“An ‘Originalist’ Court Overturns an Originalist Decision”

George Thomas, writing at The Atlantic:

Yesterday, Chief Justice John Roberts delivered what conservative originalists have long been rooting for: overturning Humphrey’s Executor v. United States. That 90-year-old decision, which the Roberts Court has gradually been chipping away at, held that Congress could create independent commissions—such as the Federal Trade Commission—whose members are appointed by the president but protected from no-cause presidential removal. According to Roberts’s opinion in Trump v. Slaughter, this limitation on the president’s power is unconstitutional.

It is worth revisiting Humphrey’s, which didn’t deserve the burial Roberts gave it. Imperfect in ways, it offered a better understanding of the separation of powers—one consistent with constitutional history, originalist understandings, and earlier Court precedent—than what Roberts offers in Slaughter.

This is a short, clear-eyed look at another of the decisions handed down this week. It’s definitely worth a read.

An ‘Originalist’ Court Overturns an Originalist Decision

Humphrey’s Executor deserved better.

www.theatlantic.com