At least six Supreme Court justices sound skeptical of making a broad ruling that would leave state legislatures virtually unchecked when making rules for elections for Congress and the presidency.
A rally is held in front of the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2022, as the Court hears arguments on a new elections case that could dramatically alter voting in 2024 and beyond. The case is from highly competitive North Carolina, where Republican efforts to draw congressional districts heavily in their favor were blocked by a Democratic majority on the state Supreme Court.
Republicans from North Carolina who brought the case to the high court argue that a provision of the U.S. Constitution known as the elections clause gives state lawmakers virtually total control over the “times, places and manner” of congressional elections, including redistricting, cutting state courts out of the process.
“This is a theory with big consequences,” Justice Elena Kagan said, allowing for the “most extreme forms of gerrymandering from legislatures.” North Carolina is among six states in recent years in which state courts have ruled that overly partisan redistricting for Congress violated their state constitutions. The others are Florida, Maryland, New York, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
But Alito, Gorsuch and Thomas wrote in March that they would have allowed the Republican-drawn map to be used this year. Alito wrote for the three justices that “there must be some limit on the authority of state courts to countermand actions taken by state legislatures when they are prescribing rules for the conduct of federal elections. I think it is likely that the applicants would succeed in showing that the North Carolina Supreme Court exceeded those limits.
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