As some 100 vacancies, in the words of President Obama, "continue to plague our judiciary," ACS encourages those concerned about the ability of the federal courts to operate efficiently to visit JudicialNominations.org, a Web-based resource for staying on top of the judicial nominations process. You can now get updates from JudicialNominations.org via Facebook, by by clicking "Like" on our new Facebook page.

JudicialNominations.org brings together for the first time an array of information, including an interactive map that allows the user to select an individual district or circuit court and identify the number of vacancies in that area, how long those vacancies have existed, whether anyone has been nominated to the seats, and how long nominees have waited for confirmation. The website also provides links to congressional statements, videos, upcoming hearings and other events, and the latest nomination news.

During an address in the Rose garden last month, Obama urged leaders of both parties in Congress to "work with us to fill the vacancies that continue to plague our judiciary. Right now, we've got nominees who've been waiting up to eight months to be confirmed as judges. Most of these folks were voted out of committee unanimously, or nearly unanimously, by both Democrats and Republicans. Both Democrats and Republicans agreed that they were qualified to serve. Nevertheless, some in the minority have used parliamentary procedures time and again to deny them a vote in the full Senate."

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg called for greater Senate cooperation in confirming judicial nominees during the American Bar Association's annual meeting, saying, "With ABA encouragement, may the U.S. Senate someday return to the collegial, bipartisan spirit that Justice Breyer and I had the good fortune to experience."

And ACS Executive Director Caroline Fredrickson told NPR in a report on Senate obstruction of judicial nominations: "We're at a point of unprecedented partisanship and bitter feuding between the two parties over judicial nominees at a level that has never happened before. And the impact is that you have nominees who are languishing for months and some of them for over a year."

"If the Senate continues to move at this "glacial pace," a system that is "already overburdened" will come to a "grinding halt," Fredrickson wrote in a column for The Huffington Post earlier this month.

Visit JudicialNominations.org today and check back frequently to follow developments on judicial nominations and vacancies on the federal bench.

The students at ACS's University of Nebraska College of Law chapter are adding to the stock of ACS podcasts available for those looking to "jog to the soothing cadence of Harvard Law professor Lawrence Lessig."

The members of the student chapter have launched a law-interviews podcast series, and ACS student hosts have already recorded interviews with an impressive set that includes Lessig, Eugene Volokh, Jen Moreno and Josh Blackman.

Starting this fall, the students will interview guests twice a month. Would-be guests, or fellow law students who want to get involved, can e-mail the chapter at amoreperfectpodcast@acslawnebraska.org.

The national headquarters' series of podcasts and videos are available on our website here or via iTunes here.

If you're a CREDO member, then you get to vote on how to distribute their 2009 donations funding. This year, ACS is on the ballot and we need your vote! The more votes we get, the more funding we'll receive from CREDO.

Voting is easy. Vote for us here. (We're in the "Civil Rights" section of the ballot.) It's a quick and effective way to support ACS at no extra cost to you.

Not a CREDO member? Sign up for CREDO Action or switch to CREDO Mobile, brought to you by Working Assets, and help increase much-needed funding for ACS just by talking on your phone. Learn more at credomobile.com.

The Justice Department announced this week that Georgia State University College of Law professor Neil Kinkopf is joining the Justice Department's Office of Legal Policy (OLP) as OLP's counselor to the assistant attorney general. Kinkopf, the faculty advisor to the ACS chapter at Georgia State, has been a regular ACS participant.

At the Justice Department, Kinkopf joins David Barron, former member of the board of advisors at the Harvard Law and Policy Review (the official journal of ACS,) and Martin Lederman, a regular ACS participant. Barron remains the de facto head of the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) pending Senate confirmation of former ACS board member Dawn Johnsen to lead the office.

Also at the Justice Department, are former ACS board member Spencer Overton and Chris Schroeder, co-author of ACS's Keeping Faith with the Constitution -- both of whom are at the OLP. And, of course, former ACS board member Eric Holder is serving as Attorney General.

Non-unionized American workers generally may see their employment terminated for any reason not expressly forbidden by the National Labor Relations Act and other protections. In other words, unlike most other industrialized countries, the United States operates under an at-will system of employment, permitting employers to fire employees without explanation. There is an exception, however.

The state of Montana has operated under the requirement of just cause for termination of employees. Under a just-cause system, employers bear the burden of proof to justify dismissals of employees, usually by offering evidence of the employee having violated company policy or rules. 

This unique experiment in labor law is the subject of Just Cause in Montana: Did the Big Sky Fall? by labor law exper Barry D. Roseman, and ACS Issue Brief included in the latest edition of Advance: The Journal of the ACS Issue Groups. 

In his brief, Roseman applies the lessons of just cause in Montana to the broader national policy debate. While those defending at-will employment claim that it is necessary to maintaining a low unemployment rate, Roseman observes that, in the only state in the Union to adopt just-cause employment, this is not true.

Montana now has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the United States. Its economy over the last three decades has been driven by factors that have nothing to do with the fact that it has abolished employment at will. 

Roseman concludes that arguments predicting doom-and-gloom as a result of just cause employment prove unwarranted. In Montana, he writes, "the Big Sky did not fall." Rather, Roseman argues, the state is a modern success story, combining protections for workers with basement-level unemployment rates.

