At this event, four distinguished lawyers who have significant experience both in government and constitutional law will discuss the key constitutional issues that are essential to understand in this controversy, the precedents from similar disputes in the past, and the implications for the future if either the president’s position or the opponents' position is ultimately upheld by the courts.

The tension between Congress and the president is palpable, and nowhere is that more true than in the controversy over recess appointments.

President Obama’s scorn for the Constitution has been expressed most recently in his "recess" appointments of members of the National Labor Relations Board and the chairmanship of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Congress has long been silent on President George W. Bush's abuse of power.

The satisfaction from the show of bipartisanship on the Eisen confirmation lasted a good five minutes.

You know politicians are serious when they move from campaigning to governing. Something like that may be happening on the Republican campaign trail -- but, unfortunately, not at the Obama White House.

The Dodd-Frank Act in general, and in particular its favorite child, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, represent sharp political disputes, as now with bypassing the Senate by the "recess" appointment of its director. But more fundamentally, they represent clashing political philosophies.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a man whose political success is largely attributable to the aura of befuddled incompetence he uses to disarm his adversaries, was a failed Watergate baby.