Fill the U.S. Court of Federal Claims vacancies

The United States Court of Federal Claims was the most important federal court that many Americans had never herd of until last month. That is when Judge Thomas Wheeler of this court ruled that Hank Greenberg and AIG shareholders had proved that the federal government exceeded its authority by demanding an eighty percent equity stake in AIG during the great recession but that plaintiffs were not entitled to damages because they suffered no economic loss.

More critical than this high profile case is the fact that the court has experienced vacancies in five of its judgeships for more than a year, while the well qualified, consensus nominees whom President Barack Obama first tapped for those openings in 2014 have languished awaiting confirmation. Because the Court of Federal Claims needs its full complement of judges to deliver justice and each nominee is highly qualified and uncontroversial, the Senate must expeditiously provide the nominees floor debates, if warranted, and up or down votes.

{mosads}This tribunal is the court in which citizens seek redress against the federal government for monetary claims. These include claims that the U.S. has taken private property without just compensation under the Fifth Amendment, claims pursued by veterans who seek disability payments for injuries received in combat and claims for compensation filed by persons who allege vaccines injured them. The tribunal’s recent caseload has increasingly encompassed complex, high-dollar cases and high profile disputes in fields, such as the 1980s savings and loan crisis and Second World War internment of Japanese Americans by the United States.

On April 10, 2014, Obama nominated Judge Nancy Firestone for reappointment and Thomass Halkowski to fifteen year terms, while on May 21, the White House nominated Armando Bonilla, Patricia McCarthy and Jeri Somers. Obama first nominated all five of the candidates more than one year ago, and they received Judiciary Committee hearings nearly a year ago. The panel unanimously reported all five out of committee rather soon after the hearings. Unfortunately, the Senate accorded none of the nominees a final vote before the 114th Congress adjourned.

Therefore, the White House renominated the five candidates in early January 2015. The Judiciary Committee in turn unanimously approved the nominees without substantive discussion in February. The five nominees have since languished on the floor over four months awaiting debates and yes or no ballots. In a June 24 Congressional Record statement, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), the Judiciary Committee Ranking Member, urged swift votes : “We have heard no opposition to any of these nominees, yet they have been in limbo for months and months because the Republican Leader has refused to schedule a vote.”

Now that the Senate has returned from its July 4 recess, one of the chamber’s first items of business must be debates and votes on the five Court of Federal Claims nominees. The tribunal needs all of the judges whom Congress has authorized to dispense justice for members of the public who seek redress because they claim that the federal government has injured them.

Tobias is the Williams Chair in Law at the University of Richmond.