Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/12pdf/12-71_7l48.pdf
Page Number: 8.0

Cite as:  570 U. S. ____ (2013) 

5 

Opinion of the Court 

ment that officials “reject” the application of a prospective
voter who submits a completed Federal Form unaccompa-
nied by documentary evidence of citizenship. 

A 
The  Elections  Clause  has  two  functions.    Upon  the
States  it  imposes  the  duty  (“shall  be  prescribed”)  to  pre-
scribe the time, place, and manner of electing Representa-
tives and Senators; upon Congress it confers the power to
alter  those  regulations  or  supplant  them  altogether.    See 
U. S.  Term  Limits,  Inc.  v.  Thornton,  514  U. S.  779,  804– 
805  (1995);  id.,  at  862  (THOMAS,  J.,  dissenting).  This 
grant  of  congressional  power  was  the  Framers’  insurance 
against the possibility that a State would refuse to provide 
for the election of representatives to the Federal Congress. 
“[E]very  government  ought  to  contain  in  itself  the  means
of its own preservation,” and “an exclusive power of regu-
lating elections for the national government, in the hands
of  the  State  legislatures,  would  leave  the  existence  of  the 
Union entirely at their mercy.  They could at any moment
annihilate  it  by  neglecting  to  provide  for  the  choice  of 
persons to  administer its affairs.”  The  Federalist No. 59, 
pp. 362–363  (C.  Rossiter  ed.  1961)  (A. Hamilton)  (empha-
sis  deleted).    That  prospect  seems  fanciful  today,  but  the
widespread,  vociferous  opposition  to  the  proposed  Consti-
tution made it a very real concern in the founding era. 

The Clause’s substantive scope is broad.  “Times, Places, 
and  Manner,”  we  have  written,  are  “comprehensive 
words,”  which  “embrace  authority  to  provide  a  complete 
code  for  congressional  elections,”  including,  as  relevant 
here  and  as  petitioners  do  not  contest,  regulations  relat-
ing  to  “registration.”    Smiley  v.  Holm,  285  U. S.  355,  366 
(1932); see also Roudebush v. Hartke, 405 U. S. 15, 24–25 
(1972)  (recounts);  United  States  v.  Classic,  313  U. S.  299, 
320  (1941)  (primaries).  In  practice,  the  Clause  functions
as “a default provision; it invests the States with responsi-