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Roosevelt Court Packing Plan
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Roosevelt's Court Packing Plan
The Deal
Conclusion
Flushed with his landslide reelection in 1936, President Roosevelt issued a proposal in February 1937 to provide retirement at full pay for all members of the court over 70. If a justice refused to retire, an “assistant” with full voting rights was to be appointed, thus ensuring Roosevelt a liberal majority.
The purpose of court-packing plan was allegedly to increase the Court’s efficiency but FDR wanted to use the plan to appoint justices who would not block his administration’s New Deal programs. FDR's actions forced the Supreme Court to back down but the controversial plan ultimately failed through lack of support cost FDR significant political capital in the process.
Opposition
FDR New Deal
Most Republicans and many Democrats in Congress opposed the so-called “court-packing” plan.
During the previous two years, the high court had struck down several key pieces of New Deal legislation on the grounds that the laws delegated an unconstitutional amount of authority to the executive branch and the federal government.
Reasons for the Plan
In his first five years in office, Roosevelt squared off against a Supreme Court with little patience for the New Deal—or for many other efforts to protect the vulnerable.
These justices were committed to a misreading of the Constitution that, among other outrages, doomed children as young as 6 to lives working in cotton mills and coal mines.
Beginning of the End
Critics
In April, however, before the bill came to a vote in Congress, two Supreme Court justices came over to the liberal side and by a narrow majority upheld as constitutional the National Labor Relations Act and the Social Security Act.
Appointed Justices
Critics immediately charged that Roosevelt was trying to “pack” the court and thus neutralize Supreme Court justices hostile to his New Deal.
Soon after, Roosevelt had the opportunity to nominate his first Supreme Court justice, and by 1942 all but two of the justices were his appointees.
The Plan wasn't Needed
The Start of a Plan
The End of the Plan
The majority opinion acknowledged that the national economy had grown to such a degree that federal regulation and control was now warranted.
Roosevelt’s reorganization plan was thus unnecessary, and in July the Senate struck it down by a vote of 70 to 22.
On February 5, 1937, President Franklin Roosevelt announces a controversial plan to expand the Supreme Court to as many as 15 judges, allegedly to make it more efficient.