This allowed the court-drawn lines of voting to remain in place.
Both cases saw the justices decline the emergency request from GOP officials to overturn lower court decisions that approved the court-drawn district. These districts replaced the electoral maps adopted in Pennsylvania and North Carolina by Republicans.
In a short order declining an emergency request by GOP officials regarding Pennsylvania’s new voting lines, there were no noted dissents. Three conservative justices in North Carolina, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch said that they would have stopped the court-approved congressional maps.
Alito joined Thomas and Gorsuch in a dissent. They stated that the Republican state legislators challenging the new voting boundaries would be “deprived” of their constitutional prerogatives to draw the congressional map in their States. The public interest will be hurt if the 2022 North Carolina congressional elections are held in districts that we ultimately determine were not constitutionally imposed.
As Democrats in these key battleground states will be able to benefit from the Supreme Court’s orders, they won’t put back the maps approved by the state legislatures that were more favorable for Republicans in the 2022 midterm elections. Democrats are trying to maintain their slim majority in Congress.
The dispute over North Carolina’s new congressional districts saw the GOP-led General Assembly adopt new district lines. This was after North Carolina gained a seat at the U.S. House, which gave Republicans an advantage 10 out of North Carolina’s 14 seats. Currently, Republicans hold eight seats while Democrats have five.
However, the North Carolina Supreme Court rejected the map and found them to be unconstitutional. It sent the case back for further proceedings to a state court.
The North Carolina trial court rejected the redrawn voting boundaries for the congressional elections. Instead, it approved a new map that was created by a group special masters and assistants. According to analysis by Campaign Legal Center, this gave Republicans six seats to the advantage of the four Democrats. There are four other districts that are more competitive.
The state legislature was challenged by Republicans who challenged the use court-drawn maps. They argued that North Carolina’s high courts decided the “manner” under which the state’s elections would be held. This effected the derogatory power given to the state legislature under Article XIV’s election clause.
“If a redistricting procedure more violative to the U.S. Constitution is existing, it’s hard to imagine it,” the GOP lawmakers stated to the Supreme Court in their Emergency Request for Intervention.
They said: “This court should stop the North Carolina judiciary from usurping the General Assembly’s specific enumerated constitution authority to regulate how congressional elections are conducted.” Any less than this will result in North Carolina’s 2022 election being subject to a congressional map which is clearly against the U.S Constitution and rewarding judicial activism of its most brazen.
The Pennsylvania case involved Governor Tom Wolf (a Democrat) who vetoed a map that was approved by the GOP-led General Assembly. A group of voters opposed the new lines in state courts. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court intervened to order the use of a map drawn by the state judiciary.
Following the 2020 census, the state lost one House seat. The court-approved map gives Republicans nine seats and Democrats eight.
“The state’s election officials plan to implement this court-selected chart and judicially modified calendar for the upcoming primaries,” Pennsylvania officials stated to the Supreme Court. “But this action is flagrantly illegal and should be immediately rescinded.”
