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Page Number: 18.0

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LUCIA v. SEC 

THOMAS, J., concurring 

The Appointments Clause provides the exclusive process
for  appointing  “Officers  of  the  United  States.”    See  SW 
General,  supra,  at  ___  (opinion  of  THOMAS,  J.)  (slip  op.,
at  1).  While  principal  officers  must  be  nominated  by  the 
President  and  confirmed  by  the  Senate,  Congress  can 
authorize  the  appointment  of  “inferior  Officers”  by  “the
President  alone,”  “the  Courts  of  Law,”  or  “the  Heads  of 
Departments.”  Art. II, §2, cl. 2.

This  alternative  process  for  appointing  inferior  officers 
strikes  a  balance  between  efficiency  and  accountability.
Given the sheer number of inferior officers, it would be too 
burdensome to require each of them to run the gauntlet of 
Senate  confirmation.  See  United  States  v.  Germaine,  99 
U. S.  508,  509–510  (1879);  2  Records  of  the  Federal  Con-
vention of 1787, pp. 627–628 (M. Farrand ed. 1911).  But, 
by  specifying  only  a  limited  number  of  actors  who  can 
appoint  inferior  officers  without  Senate  confirmation,  the 
Appointments Clause maintains clear lines of accountabil-
ity—encouraging good appointments and giving the public 
someone to blame for bad ones.  See The Federalist No. 76, 
p. 455  (C.  Rossiter  ed.  1961)  (A. Hamilton);  Wilson,  Lec-
tures  on  Law:  Government,  in  1  The  Works  of  James 
Wilson 343, 359–361 (J. Andrews ed., 1896). 

The Founders likely understood the term “Officers of the
United States” to encompass all federal civil officials who 
perform  an  ongoing,  statutory  duty—no  matter  how  im-
portant or significant the duty.  See Mascott 454.  “Officers 
of the United States” was probably not a term of art that
the  Constitution  used  to  signify  some  special  type  of  offi-
cial.  Based  on  how  the  Founders  used  it  and  similar 
terms,  the  phrase  “of  the  United  States”  was  merely  a 

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employees, who are not.  I express no view on the meaning of “Office” or
“Officer”  in  any  other  provision  of  the  Constitution,  or  the  difference 
between principal officers and inferior officers under the Appointments
Clause.