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Page Number: 34.0

12 

BERGER v. NORTH CAROLINA STATE 
CONFERENCE OF THE NAACP 
SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

Ante, at 16; see Brief for Petitioners 48 (“The differing per-
spectives of Petitioners and State Board Respondents are a 
product of their different relationships to the State”).  The 
Court’s position rests in part on the assumption that lead-
ers  of  the  General  Assembly  have  a  unique  interest  that 
should be represented in the litigation.  As noted, however, 
the case’s procedural posture forecloses that argument be-
cause petitioners forfeited it.4 

In any event, the difference in perspective the Court per-
ceives boils down only to a disagreement over trial strategy. 
As the Court rightly concedes, the State has a strong inter-
est in the orderly administration of its elections.  See ante, 
at 16 (acknowledging state respondents’ interest in “stabil-
ity  and  certainty”  in  an  upcoming  election).  That  is  not, 
however, the only state interest that state respondents, rep-
resented by the attorney general, sought to defend.  The at-
torney general has insisted all along that the interests he 
seeks to represent, and indeed is required to represent un-
der  state  law,  include  defending  the  constitutionality  of
North Carolina laws like the voter-identification law at is-
sue here.  See N. C. Gen. Stat. Ann. §114–2.  These state 
interests  are  not  mutually  exclusive.  The  attorney  gen-
eral’s choice to emphasize the State’s interest in election ad-
ministration  at  a  particular  stage  of  the  litigation,  while 
simultaneously maintaining a firm position on the consti-
tutionality of S. B. 824, was merely a choice about litigation 
strategy.  It is a choice with which petitioners might disa-
gree, but it does not render state respondents’ representa-
tion inadequate.  See 7C Wright, Miller, & Kane §1909 (“A 
mere difference of opinion concerning the tactics with which 

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4 The argument that petitioners may intervene to represent a different 
“perspective”  might  have  been  a  better  fit  for  permissive  intervention 
under  Rule  24(b),  rather  than  intervention  as  a  matter  of  right  under 
Rule 24(a)(2).  Petitioners, however, did not ask this Court to review the 
District Court’s conclusion that they were not entitled to permissive in-
tervention.