positions and 72 to part-time positions. \nSix of President Obama\u2019s recess appointments were made during recesses between Congresses or between sessions of Congress (intersession recess appointments). The remaining 26 were made during recesses within sessions of Congress (intrasession recess appointments). \nIn each of the 32 instances in which President Obama made a recess appointment, the individual also was nominated to the position to which he or she was appointed. In all of these cases, a related nomination to the position preceded the recess appointment. In 20 of the 32 cases, the Senate later confirmed the nominee to the position to which he or she had been recess appointed. The nominations of the 12 remaining recess appointees were either returned to, or withdrawn by, the President. \nBeginning in the 110th Congress, the Senate periodically used pro forma sessions to prevent the occurrence of a recess of more than three days. There appears to have been an expectation that this scheduling would block the President from making recess appointments, based on an argument that an absence of the Senate of three days or less would not constitute a \u201crecess\u201d long enough to permit the use of this authority. \nIn January 2012, President Obama made four recess appointments during a three-day recess between pro forma sessions of the Senate on January 3 and January 6, 2012, a period that was generally considered too short to permit recess appointments. The recess during which the President made the appointments was part of a period of Senate absence that, absent the pro forma sessions, would have constituted an intrasession adjournment of 10 days or longer. \nIn an opinion regarding the lawfulness of these appointments, the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice argued that \u201cthe President may determine that pro forma sessions at which no business is to be conducted do not interrupt a Senate recess for the purposes of the Recess Appointments Clause.\u201d The U.S. Supreme Court later concluded otherwise in a case regarding three of the four appointments. It held that, for purposes of the Clause, \u201cthe Senate is in session when it says it is, provided that, under its own rules, it retains the capacity to transact Senate business.\u201d The three recess appointments at issue were found to be constitutionally invalid.\nAdditional information on recess appointments may be found in other CRS reports: CRS Report RS21308, Recess Appointments: Frequently Asked Questions, by Henry B. Hogue; and CRS Report RL33310, Recess Appointments Made by President George W. Bush, by Henry B. Hogue and Maureen O. Bearden.\nThis report will not be updated.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/R42329", "sha1": "76fe8d7b58e093f025ad9919e107bd123f10a66d", "filename": "files/20170907_R42329_76fe8d7b58e093f025ad9919e107bd123f10a66d.html", "images": {} }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R42329", "sha1": "7788139e1c21c70ac7500a821f172e72835e97df", "filename": "files/20170907_R42329_7788139e1c21c70ac7500a821f172e72835e97df.pdf", "images": {} } ], "topics": [ { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4782, "name": "Executive & Judicial Branch Appointments" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4817, "name": "Executive Branch" } ] }, { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 441669, "date": "2015-05-28", "retrieved": "2016-04-06T18:59:59.050694", "title": "Recess Appointments Made by President Barack Obama", "summary": "Under the Constitution, the President and the Senate share the power to make appointments to high-level politically appointed positions in the federal government. The Constitution also empowers the President unilaterally to make a temporary appointment to such a position if it is vacant and the Senate is in recess. Such an appointment, termed a recess appointment, expires at the end of the following session of the Senate. This report identifies recess appointments by President Barack Obama, from the beginning of his presidency, on January 20, 2009, until May 1, 2015. The report discusses these appointments in the context of recess appointment authorities and practices generally, and it provides related statistics. Congressional actions to prevent recess appointments are also discussed.\nAs of May 1, 2015, President Obama had made 32 recess appointments, all to full-time positions. By the same point in his presidency, President William J. Clinton had made 55 of his 139 recess appointments, 41 to full-time positions and 14 to part-time positions. President George W. Bush had made all of his 171 recess appointments, 99 to full-time positions and 72 to part-time positions. \nSix of President Obama\u2019s recess appointments had been made during recesses between Congresses or between sessions of Congress (intersession recess appointments). The remaining 26 had been made during recesses within sessions of Congress (intrasession recess appointments). \nIn each of the 32 instances in which President Obama had made a recess appointment, the individual had also been nominated to the position to which he or she was appointed. In all of these cases, a related nomination to the position preceded the recess appointment. In 20 of the 32 cases, the Senate later confirmed the nominee to the position to which he or she had been recess appointed. The nominations of the 12 remaining individuals who had been recess appointed by May 1, 2015, were either returned to, or withdrawn by, the President. \nBeginning in the 110th Congress, the Senate periodically used pro forma sessions to prevent the occurrence of a recess of more than three days. There appears to have been an expectation that this scheduling would block the President from making recess appointments, based on an argument that an absence of the Senate of three days or less would not constitute a \u201crecess\u201d long enough to permit the use of this authority. \nIn January 2012, President Obama made four recess appointments during a three-day recess between pro forma sessions of the Senate on January 3 and January 6, 2012, a period that was generally considered too short to permit recess appointments. The recess during which the President made the appointments was part of a period of Senate absence that, absent the pro forma sessions, would have constituted an intrasession adjournment of longer than 10 days. \nIn an opinion regarding the lawfulness of these appointments, the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice argued that \u201cthe President may determine that pro forma sessions at which no business is to be conducted do not interrupt a Senate recess for the purposes of the Recess Appointments Clause.\u201d The U.S. Supreme Court later concluded otherwise in a case regarding three of the four appointments. It held that, for purposes of the Clause, \u201cthe Senate is in session when it says it is, provided that, under its own rules, it retains the capacity to transact Senate business.\u201d The three recess appointments at issue were found to be constitutionally invalid.\nAdditional information on recess appointments may be found in other CRS reports: CRS Report RS21308, Recess Appointments: Frequently Asked Questions, by Henry B. Hogue; CRS Report RL33310, Recess Appointments Made by President George W. Bush, by Henry B. Hogue and Maureen O. Bearden; and CRS Report RL33009, Recess Appointments: A Legal Overview, by Vivian S. Chu.\nThis report will be updated as developments warrant.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/R42329", "sha1": "f6d1b0d0909818adf70d4e3ad6dd1b93e8cc81c2", "filename": "files/20150528_R42329_f6d1b0d0909818adf70d4e3ad6dd1b93e8cc81c2.html", "images": null }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R42329", "sha1": "4265b5369487eaa621e2eec67874f4164c2a0b30", "filename": "files/20150528_R42329_4265b5369487eaa621e2eec67874f4164c2a0b30.pdf", "images": null } ], "topics": [ { "source": "IBCList", "id": 2153, "name": "Executive Branch Appointments" } ] }, { "source": "University of North Texas Libraries Government Documents Department", "sourceLink": "https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc463185/", "id": "R42329_2013Jun11", "date": "2013-06-11", "retrieved": "2014-12-05T09:57:41", "title": "Recess Appointments Made by President Barack Obama", "summary": "This report identifies recess appointments by President Obama, from the beginning of his presidency, on January 20, 2009, until June 3, 2013. The report discusses these recess appointments in the context of recess appointment authorities and practices generally, and it provides related statistics", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORT", "active": false, "formats": [ { "format": "PDF", "filename": "files/20130611_R42329_9365d248108e81c638539519f559aed66e84a824.pdf" }, { "format": "HTML", "filename": "files/20130611_R42329_9365d248108e81c638539519f559aed66e84a824.html" } ], "topics": [ { "source": "LIV", "id": "Presidents", "name": "Presidents" }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Presidential appointments", "name": "Presidential appointments" }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Presidential powers", "name": "Presidential powers" } ] } ], "topics": [ "American Law", "Constitutional Questions", "Foreign Affairs", "Science and Technology Policy" ] }