Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-1271_3f14.pdf
Page Number: 62.0

24 

MOORE v. HARPER 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

on the question presented.  In every case properly before it, 
any court—state or federal—must ascertain and apply the 
substantive law that properly governs that case.  Thus, the 
court naturally must apply the Federal Constitution rather 
than  any  statute  in  conflict  with  it.  The  court  must  also 
apply the state constitution over any conflicting statute en-
acted under a power limited by that constitution.  Petition-
ers’ argument, however, is that legislation about the times, 
places, and manner of congressional elections is not limited 
by state constitutions—because the power to regulate those 
subjects comes from the Federal Constitution, not the peo-
ple of the State.  Right or wrong, this question has nothing 
to do with whether state courts have the power to conduct 
judicial review in the first place.  To say that “state judicial 
review”  authorizes  applying  state  constitutions  over  con-
flicting Elections Clause legislation, ante, at 15, is simply to 
assume away petitioners’ argument. 

III 
The  majority  opinion  ends  with  some  general  advice  to
state and lower federal courts on how to exercise “judicial
review” “in cases implicating the Elections Clause.”  Ante, 
at 28.  As the majority offers no clear rationale for its inter-
pretation of the Clause, it is impossible to be sure what the
consequences of that interpretation will be.  However, judg-
ing  from  the  majority’s  brief  sketch  of  the  regime  it  envi-
sions, I worry that today’s opinion portends serious troubles 
ahead for the Judiciary.

The majority uses the separate writings in Bush v. Gore, 
531 U. S. 98 (2000) (per curiam), as a loose touchstone for 
the kind of judicial review that it apparently expects federal 
courts to conduct in future cases like this one.  On its face, 
this is an awkward analogy, for there is a significant differ-
ence between Bush and Harper I.  In Bush, the state court’s 
judgment was based on an interpretation of state statutory 
law,  enacted  by  the  state  legislature.    Thus,  the  relevant