Podcast Assignment 6 Analysis

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Podcast Assignment 6: “FDR’s Losing Battle To Pack The Supreme Court”. Podcast Assignment 6 is about the interview to historian Jeff Shesol –author of several books and former speechwriter for President Bill Clinton– about his book: Supreme Power: Franklyn Roosevelt Vs. The Supreme Court. This book is a narrative of President Roosevelt’s idea for packing the United States Supreme Court and the events that originated this idea; the strategy he used to achieve his plan; the reaction of his presidential cabinet and Congress to his proposal; and lastly, the resolution: although the plan to pack the Supreme Court was never executed, the Supreme Court ended up being reformed. In addition, historian Jeff Shesol briefly discusses how the speechwriting process has changed since the 1930’s. In the …show more content…
Hence, Roosevelt secretly planned to pack the Supreme Court (only his attorney General, Homer Cummings, knew about this idea) with more liberal justices who would approve the New Deal. His proposal was that “for every justice over the age of 70 who refused to retire, the president would have the right to appoint another justice, and so there would be a cap on the number of justices at 15”. If no one retired, then he would appoint six additional liberal justices to the Supreme Court. Unquestionably, he tried to put a mask to his real intentions (passing the New Deal), and aimed to sell the idea that this change would promote judicial efficiency. For instance, he claimed that the justices’ age was central as they were unaware of the necessities of the new times; and in addition, their age was affecting their work productivity, thus needed some help to fulfill their jobs on time. Unfortunately, his plan was not accepted as

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