After winning re-election in a landslide. Roosevelt was frustrated that the Supreme Court was declaring some of his New Deal programs unconstitutional. In 1937, FDR addressed congress saying "The statute of N.R.A. has been outlawed. The problems have not. They are still with us." Determined not to let the courts stop him, he began devising his plan to pack the court. He wanted congress to grant the President power to appoint an additional Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court, up to a maximum of six, for every member of the court over the age of 70 years and 6 months. FDR announced his plan in February or 1937. While this caught many by surprise, just one month earlier in January he addressed congress with these words:
"The Judicial branch also is asked by the people to do its part in making democracy successful. We do not ask the Courts to call non-existent powers into being, but we have a right to expect that conceded powers or those legitimately implied shall be made effective instruments for the common good. The process of our democracy must not be imperiled by the denial of essential powers of free government."
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=15336
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