{"id":2471,"date":"2020-11-18T18:20:08","date_gmt":"2020-11-18T18:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cornelllawreview.org\/?p=2471"},"modified":"2026-05-27T17:40:25","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T17:40:25","slug":"too-much-acting-not-enough-confirming-the-constitutional-imbalance-between-the-president-and-senate-under-the-federal-vacancies-reform-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/2020\/11\/18\/too-much-acting-not-enough-confirming-the-constitutional-imbalance-between-the-president-and-senate-under-the-federal-vacancies-reform-act\/","title":{"rendered":"Too Much &#8220;Acting,&#8221; Not Enough Confirming: The Constitutional Imbalance Between the President and Senate Under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>This Note proceeds as follows. Part I describes the FVRA\u2019s basic mechanics, highlights aspects of the statute this Note\u2019s proposed changes seek to address, and details Trump Administration controversies illustrating how, with regard to the process of filling the upper ranks of executive agencies, the FVRA amplifies presidential authority to the detriment of the Senate\u2019s authority. Part II analyzes the FVRA\u2019s constitutional foundation, delineates the key tension in the statute flowing from the nexus between the President\u2019s take care obligation and the Senate\u2019s advice and consent function, argues that the FVRA aids the former at the expense of the latter, and contextualizes this argument by describing the increasing Senate resistance the President must overcome in today\u2019s appointments process. Part III sets forth changes to the FVRA in view of its constitutional imbalance between the Take Care Clause and Senate advice and consent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>To read more, click here: <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/live-cornell-law-review.pantheonsite.io\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/Johnson-note-final.pdf\" data-type=\"URL\" data-id=\"https:\/\/live-cornell-law-review.pantheonsite.io\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/Johnson-note-final.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Too Much &#8220;Acting,&#8221; Not Enough Confirming: The Constitutional Imbalance Between the President and Senate Under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;While the recent uproar over acting service largely stems from perceived abuses of the Federal Vacancies Reform Act during Trump\u2019s presidency, it is properly understood as a foreseeable consequence of the structure of the legislative lever that the President\u2014any president, not just President Trump\u2014can pull to temporarily fill key positions in the Executive Branch absent Senate consent. This Note charts a path toward fixing that structure. . . .<\/p>\n<p>This Note proceeds as follows. Part I describes the Federal Vacancies Reform Act&#8217;s basic mechanics, highlights aspects of the statute this Note\u2019s proposed changes seek to address, and details Trump Administration controversies illustrating how, with regard to the process of filling the upper ranks of executive agencies, the FVRA amplifies presidential authority to the detriment of the Senate\u2019s authority. Part II analyzes the FVRA\u2019s constitutional foundation, delineates the key tension in the statute flowing from the nexus between the President\u2019s take care obligation and the Senate\u2019s advice and consent function, argues that the FVRA aids the former at the expense of the latter, and contextualizes this argument by describing the increasing Senate resistance the President must overcome in today\u2019s appointments process. Part III sets forth changes to the FVRA in view of its constitutional imbalance between the Take Care Clause and Senate advice and consent.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[46,719,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-notes","category-print-volume-105","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2471"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2471\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5359,"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2471\/revisions\/5359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/publications.lawschool.cornell.edu\/lawreview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}