As a retired federal employee, I have long been concerned about preserving the merit system that has given the American people one of the finest civil services in the world.

Was it perfect when I was there? Of course not. No system designed by human beings is perfect. But by and large, I worked with people who took their responsibilities seriously and did their best to serve the public, regardless of which political party controlled the White House.

That is why I was concerned when I learned of today’s Supreme Court decision in Trump v. Slaughter. My first question was simple: What does this mean for the federal workforce?

Time will ultimately tell. But after reading what the Court decided, looking at the law as it now stands, and reviewing some early legal analysis, here is what I have found so far.

What the Court decided

On June 29, the Supreme Court handed down a 6-3 decision in Trump v. Slaughter, a case involving President Trump’s 2025 firing of Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter without stating a cause under the statute.

For 91 years, the 1935 Supreme Court decision in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States had allowed Congress to protect members of independent, multi-member commissions from being removed by a president except for “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.”

The Court’s majority swept much of that precedent aside. The ruling holds that FTC commissioners exercise executive power and therefore must be removable by the president. In the majority’s view, Congress cannot insulate such officials from presidential control when they are carrying out executive functions.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented sharply. She warned that the majority had embraced a theory of sweeping presidential control that neither Congress nor the Constitution had granted.

Why federal retirees and employees should pay attention

The ruling does not directly repeal the merit-system protections that apply to most rank-and-file federal employees. Those protections remain in Title 5 of the U.S. Code.

That distinction is important.

The concern is not that every federal employee immediately lost civil-service protection. The concern is about who enforces those protections, and whether those enforcement bodies can remain independent enough to do their jobs.

One key agency is the Merit Systems Protection Board, commonly known as the MSPB. The board hears appeals when federal employees are fired, demoted, suspended, or retaliated against for whistleblowing. Its three members have traditionally had the same type of for-cause removal protection the Supreme Court just rejected in the FTC case.

A federal appeals court had already applied similar reasoning to the MSPB in Harris v. Bessent, involving the removal of MSPB Chair Cathy Harris. Today’s Supreme Court ruling appears to cement that direction.

As University of Minnesota law professor Nicholas Bednar wrote in Lawfare, the MSPB’s independence is now, for all practical purposes, gone. The statutory safeguards Congress created — including bipartisan balance and decisional independence — now survive only as long as the White House chooses to respect them.

The quorum problem

The most immediate practical danger may be the quorum issue.

The MSPB has three members, but it needs at least two to issue final board decisions. If a president can remove board members at will, the president can break that quorum. A president can also leave seats vacant, with the same result.

That is not a theoretical problem. From 2017 to 2022, the MSPB lacked a quorum for more than five years. During that period, the board could not issue final decisions on petitions for review. The backlog reached roughly 3,800 cases, leaving many federal employees in limbo.

Administrative judges could still issue initial decisions. But if either side appealed to the full board, the case could not receive a final board decision until a quorum was restored. For employees trying to challenge removals, suspensions or whistleblower retaliation, delay can become denial.

Because federal workers generally must go through the MSPB process before seeking judicial review, a paralyzed board can mean there is no meaningful review at all, at least not in any timely way.

Is this a return to the spoils system?

Not automatically. That distinction matters.

The civil-service laws enacted after the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act of 1883 — passed in the aftermath of President James Garfield’s assassination by a disappointed office-seeker — remain on the books. The merit system has not been repealed.

But today’s decision weakens the institutional independence that helps make those laws enforceable.

That is where the concern lies. If the officials who decide federal employment appeals can be removed at will, if the board can be disabled by the loss of a quorum, and if legal interpretations can be pulled closer to presidential control, then merit protections may remain intact on paper while being weakened in practice.

Critics argue that this combination could hollow out the civil-service system without Congress ever formally repealing it.

Defenders of the ruling see it differently. They argue that the Constitution vests executive power in an elected president, and that those who exercise that power must be accountable to the president. In their view, accountability to voters is the appropriate check.

What comes next

The next move may need to come from Congress.

Lawmakers could create a more independent court or tribunal for federal employment disputes. They could also provide a direct path to federal court when the MSPB lacks a quorum and cannot issue final decisions.

Whether a divided Congress will act is another question.

For now, the merit-system protections that have defined federal service for more than 140 years remain in law. But after today’s decision, their practical strength may depend more heavily on presidential restraint than on the independent enforcement structure Congress designed.

That should concern anyone who values a federal government staffed by competence, experience and service to the public — not personal loyalty to the president.