# De Facto Officer Doctrine > [!note] Stub > This is a short entry that hasn't been fully written yet. A judge-made rule that the official acts of a person holding an office under colour of authority are valid as to the public and to third parties, even if that person's title to the office turns out to be defective. Its purpose is practical rather than principled: it keeps the decisions of a court, an agency or an office from unravelling retroactively because of a flaw in how its occupant got there. The doctrine is the counterweight to every argument that an unlawfully installed official's work is void. In the [[Federal Vacancies Reform Act]] it is what Congress displaced on purpose for most offices: 5 U.S.C. § 3348(d)(1) declares the acts of a non-compliant acting official to have "no force or effect," and § 3348(d)(2) forbids ratifying them. Where § 3348 does not reach — the five offices excluded by § 3348(e), and any duty the statute does not require that officer and only that officer to perform — the ordinary doctrine is what is left, and acts generally stand. Courts have also split on whether a non-compliant act is void or merely voidable, which decides who has to do something about it and when. ## See also - [[How an Acting Official Is Installed]] — where the doctrine sits in the Act's remedy - [[Federal Vacancies Reform Act]] · [[Kajmowicz v. Whitaker]] · [[United States v. Giraud]] - [[Appointments Clause]] · [[Separation of Powers]] · [[Advice and Consent]]