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Page Number: 23.0

18 

MOORE v. HARPER 

Opinion of the Court 

“retain autonomy to establish their own governmental pro-
cesses.”  Id., at 816. 

The  significant  point  for  present  purposes  is  that  the
Court  in  Arizona  State  Legislature  recognized  that  what-
ever authority was responsible for redistricting, that entity
remained subject to constraints set forth in the State Con-
stitution.  The Court embraced the core principle espoused 
in Hildebrant and Smiley “that redistricting is a legislative 
function,  to  be  performed  in  accordance  with  the  State’s 
prescriptions for lawmaking, which may include the refer-
endum and the Governor’s veto.”  576 U. S., at 808; see also 
id.,  at  840–841  (ROBERTS,  C. J.,  dissenting)  (recognizing 
that Hildebrant and Smiley support the imposition of “some
constraints on the legislature”).  The Court dismissed the 
argument that the Elections Clause divests state constitu-
tions of the power to enforce checks against the exercise of
legislative  power:  “Nothing  in  [the  Elections]  Clause  in-
structs, nor has this Court ever held, that a state legislature 
may prescribe regulations on the time, place, and manner 
of holding federal elections in defiance of provisions of the 
State’s constitution.”  576 U. S., at 817–818 (majority opin-
ion).

The reasoning we unanimously embraced in Smiley com-
mands our continued respect: A state legislature may not 
“create  congressional  districts  independently  of ”  require-
ments imposed “by the state constitution with respect to the 
enactment of laws.”  285 U. S., at 373. 

B 

The legislative defendants and the dissent both contend 
that, because the Federal Constitution gives state legisla-
tures  the  power  to  regulate  congressional  elections,  only 
that  Constitution  can  restrain  the  exercise  of  that  power.
Brief for Petitioners 22; post, at 17 (opinion of THOMAS, J.).
The  legislative  defendants  cite  for  support  Federalist 
No. 78,  which  explains  that  the  wielding  of  legislative