Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/13-1314_3ea4.pdf
Page Number: 9

Cite as:  576 U. S. ____ (2015) 

5 

Opinion of the Court 

not  only  to  enact  ordinary  laws,  but  also  to  amend  the 
State’s  Constitution.    J.  Dinan,  The  American  State  Con­
stitutional Tradition 62 (2006).  By 1920, the people in 19
States  had  reserved  for  themselves  the  power  to  initiate 
ordinary lawmaking, and, in 13 States, the power to initi­
ate  amendments  to  the  State’s  Constitution.    Id.,  at  62, 
and n. 132, 94, and n. 151.  Those numbers increased to 21 
and  18,  respectively,  by  the  close  of  the  20th  century. 
Ibid.3 

B 

For the delegates to Arizona’s constitutional convention, 
direct lawmaking was a “principal issu[e].”  J. Leshy, The
Arizona  State  Constitution 8–9  (2d  ed.  2013)  (hereinafter 
Leshy).  By a margin of more than three to one, the people 
of Arizona ratified the State’s Constitution, which included, 
among  lawmaking  means,  initiative  and  referendum  pro- 
visions.  Id.,  at  14–16,  22.    In  the  runup  to  Arizona’s  ad­
mission  to  the  Union  in  1912,  those  provisions  generated 
no controversy.  Id., at 22. 

In  particular,  the  Arizona  Constitution  “establishes  the 

electorate  [of  Arizona]  as  a  coordinate  source  of  legisla­
tion”  on  equal  footing  with  the  representative  legislative 
body.  Queen  Creek  Land  &  Cattle  Corp.  v.  Yavapai  Cty. 
Bd. of Supervisors, 108 Ariz. 449, 451, 501 P. 2d 391, 393 
(1972); Cave Creek Unified School Dist. v. Ducey, 233 Ariz. 
1,  4,  308  P. 3d  1152,  1155  (2013)  (“The  legislature  and 

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3 The people’s sovereign right to incorporate themselves into a State’s
lawmaking  apparatus,  by  reserving  for  themselves  the  power  to  adopt
laws and to veto measures passed by elected representatives, is one this
Court  has  ranked  a  nonjusticiable  political  matter.  Pacific  States 
Telephone  &  Telegraph  Co.  v.  Oregon,  223  U. S.  118  (1912)  (rejecting
challenge to referendum mounted under Article IV, §4’s undertaking by
the United States to “guarantee to every State in th[e] Union a Repub­
lican  Form  of  Government”).    But  see  New  York  v.  United  States,  505 
U. S.  144,  185  (1992)  (“[P]erhaps  not  all  claims  under  the  Guarantee 
Clause present nonjusticiable political questions.”).