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Page Number: 31

26 

MOORE v. HARPER 

Opinion of the Court 

closely  parallel.  And  around  the  time  the  Articles  were 
adopted  by  the  Second  Continental  Congress,  multiple 
States regulated the “manner” of “appoint[ing] delegates,” 
ibid., suggesting that the Framers did not understand that
language to insulate state legislative action from state con-
stitutional provisions.  See Del. Const., Art. XI (1776); Md. 
Const., Art. XXVII (1776); Va. Const., cls. 3–4 (1776); Pa.
Const.,  §11  (1776);  N.  C.  Const.,  Art.  XXXVII  (1776);  Ga. 
Const., Art. XVI (1777); N. Y. Const., Art. XXX (1777); S. C. 
Const., Art. XXII (1778); Mass. Const., pt. 2, ch. IV (1780);
N. H. Const., pt. II (1784). 

The defendants stress an 1820 convention held in Massa-
chusetts to amend the Commonwealth’s Constitution.  Af-
ter a Boston delegate proposed a provision regulating the
manner of federal elections, Joseph Story—then a Justice 
of this Court—nixed the effort.  In Story’s view, such a pro-
vision  would  run  afoul  of  the  Elections  Clause  by  “as-
sum[ing] a control over the Legislature, which the constitu-
tion of the United States does not justify.”  Journal of the 
Debates  and  Proceedings  in  the  Convention  of  Delegates 
110 (1853).  But Story’s comment elicited little discussion,
and reflects the views of a jurist who, although “a brilliant 
and accomplished man, . . . was not a member of the Found-
ing generation.”  U. S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, 514 
U. S. 779, 856 (1995) (THOMAS, J., dissenting). 

V 
A 
Although we conclude that the Elections Clause does not
exempt state legislatures from the ordinary constraints im-
posed by state law, state courts do not have free rein.  “State 
courts are the appropriate tribunals . . . for the decision of 
questions arising under their local law, whether statutory
or  otherwise.”  Murdock  v.  Memphis,  20  Wall.  590,  626 
(1875).  At the  same  time,  the  Elections  Clause  expressly 
vests power to carry out its provisions in “the Legislature”