Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/18-1334_8m58.pdf
Page Number: 58

Cite as:  590 U. S. ____ (2020) 

21 

SOTOMAYOR, J., concurring in judgment 

arrangements for “transition[ing]” quickly to forms of “rep-
resentative government.”  J. Eblen, The First and Second 
United States Empires: Governors and Territorial Govern-
ment 1784–1912, pp. 54, 59 (1968); see also Leibowitz, De-
fining Status, at 6–7. 

Congress’ provision of limited or incremental home-rule 
measures,  moreover,  seems  to  reveal  little  about  the  re-
strictions the Appointments Clause imposes on officers se-
lected by the Federal Government.  By definition, selection 
by  home  rule  does  not  track  the  methods  outlined  in  the 
Appointments Clause.  But perhaps that is because home-
rule measures give to the Territory the ability to select its
own  governing  officers,  which  by  necessity  are  territorial
rather than federal.  That the Territory selects its own gov-
erning officers, and that these officers are necessarily terri-
torial,  does  not  obviously  imply  that  Congress  may  disre-
gard  the  Appointments  Clause  when  it  later  provides  for
the Federal Government to select officers carrying out ter-
ritorial responsibilities.6 

In  all,  then,  it  is  not  particularly  surprising  that  many
officers who acted for the Territories historically were ap-
pointed in a manner other than that set out in the Appoint-
ments  Clause.  Viewed  in  proper  historical  context,  those 
officers’  appointments  may  reflect  nothing  more  than  the 
necessary incidents of the transition to and establishment 
of  full  territorial  self-government.  For  the  overwhelming
majority  of  Territories  in  this  Nation’s  history,  of  course, 
that turning point coincided with Statehood.  See Leibowitz, 
Defining Status, at 6–8 (describing the “transitory nature”
of the early Territories’ “evolutionary process culminat[ing] 

—————— 

6 For that reason, no unavoidable tension seems to exist between re-
quiring compliance with the Appointments Clause for the Board mem-
bers and preserving complete home rule in Puerto Rico (or, for that mat-
ter, any of the other Territories).