"We are under a constitution," wrote Charles Evans Hughes in 1908 when he was Governor of New York, "but the Constitution is what the judges say it is."
Scrawled in black ink in the fat, gray, clothbound docket of the United States Supreme Court today are more than 1,000 lawsuits involving the constitutionality of the New Deal.
How will the nine black-robed judges, who say what the Constitution is, decide the fate of the P. W. A., T. V. A., the Guffey coal bill and A. A. A.--backbone of the Administration's agricultural program which affects millions of farmers?
In its last term ( 1934-'35), out of six decisions involving the New Deal, the court five times said "Thou Shalt Not" to Congress and the President. Its decisions during this term and the next will shape the course of government for years to come.
On the whole the people of this nation now approve of the power of the Supreme Court to check the other two branches of government. A recent poll of the people indicates that only two persons in six think this power should be curbed, while approximately three are satisfied to leave matters as they are, and one has no opinion.
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