WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that North Carolina’s top court did not overstep its bounds in striking down a congressional districting plan as excessively partisan under state law.
The justices rejected the broadest view of a legal theory that could have transformed elections for Congress and president.
The court declined to invoke for the first time the “independent state legislature” theory, which would leave state legislatures virtually unchecked by their state courts when dealing with federal elections.
The high court did, though, suggest there could be limits on state court efforts to police elections for Congress and president.
The practical effect of the decision is minimal in that the North Carolina Supreme Court, under a new Republican majority, already has undone its redistricting ruling.
Another redistricting case from Ohio is pending, if the justices want to say more about the issue before next year’s elections.
This is a breaking news update. A previous version of this report is below.
The U.S. Supreme Court released a decision on a case that deals with the legitimacy of a controversial legal theory about who oversees elections and whether that authority has limits.
The “independent state legislature” theory, backed by a group of conservative advocates, contends that state lawmakers have the ultimate power to regulate federal elections. That power of elected representatives, the theory’s supporters argue, isn’t subject to the traditional restrictions provided by state constitutions, state courts and governors’ vetoes.
But the theory, if embraced by the justices in its most extreme application, could have a dramatic impact on how congressional maps are drawn, voting rules are written and more, according to election experts who spoke with ABC News.
The theory could undermine how American democracy works now, these experts said, raising concerns about what it could mean for how the 2024 presidential race and other contests are run.
The concept is at the center of Moore v. Harper, a redistricting case out of North Carolina, and concerns how two key clauses in the U.S. Constitution should be interpreted.
The Elections Clause states that “the Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations.”
And the Presidential Electors Clause reads: “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors.”
Jason Snead, the executive director of the Honest Elections Project, a conservative-aligned group which filed an outside amicus brief in Moore v. Harper supporting the theory, told NPR in August that the issue gets to “the very core of what it is to have a free election.”
“If the Supreme Court comes down with a ruling that says, in fact, the word ‘legislature’ means legislature, I think that’s a win for voters who want fair rules. I would define ‘fair’ as rules written by the people that they elect to write the law,” Snead told ABC News.
But critics of this view say that overstates the intended dominance of one branch of government.
The theory “fixates on the word ‘legislature’ and makes the leap that because the Constitution uses that word, it means to allow a legislature to regulate federal elections absent all those ordinary checks and balances,” said Ethan Herenstein, counsel with the democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice, an advocacy group and think tank focused on the “values of democracy” and “the rule of law.”
The Supreme Court’s justices rejected aspects of the “independent state legislature” theory as recently as 2019, when they found that state courts and constitutions could be a check on gerrymandering. But since then, a key number of them have indicated they’re open to exploring the issue again — though it’s unclear if their underlying opinions have changed.
Justice Samuel Alito wrote in an opinion in March that “we will have to resolve this question sooner or later, and the sooner we do so, the better.”
“It takes four justices to decide to take a case, so there are at least four justices interested in resolving whether the independent state legislature theory is an appropriate reading of the Constitution, but that doesn’t mean that the court is prepared to adopt this idea,” said Eliza Sweren-Becker, counsel in the Brennan Center’s Voting Rights and Elections Program.
At the heart of the dispute in Moore are Republican lawmakers in North Carolina who want to resurrect a congressional map that the state Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional for violating free speech, free assembly and equal protection provisions of the state constitution. A map approved by a state court was instead put in place for this year’s midterm elections.
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