No. It does not. The separation of powers would make such a law unconstitutional. The judiciary would never abide by it. And good luck to Congress trying to enforce it. Never in the history of the republic has one branch of government been able to dictate in such granularity who may be hired by another branch.
You're underestimating how much power Congress legitimately has over the rest of the government, when they choose to exercise it.
All money spent by the federal government in all three branches, including on judicial clerk compensation salaries, is determined by Congressional authorization and congressional statutes regarding employment and compensation. Congressional statute law heavily regulates hiring throughout the executive branch, despite that being a separate branch of government from Congress. There's no reason the judiciary is any different.
What's more, while the procedural rules of the federal courts are mostly set by the federal courts themselves, this is done under the authority of an act of Congress, which has been amended several times both to increase and reduce the courts' self-regulatory authority. As for the Federal Rules of Evidence, Congress refused to allow the version of those which the Supreme Court originally approved to go into affect, and then they later passed a substantially altered version as an Act of Congress.
The Constitution itself makes explicit Congress's ability to regulate the Supreme Court's appellate jurisdiction (which applies to almost all of its docket) and even to reduce the scope of that jurisdiction. And it has pretty plenary power to add, remove, and restructure the inferior federal courts, aside from whatever tenure protections apply to individual judges who have not been impeached by the House and removed from office by the Senate.
And, as others have said, the Senate even individually approves federal judges as per its constitutional mandate under the appointments clause. This is certainly not a separation of powers violation.
I'm not underestimating anything. You're outside your depth here.
Congress can ordain and establish inferior courts, and can regulate the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court. However, it cannot regulate much of the judiciary outside that. For one, it cannot expand the Supreme Court's original jurisdiction. Marbury. Nor can it dictate how the court applies the law. Klein. Congress's power over the federal judiciary is constrained and there is no basis in the text of the Constitution or in any case law to support your position.
Marbury is nothing more than a power-grab by the judiciary that we have all decided to abide by, for the moment. The judiciary has no power whatsoever other than that which comes from its perceived legitimacy; legitimacy which has been heavily damaged over the past 20 years and which is dangling by a thread at the moment. There is really nothing stopping Congress from slapping back the Supremes other than convention, and I suspect that this is going to be ending soon -- Congress can cut the Supreme Court back to nothing but original jurisdiction and then create a new court for constitutional appeals to bypass them completely. Quoting case law won't help them and no matter what they may claim there is nothing nine politicians in black robes can do about it if the other two branches decide that this is how things are going to work going forward.
No, Congress cannot just create a shadow Supreme Court within our Constitutional framework. And if you're talking about disregarding the Constitution, then your point is meaningless.
The Constitution doesn't directly say the Supreme Court has a power of judicial review that can overturn laws. It's just that the Supreme Court interprets it that way, and we currently go along with that. The person who proposed a separate top court for constitutional appeals (not me) was making more of a realpolitik point than a constitutional one.
However, I think a variation of the idea would be constitutional: within the Supreme Court, Congress creates two divisions for purposes of appellate jurisdiction cases (they would stay unified for original jurisdiction cases to avoid a constitutional problem). Justices would be assigned to only one or the other, no overlap. One division handles constitutional appeals, one division handles other cases.
Congress could also remove the appellate jurisdiction of the court to hear claims that laws are unconstitutional, leaving the only appellate jurisdiction as claims that officials are acting illegally or unconstitutionally or disputes of lower-level decisions as incorrect.
I'm not saying this is necessary good policy, but it would be constitutional.
> The Constitution doesn't directly say the Supreme Court has a power of judicial review
Yes, it does. Jurisdiction literally means the ability to say what the law is. There is no plausible definition of appellate jurisdiction in the Anglo-American legal tradition that would not involve the power and duty to reconcile incompatible sources of law.
> Congress could also remove the appellate jurisdiction of the court to hear claims that laws are unconstitutional
No, it cannot. First, the power to make "exceptions" does not imply the ability to completely remove power. Second, whatever power Congress had under Article III was limited by later amendments, e.g., it cannot remove jurisdiction in a way that results in an impingement on the right to due process under the Fifth Amendment. There is nothing in the text of the Constitution nor in any case law that would support your implicit contention that Article III is somehow immune to being subject to the amendments process.
Third, although Klein has been a bit disfavored lately, it was reaffirmed in Patchak only a couple years ago. Some commentators focus on the plurality opinion while ignoring the fact that they're only a plurality and not the dissent because of Ginsburg's and Sotomayor's concurrence. That opinion interpreted Congress's intent generously and reasoned that Congress merely amended its waiver of sovereign immunity rather than dictated a result in a particular case. Of note, the concurring opinion explicitly agreed in principle with the "dissent," and they still ruled substantively on the merits notwithstanding Congress's attempt to strip jurisdiction.
If you'd like to continue this, please read Chemerinsky's excellent hornbook on federal jurisdiction first. And, you know, maybe go to law school.
Disregarding what the Supreme Court says the Constitution says != disregarding the Constitution. Important distinction that will become more important in the future.
Congress certainly can't regulate the substance of how the courts apply the law, that's absolutely true. But they can regulate the procedure of how courts apply the law, and as per the examples I gave, they have often done so, including against the Supreme Court's wishes. (The two examples I gave are the Rules Enabling Act and its amendments, controlling how the Supreme Court manages the federal rules for both criminal and civil procedure, and the handling of the Federal Rules of Evidence.)
I'm not disagreeing with the other examples you gave, including about original jurisdiction - clearly separation of powers and the constitutional structure are both real and binding. But equally, those concerns don't prevent the kind of personnel regulation we're discussing.
Judges would be pretty outraged over meddling with their personal fiefdoms, no doubt. And modern congress is pretty spineless in general.
But the power and precedent exists — see the Pendleton Civil Service Act. Even in these times, the federal bureaucracy is a significant barrier to systematic corruption and patronage.
Apples and oranges. Senate confirmation is not the same thing as a law prohibiting the hiring of people with certain experience. And it is certainly not the same as usurping the hiring decision entirely.
A careful reading of the Constitution will reveal that Congress is more powerful than the other two branches — and rightfully so. Only Congress can make laws, and can do so with or without the president's consent. Congress can remove a president or a Supreme Court justice, but only Congress can expel a member.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judiciary_Act_of_1869
Congress has already established the composition and the procedures of the court. Of course it has that power.