Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/13-1314_3ea4.pdf
Page Number: 40.0

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

1 

ROBERTS, C. J., dissenting 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

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No. 13–1314 
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ARIZONA STATE LEGISLATURE, APPELLANT v.
 
ARIZONA INDEPENDENT REDISTRICTING 

COMMISSION ET AL. 

ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR 
THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA 

[June 29, 2015] 

CHIEF  JUSTICE  ROBERTS,  with  whom  JUSTICE  SCALIA, 

JUSTICE THOMAS, and JUSTICE ALITO join, dissenting. 

Just  over  a  century  ago,  Arizona  became  the  second 
State in the Union to ratify the Seventeenth Amendment.
That  Amendment  transferred  power  to  choose  United 
States  Senators  from  “the  Legislature”  of  each  State, 
Art. I,  §3,  to  “the  people  thereof.”    The  Amendment  re-
sulted  from  an  arduous,  decades-long  campaign  in  which
reformers  across  the  country  worked  hard  to  garner  ap-
proval from Congress and three-quarters of the States.

What  chumps!    Didn’t  they  realize  that  all  they  had  to 
do was interpret the constitutional term “the Legislature”
to mean “the people”?  The Court today performs just such
a magic trick with the Elections Clause.  Art. I, §4.  That 
Clause  vests  congressional  redistricting  authority  in  “the 
Legislature”  of  each  State.  An  Arizona  ballot  initiative 
transferred  that  authority  from  “the  Legislature”  to  an
“Independent  Redistricting  Commission.”    The  majority
approves  this  deliberate  constitutional  evasion  by  doing 
what  the  proponents  of  the  Seventeenth  Amendment
dared not: revising “the Legislature” to mean “the people.”
The Court’s position has no basis in the text, structure,
or  history  of  the  Constitution,  and  it  contradicts  prece-
dents  from  both  Congress  and  this  Court.  The  Constitu-