FDR's Gambit: The Court Packing Fight and the Rise of Legal Liberalism

A comprehensive, engaging, and revisionist account of the Court fight that ties it to contemporary policy debates.

In the last past few years, liberals concerned about the prospect of long-term conservative dominance of the federal courts have revived an idea that famously crashed and burned in the 1930s: court packing. Not surprisingly, today's court packing advocates have run into a wall of opposition, with most citing the 1930s episode as one FDR's greatest failures. In early 1937, Roosev...