Obama's appointments

I join Ilya Somin in full on this.

Executive branch officers are the "hand[s] of the President," United States v. Cox, 342 F.2d 167, 171 (5th Cir. 1965) (en banc), "intermediaries for the executive power, and surrogates for the President in whom that power is vested by the Constitution." Presidents, like Governors, "must work through and therefore be able to trust and rely on [their] subordinates"; they "can only implement their policies (and thereby keep their promises [to the electorate]) through the agency of their officers." Consistent with that, as Somin says, "it is important that the president be able to choose people who share his policy priorities. Conservative advocates of the unitary executive should be among the first to appreciate the importance of allowing the president to choose his own top advisers." Quite so.

As Somin says, however, this is not a blank cheque; Presidents get a high level of deference on executive branch appointments, but I continue to think that Obama's apparent desire to appoint Hillary is Constitutionally problematic.