What's in the News: The Supreme Court that might have been

By Kathleen O'Toole
WPSX-TV/Penn State Public Broadcasting

Had Franklin Roosevelt had his way, four of the current Supreme Court justices might have retired instead of starting a new session this week.

In 1937, Roosevelt argued that the Court needed "younger blood" to deal with a complex and changing world.

"Little by little, new facts become blurred through old glasses fitted, as it were, for the needs of another generation," he said.

In fact, the justices could see well enough to know what Roosevelt was really trying to do. It was their rulings, not their age that worried the president.

In his early years in office, Roosevelt's most daunting challenge was the Great Depression, the economic crisis that resulted in failed farms and businesses and left millions of Americans in poverty. To tackle the nation's hardships, Roosevelt pushed through Congress a collection of laws called the New Deal. To his dismay, however, the Supreme Court, ruled that some parts of these laws were unconstitutional.

Roosevelt protested that the Supreme Court was preventing him from pulling the country out of the depression. To add to his frustration, no Supreme Court justices retired during his first term, so he didn't have an opportunity to appoint new justices who might have supported his New Deal.

Four of the nine justices, in particular, consistently voted against Roosevelt's laws. The president and other critics called them the "Four Horsemen," after the characters whose arrival, according to the Bible, would mark the end of the world.

After easily winning reelection in 1936, Roosevelt decided to challenge the Four Horsemen. In February of 1937, he sent the Judicial Reorganization Bill to the Senate. Under the proposed law, for every justice over the age of 70 who refused to retire, the president would appoint a new justice until the Court had a total of 15 justices. Six justices were already older than 70, so Roosevelt would have been able to pack the court with new justices who favored his policies.

The full Senate never voted on the bill. Many senators, both Democrats and Republicans, believed that Roosevelt's attempt to influence the Supreme Court violated one of the main principles on which the United States was built -- a separation of powers among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government.

The Senate's refusal to pass the president's law was considered a victory for an independent Supreme Court. Yet, in the end, Roosevelt got his way. One of the justices who had sometimes voted against New Deal laws had a change of heart and began voting to uphold many Roosevelt programs. Justice Owen Roberts' new voting pattern became known as "the switch in time that saved nine."

This week, "What's in the News" takes a look at criminal justice issues in the United States.

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"What's in the News," a current events program for 4th through 7th grade social studies classes, airs at noon and 5 p.m. Fridays and 10 a.m. Sundays on WPSX-TV (check local listings for air times in your area). Kathleen O'Toole writes and co-hosts the series, which is produced by WPSX-TV/Penn State Public Broadcasting in cooperation with Penn State's College of Education. The show is endorsed by the National Council for the Social Studies. For more information, visit http://www.witn.psu.edu