38. John Nance Garner
It is difficult to find influential Vice-Presidents of the United States, at least while they served in that office, but John Nance Garner was one, and he exerted that influence against the president whose administration he served. When FDR attempted to expand the number of justices on the Supreme Court in 1937, which became the Court Packing debate, Garner opposed the attempt and spent a great deal of his political capital acquired over his long career to build opposition to the proposal in the House and Senate. In the end the measure was defeated but Garner’s actions cost him his job, and he was dropped from the ticket in the 1940 elections by an angry Roosevelt.
