President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s threat to pack the U.S. Supreme Court with appointees predisposed to uphold the constitutionality of his New Deal programs was an unnecessary risk of political capital. The so-called constitutional revolution of 1937 didn’t need FDR’s provocation because the Court had already been moving toward curtailing constitutional protections for economic liberties.
William F. Shughart II is a Distinguished Research Advisor at the Independent Institute and the J. Fish Smith Professor in Public Choice in the Jon M. Huntsman School of Business at Utah State University.
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Other Independent Review articles by William F. Shughart II
Spring 2025 The Year That Broke Politics: Collusion and Chaos in the Presidential Election of 1968
Fall 2024 The DOJ’s Complaint against Apple Doubles Down on Earlier Antitrust Law Enforcement Mistakes
Spring 2023 FDR’s Gambit: The Court Packing Fight and the Rise of Legal Liberalism
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