Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/18-1334_8m58.pdf
Page Number: 39.0

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FINANCIAL OVERSIGHT AND MANAGEMENT BD. FOR 
PUERTO RICO v. AURELIUS INVESTMENT, LLC 
SOTOMAYOR, J., concurring in judgment 

Nearly  60  years  ago,  the  people  of  Puerto  Rico  “em-
bark[ed] on [a] project of constitutional self-governance” af-
ter entering into a compact with the Federal Government. 
Puerto Rico v. Sánchez Valle, 579 U. S. ___, ___ (2016) (slip 
op., at 3).  At the conclusion of that endeavor, the people of
Puerto  Rico  established,  and  the  United  States  Congress
recognized, a “republican form of government” “pursuant to
a constitution of [the Puerto Rican population’s] own adop-
tion.”  Act of July 3, 1950, ch. 446, §§1, 2, 64 Stat. 319; see 
also Act of July 3, 1952, 66 Stat. 327.  One would think the 
Puerto Rican home rule that resulted from that mutual en-
terprise might affect whether officers later installed by the 
Federal  Government  are  properly  considered  officers  of 
Puerto Rico rather than “Officers of the United States” sub-
ject to the Appointments Clause.  U. S. Const., Art. II, §2, 
cl. 2.  Yet the parties do not address that weighty issue or 
any  attendant  questions  it  raises.    I  thus  do  not  resolve 
those matters here and instead concur in the judgment.

I nevertheless write to explain why these unexplored is-
sues  may  well  call  into  doubt  the  Court’s  conclusion  that 
the members of the Financial Oversight and Management
Board for Puerto Rico are territorial officers not subject to 
the “significant structural safeguards” embodied in the Ap-
pointments  Clause.  Edmond  v.  United  States,  520  U. S. 
651,  659  (1997).  Puerto  Rico’s  compact  with  the  Federal 
Government  and  its  republican  form  of  government  may
not  alter  its  status  as  a  Territory.  But  territorial  status 
should not be wielded as a talismanic opt out of prior con-
gressional commitments or constitutional constraints. 

I 
A 
Puerto  Rico  became  a  Territory  of  the  United  States  in
1898,  pursuant  to  a  treaty  concluding  the  Spanish-
American  War.  After  a  series  of  temporary  military  gov-
erning measures, Congress passed the Foraker Act of 1900,