Discussion Questions for William Leuchtenburg’s The Supreme Court Reborn: The Constitutional Revolution in the Age of Roosevelt.

• How does legal or constitutional history as practiced by Leuchtenburg differ from Linda Przybysewski’s study of Justice Harlan? Which is more effective? Why?

• Who are the "agents of change" in Leuchtenburg’s telling of the Constitutional Revolution of 1937? FDR, government bureaucrats at the Department of Justice, Congress?

• Are you convinced that there was a Constitutional Revolution in 1937? What makes this period revolutionary, if at all?

• Is Leuchtenburg too dismissive of the argument that the post-1937 Supreme Court was simply returning to earlier case precedents? Is the Supreme Court truly "reborn"?

• Is the "Constitutional Revolution" simply an example of power politics unconnected to underlying legal issues?

• Given the overwhelming mandate of the 1936 election, did FDR have other options in responding to the opposition by the Supreme Court to New Deal legislation?

• What were the short-term and long-term effects on federal power as a result of the court-packing conflict?

• Do you think Leuchtenburg proves his claim that the "Court squabble" undermined support for the New Deal? How do you reconcile that position with his claim that the squabble also legitimated "the vast expansion of the power of government in American life?"

• What is the significance of Leuchtenburg’s claim that Roosevelt’s court plan was inevitable and not capricious (p. 131)?

• How does the essay on the Buck v. Bell case fit into Leuchtenburg’s argument about a Constitutional Revolution?