It is time-many believe, long past time-for the federal government and the states to enact laws to require just cause for termination of employment. The economy of the United States, the global economy and the state of labor relations are vastly different than they were in the first year of the administration of Rutherford B. Hayes, the year in Horace Wood first announced the doctrine of employment at will. The mere fact that this has become the default rule for the common law of employment does not mean that it is based on sound policy, if that ever was the case.

We don't usually interrupt our serious discussion of constitutional law on ACSblog, but today, we're asking for your assistance. ACS's Spring Appeal is critical to helping fund many ACS resources, including ACSblog and we need your help to reach our $100,000 goal. We're very close - only $3,000 away - and your gift today can help put us over the top. As we hope you have noticed, ACSblog has made a number of design changes that allow us to offer more content and to greatly expand our network of writers and readers. Your generous support has made this possible, and we want to keep enhancing this product and building our network.

Especially during difficult economic times, ACS relies on the generosity of individual members like you, and for your support we are truly grateful. To donate, please visit www.acslaw.org/donate or click here.

Gary S. Feinerman, a partner at Chicago's Sidley, Austin LLP, one of the nation's leading appellate attorneys, and a member of the ACS Chicago Lawyer Chapter Board of Advisors, was recently selected as the new president of the Illinois Appellate Lawyers Association.

Outgoing ALA President Michael I. Rothstein told the Chicago Daily Law Journal, "Gary is one of the finest and most talented appellate lawyers in the country. He's accomplished at a relatively young age more than most appellate lawyers accomplish in an entire career." Feinerman, who has argued two cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, told the legal newspaper that beyond increasing ALA members, he would like to bolster the services provided to members, such as adding more Web seminars and making it easier to attend continuing legal education seminars. Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan also lauded Feinerman's appellate work saying, "Gary gets it. He sees the big picture as well as seeing all the details."

The White House has officially announced its intent to nominate Prof. Christopher Schroeder (right) of Duke University School of Law to the head the Justice Department's Office of Legal Policy.

"In his new role, Schroeder would be a leading voice on legislation related to law enforcement and the federal court system, and on nominations for the federal judiciary," according to The Blog of the Legal Times. "If confirmed by the Senate, he would be the chief policy advisor to Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. and Deputy Attorney General David Ogden."

Along with Profs. Goodwin Liu and Pamela Karlan, Schroeder co-authored Keeping Faith with the Constitution, released this month by ACS. In Keeping Faith, the co-authors write, "[O]ur central theme is that the practice of constitutional interpretation must be faithful to what the Constitution is: not a legal code, not a lawyer's contract, but a basic charter of government whose practical meaning arises from the continual adaptation of its enduring text and principles to the conditions and challenges facing each generation." Liu and Karlan will join Judges Rosemary Barkett and Judge Jeffrey Sutton along with Supreme Court litigators Tom Goldstein and Pamela Harris to explore the ideas set forth in Keeping Faith with the Constitution at the 2009 ACS National Convention.

Writing in The Huffington Post, Prof. Geoffrey Stone described Keeping Faith as a work that "critiques the ‘conservative' approaches to constitutional interpretation - originalism and so-called strict construction, and then traces out a more progressive approach to constitutional interpretation, which the authors describe as ‘constitutional fidelity,' which is designed both to preserve the Constitution's meaning over time while at the same time recognizing that the Framers intended the Constitution to be a ‘visionary document.'"

ACS is very proud to announce a successful conclusion to our search for a new executive director: Caroline Fredrickson (right).

Since 2005, Fredrickson has been the director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Washington Legislative Office, where she led the organization's efforts to promote its priorities in Congress, the White House and federal agencies. Her selection is the culmination of a thorough search process that began after the former ACS Director Lisa Brown was selected by President Obama to be Assistant to the President and White House Staff Secretary. Deputy Executive Director David Lyle has admirably served as acting executive director in the meantime.

Prior to assuming leadership of the ACLU's national legislative portfolio, Fredrickson served as General Counsel and Legal Director of NARAL Pro-Choice America. Before that, Fredrickson was Chief of Staff to Sen. Maria Cantwell and Deputy Chief of Staff to then-Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle. During the Clinton administration, Fredrickson served as Special Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs. She has been widely published and appears frequently in the media on topics including labor law, anti-discrimination law, and human and civil rights issues. She holds a law degree from Columbia and graduated summa cum laude from Yale. 

"We could not ask for a better leader than Caroline Fredrickson to take ACS into its next stage of development and growth," said Goodwin Liu, Chair of the ACS Board of Directors and Associate Dean and Professor of law at UC Berkeley School of Law. 

The American Constitution Society is proud to announce that Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) will speak at the ACS National Convention.

Whitehouse sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee and serves as chair of the Subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts. In his capacity as oversight subcomittee chair, Whitehouse recently convened a hearing on torture. Whitehouse has been an outspoken advocate of Truth Commission on torture.

Continuing in his leadership role in the torture accountability debate, Whitehouse recently fielded questions about suggestions that then-Vice President Dick Cheney ordered a former Iraqi intelligence officer waterboarded in order to produce evidence of links betweeen al Qaida and Saddam Hussein. See Whitehouse's handling of the revelations below.