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The question is a little misleading. No President successfully packed the US Supreme Court. President Franklin D. Roosevelt proposed a bill in 1937 that would have added one justice to the Supreme Court for each sitting justice over the age of 70.5, to a maximum of six justices, which would have increased the size of the Court from nine to fifteen. This was known as the "Court-Packing Plan," but it never got through Congress. The Senate sent the bill to its Judiciary Committee where it died, so FDR never got to "pack" the Court.

The reason Roosevelt was interested in adding justices to the Supreme Court went farther than attempting to overturn a single ruling. The nine justices opposed FDR's New Deal legislation and believed much of it was unconstitutional; they overturned six pieces of New Deal legislation and closed a government agency in the process. Roosevelt hoped appointing extra justices would dilute the conservative vote and allow him to proceed with his economic plan for the country.

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14y ago

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