Free Republic

Calling the president’s illegal non-recess appointments “an escalation in a pattern of contempt for the elected representatives of the American people,” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, dismissed a Justice Department memo on Thursday that sought to lend retroactive constitutional weight to the president’s move. Grassley hinted at Senate “action to check and balance” the president’s power grab, though he declined to go into specifics. The DOJ Office of Legal Counsel’s memo, also debunked by Heritage’s Todd Gaziano, claims that pro forma Senate sessions do not preclude the president from unilaterally appointing federal officials. That legal...

Republicans outraged over the recess appointments of Richard Cordray and three NLRB commissioners argue that the pro forma Senate sessions every three days means that the Senate has not recessed at all. The Congressional Research Service notes that no President in the 20 years prior to Barack Obama’s actions in the past two weeks has attempted a recess appointment unless Congress has been out of session more than nine days. Today, to no one’s great shock, Obama’s own Department of Justice says that these arguments aren’t good enough to stop the President from the exercise of his constitutional power: President...

The Senate is famed for its long-winded debates, but on Friday it took Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown just seconds to stop Republicans in their tracks. With the Senate entering the first day of its Memorial Day recess, the Ohio senator was briefly in the chair, before a near-empty chamber, to gavel in and gavel out what is called a pro forma session. Without that procedural move, the Senate would technically be adjourned and President Bush could install administration officials or judges as "recess appointments" — without Senate confirmation. "That's the fastest I've ever done it," said Brown, who like other...