Employees? Consumers? Feh!

prospect.org — Should the Supreme Court uphold it, last Friday’s decision by three Reagan-appointees to the D.C. Circuit Appellate Court appears at first glance to rejigger the balance of power between Congress and the president. The appellate justices struck down three recess appointments that President Obama had made to the five-member National Labor Relations Board during the break between the 2011 and 2012 sessions of Congress partly on the grounds that Congress wasn’t formally in recess. It’s not that Obama has made a lot of recess appointments. He’s only made 32—compared to the 171 made by George W. Bush. Presidents have been making recess appointments since the mid-19th century, but this is the first time that the courts have objected. Certainly, the three judges on the D.C. appellate court voiced no such opinions when Bush was president. The real issue here is who Obama appointed, and to what agencies.

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