That is the Supreme Court case involving congressional redistricting maps here in NC. And unbefitting my legendary laziness, I read the opinion because the left was as always acting like they destroyed the right and some commenters were suggesting that it wasn’t a big deal.

Rest assured that it’s not a big deal and while I agree with the majority ultimate conclusion, there are two reasons that they should not have ruled on the case. The first is that if ever there was a case that was moot, this is it. Let me explain.

The history of the case is complicated and confusing. In the original case the NC SC held that the legislatures plan violated the state constitution. The case was appealed to the Supremes and they accepted. However before the case was heard an election flipped the NC SC from Dem to republican and that court agreed to a rehearing and in fact held that the maps did not violate the state constitution. So at that point the Republican legislators, who were the plaintiffs, got the relief they desired and wanted the case dismissed as moot, but contrary to their normal predeliction the Supremes said it wasn’t and so heard the case.

The actual decision was very narrow and precise and involved what is known as the Independent Legislator Theory (ILT) basically that since the US Constitution says the rules for voting in federal elections are exclusively the province of the state legislature that they are therefore not subject to any judicial review. The court disagreed and said that judicial review by state courts was allowed. But the grounds are very limited, namely that the legislature violated the state constitution. In this case it was said that partisan gerrymandering was forbidden by the state constitution.

Now as I will explain below, that was wrong. However it is a very limited decision! State courts can’t decide that they will extend the date for receiving and counting ballots. Nor can they change voter identification requirements or signature verification requirements. Their power is limited to provisions that violate the state constitution or potentially federal laws.

The reason I think that the decision was wrong, as pointed out by Justice Thomas, the provision in the state constitution relied on only applied to redistricting in state legislature voting not federal elections.

Now here’s why I think they did it because they wanted to put the ILT to rest before 2024 elections and proscribed just what judges could and couldn’t do in the future. Consider this their way to stop the nonsense that happened in 2020 ahead of time so they don’t get caught in another conundrum after the election and certainly the wimp Chief Justice would want that.