Presiding over the country during the Great Depression and the New Deal meant to overcome it, the Court was dominated through the 1937 term by four conservative justices, known as the "Four Horsemen" (Pierce Butler, James Clark McReynolds, George Sutherland, and Willis Van Devanter), and struck down many of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal policies.

With the confirmation of Roberts, the Hughes Court consisted of Hughes, Roberts, and seven veterans of the Taft Court: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., Van Devanter, McReynolds, Louis Brandeis, Sutherland, Butler, and Harlan F. Stone.

Roosevelt made his first appointment to the court in 1937, replacing the retiring Van Devanter with Hugo Black.

Douglas served from April 15, 1939, to November 12, 1975 – 36 years, 209 days, which is longer than any other justice in the Court's history.

[1] However, some scholars, such as Barry Cushman, have rejected this conventional wisdom as overly simplistic in emphasizing the justices’ roles as political actors.

[5][6] Cushman argues that many of the New Deal acts were struck down because they were not written with proper consideration for constitutional issues, and that the Roosevelt Justice Department under Homer Cummings failed to adequately defend the laws in court.