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The Federal Vacancies Reform Act — the law that determines who can serve as an acting political appointee, and for how long — has been put through its paces over the last two-and-a-half years. The number of vacancies in Senate-confirmed positions, the length of those vacancies, and the circumstances surrounding them have raised questions the framers of the law apparently didn’t envision when Congress passed it in 1998.

So, according to our next guest, Anne Joseph O’Connell, now’s a good time for lawmakers to revisit the act. O’Connell is a lawyer and professor at Stanford University. She’s also the primary consultant on a project for the Administrative Conference of the United States on acting officials and delegated authority. Hear her take on Federal Drive with Tom Temin.

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