The Best Laid Plans: Fred M. Vinson and the Decline and Fall of the Roosevelt Court, 1946-1949

Abstract

One of the great ironies in constitutional history is the fact that the Supreme Court that Franklin Roosevelt labored so hard to construct lasted for such a short period of time following his death. Dying early in his fourth term in 1945, FDR’s supporters could at least take solace in the fact that eight of the Court’s nine sitting justices had been appointed by the late president. Within four years of Roosevelt’s death, however, the myth of monolithic-styled unity would be shattered and the so-called “Roosevelt Court” of Harlan Fiske Stone would have given way to the “Truman Court” of Fred M. Vinson. The great irony behind this transformation is that the very same economic issues that initially brought the Roosevelt Court together ultimately helped to likewise drive it apart.