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Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
SteveBellovin@infosec.exchange ("Steve Bellovin") wrote:

The DC Circuit ruled en banc (https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cadc.41813/gov.uscourts.cadc.41813.01208727297.0.pdf) that the president cannot unilaterally fire members of multi-member governing bodies, in this case the National Labor Relations Board and the Merit Systems Protection Board, without going through the process prescribed by statute. They relied on a 90-year-old Supreme Court precedent, which they're not empowered to overrule.

The Supreme Court has repeatedly told the courts of appeals to follow extant Supreme Court precedent unless and until that Court itself changes it or overturns it. If a precedent of the Supreme Court “has direct application in a case,” lower courts “‘should follow the case which directly controls,’” leaving to the Supreme Court “‘the prerogative of overruling its own decisions.’” Mallory v. Norfolk S. Ry. Co., 600 U.S. 122, 136 (2023) (quoting Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/American Express, Inc., 490 U.S. 477, 484 (1989)). That rule governs “even if the lower court thinks the precedent is in tension with ‘some other line of decisions.’” Mallory, 600 U.S. at 136 (quoting Rodriguez de Quijas, 490 U.S. at 484); see also Agostini v. Felton, 521 U.S. 203, 237 (1997) (“We do not acknowledge, and we do not hold, that other courts should conclude our more recent cases have, by implication, overruled an earlier precedent.”).