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TheBrennanCenter OP t1_iynnvo0 wrote

Reply to comment by Ven18 in We're Tom Wolf,Eliza Sweren-Becker, and Ethan Herenstein. We work on democracy reform at the Brennan Center for Justice. Ask us anything about the Supreme Court’s upcoming case Moore v. Harper and the “independent state legislature” theory. by TheBrennanCenter

Tim Moore is the Speaker of the North Carolina House of Representatives. Rebecca Harper is a voter in North Carolina. Last year, North Carolina’s Republican-dominated state legislature—led by Moore—passed, on a party-line vote, an extreme partisan gerrymander to lock in a supermajority of the state’s 14 congressional seats. Harper, along with other voters and non-profit groups, successfully contested the map in state court, contending that the map violated the state constitution’s “free elections clause,” among other provisions. But Moore wasn’t willing to accept the state court’s ruling, so he asked the U.S. Supreme Court to get involved. Before the U.S. Supreme Court, Moore has invoked the so-called “independent state legislature theory,” the dangerous theory that state legislatures have near exclusive power to set the rules for federal elections.

The ISLT would have catastrophic effects for our elections if it became the law of the land. It would kneecap the state-level movement to end partisan gerrymandering. But it could also endanger the right to a secret ballot in many state constitutions, the right to cast an absentee ballot in at least sixteen states, ranked-choice voting regimes in Alaska and Maine, automatic voter registration in Michigan and Nevada, and on and on. In all, the theory could upend more than 170 constitutional provisions and more than 650 state statutes that protect your right to vote and make sure that elections are free and fair. That’s a recipe to upend elections if there ever were one. -- Ethan

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Mysterious_Lesions t1_iynonlc wrote

The now quaint seeming Voting Rights Act would have been ineffective if this concept was in play.

We have a similar thing going on in Canada as well. A province here wants the ability to opt out of federal legislation that they don't agree with - including the federal criminal code. This one will definitely be a rougher path to realization.

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spinbutton t1_iyo2qlt wrote

By the way NC just put two more Republicans on our state supreme court so we'll never have fair elections again in my lifetime.

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Lysandren t1_iyp3sua wrote

Our Supreme Court judges aren't lifetime appointments in NC. Unless you plan on dying soon you could easily see the court turn blue again.

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spinbutton t1_iyvdmoh wrote

I'm pretty old...but I'd like to see it switch back in the next time there are seats up for grabs

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rckhppr t1_iypihi7 wrote

It sounds counter intuitive that federal elections need hundreds of state laws to ensure a fair execution. Will the US voting laws need to be simplified or made more concise?

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