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4 

DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE v. WISCONSIN 
STATE LEGISLATURE 
GORSUCH, J., concurring 

might be frustrated.  Our oath to uphold the Constitution 
is tested by hard times, not easy ones.  And succumbing to 
the temptation to sidestep the usual constitutional rules is 
never costless.  It does damage to faith in the written Con-
stitution as law, to the power of the people to oversee their 
own  government,  and  to  the  authority  of  legislatures,  for 
the  more  we  assume  their  duties  the  less  incentive  they 
have to discharge them.  Last-minute changes to longstand-
ing election rules risk other problems too, inviting confusion 
and  chaos  and  eroding  public  confidence  in  electoral  out-
comes.  No one doubts that conducting a national election 
amid a pandemic poses serious challenges.  But none of that 
means  individual  judges  may  improvise  with  their  own 
election rules in place of those the people’s representatives 
have adopted.