In a 6-3 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld its right to hear cases involving questions concerning state law and rejected a conservative legal theory that would radically transform federal elections.
Moore v. Harper, which was heard last December, concerned a ruling from the North Carolina Supreme Court rejecting politically gerrymandered congressional maps.
In 2021, the North Carolina legislature passed an extreme partisan gerrymander that would have all but guaranteed Republicans 10 seats and Democrats four — a significant imbalance for a purple state where, in the 2020 presidential election, then-President Donald Trump won the state by less than 100,000 votes.
When challenged in 2022 before the state’s high court, which at the time leaned Democratic, the justices sided with the plaintiffs, concurring that the new map violated the state’s constitution.
State Republicans, led by House Speaker Tim Moore, wasted no time attempting to relitigate their effort. Since North Carolina Republicans made it impossible for federal courts to regulate redistricting in 2019’s Rucho v. Common Cause, they used a fringe legal theory to get their foot in the door of the U.S. Supreme Court — where they expected to find ideological refuge with the high court's new conservative majority.
Instead of a simple partisan gerrymandering case, Republicans transformed their suit into a question of federal legitimacy that they wagered the court would have to answer.
They suggested that the state Supreme Court’s ruling was federally incongruent, arguing that the U.S. constitutional provision allowing states to dictate “The Times, Places and Manner” of their elections granted far broader authority to make election laws that couldn't be touched by federal oversight.
This is a part of a larger, extreme legal theory proposed by conservative lawmakers which would have vacated state and federal court oversight over state lawmaking around elections. The “Independent State Legislature theory doctrine” as it is known, would radically transform U.S. elections and law had it been embraced by the high court.
If legitimized by the Supreme Court, the doctrine would have had drastic impacts on state constitutions across the country, potentially nullifying provisions concerning voting and election practices. The Brennan Center, a nonpartisan law and policy think tank, has suggested that this legal framework would have allowed state legislatures “refuse to certify” election results in 2020.
The Brennan Center also noted that, of the nearly 70 amicus or 'friend-of-the-court' briefs, the majority cast doubt on the doctrine.
"In a sure sign of how radical the theory is, forty-eight friend-of-court briefs—filed by a diverse array of historians, bipartisan groups of federal, state, and local government officials, law professors, civil rights organizations, and good government groups, among others—support the voters and non-profits challenging the theory. Meanwhile, sixteen briefs support the legislators and five briefs support neither party," the Brennan Center wrote in late 2022.
But Tuesday's ruling firmly rejected that theory, affirming federalism and principles of checks and balances.
In his opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts proclaimed, “This Court has an obligation to ensure that state court interpretations of state law do not evade federal law.”
Roberts, along with Kavanaugh, Jackson, Barrett, Sotomayor, and Kagan went all the way back to 1803 and the foundational precedent of Marbury v. Maddison, a case taught in civics classes across the country, to firmly reject the independent state legislature doctrine.
Thomas, Gorsuch, and Alito dissented, with Thomas predicting uncertainty akin to the 2000 Bush v. Gore — where the high court first considered independent state legislature doctrine.
Following the decision, Speaker Tim Moore, who led the suit said in a statement, “I am proud of the work we did to pursue this case to the nation's highest court.”
But since the initial arguments of Moore v Harper, things have changed drastically in North Carolina. In April, the initial case, Harper v. Hall was re-heard by the new conservative majority on the North Carolina Supreme Court, who granted a favorable ruling to state Republicans. Justice Thomas suggested this ruling rendered Moore v. Harper moot.
In an interview with WHQR earlier this month, Attorney General Josh Stein said the re-litigation of Harper had “no legal basis”.
“Unfortunately, at this point, the legislature has a lot of power in terms of abusing the redistricting process, to cement themselves in control and in power, which is in flagrant violation of the dictates of our North Carolina Supreme Court,” he continued.
North Carolina will now begin the process of drawing new congressional maps. And with the state Supreme Court’s blessing, it is likely they will share a similar 10-4 gerrymandered, partisan split to the maps that catalyzed this case in the first place.
