Court Opinion

ID: 9609609
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 03:29:10.055946+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:42.242006
License: Public Domain

RICHARDSON, J., Concurring and Dissenting.
I concur in the majority’s conclusion that the referendum petitions are valid and fully qualify for the 1982 primary ballot, that the qualification of the referenda stays the operation of the state Legislature’s 1981 reapportionment statutes, and that because of the constraints of federal law and the allocation of two new congressional seats, as a matter of both practical and legal necessity, we should adopt, temporarily, the 1981 legislative enactment of congressional boundaries. I respectfully, but vigorously, dissent, however, from the majority’s acceptance of the 1981 legislative enactment of Senate and Assembly district boundaries. In my view, this is most unnecessary, unwise and improper.
*680Today, and by the thinnest of margins, the majority accepts as its own and in its entirety, a legislative package, the validity of which is under very serious referendum challenge. It does so in the face of a pending election in which the people of this state will, in just over four months, make a final and definitive judgment on the propriety of this very legislation. The majority is not compelled to do so. It acknowledges, as it must, that the qualification of the referenda for the June 1982 ballot has the effect of fully staying the operation of the 1981 legislation. Nonetheless, the majority completely disregards this stay and imposes upon the people of California a state legislative reapportionment plan which has been stopped dead in its tracks by operation of law and which is heavily veiled in a cloud of political uncertainty. The majority’s adoption of this plan prejudges the result and its action can only be perceived as an official alignment of the court with one side in a partisan dispute as to which we should remain scrupulously neutral.
Only 10 years ago we unanimously agreed, under circumstances wholly analogous to those presented here, that we would retain the existing legislative district boundaries for the 1972 elections despite their noncompliance with federal one person, one vote principles. (Legislature v. Reinecke (Reinecke I) (1972) 6 Cal.3d 595 [99 Cal.Rptr. 481, 492 P.2d 385].) Reinecke I controls the disposition of the present case, and in my view affords the only satisfactory and practical solution consistent with the people’s constitutional right of referendum.
Certain general principles must govern our inquiry. First, the referendum and initiative are very special and favored rights. As we recently observed, “The amendment of the California Constitution in 1911 to provide for the initiative and referendum signifies one of the outstanding achievements of the progressive movement of the early 1900’s. Drafted in light of the theory that all power of government ultimately resides in the people, the amendment speaks of the initiative and referendum, not as a right granted the people, but as a power reserved by them. Declaring it ‘the duty of the courts to jealously guard this right of the people’ [citation], the courts have described the initiative and referendum as articulating ‘one of the most precious rights of our democratic process’ [citation]. ‘[I]t has long been our judicial policy to apply a liberal construction to this power wherever it is challenged in order that the right be not improperly annulled. If doubts can reasonably be resolved in favor of the use of this reserve power, courts will preserve it.’ [Citations.]” (Associated Home Builders etc., Inc. v. City of Livermore (1976) 18 Cal.3d 582, 591 [135 Cal.Rptr. 41, 557 P.2d *681473, 92 A.L.R.3d 1038]; accord, Fair Political Practices Com. v. Superior Court (1979) 25 Cal.3d 33, 41 [157 Cal.Rptr. 855, 599 P.2d 46], cert. den. (1980) 444 U.S. 1049 [62 L.Ed.2d 736, 100 S.Ct. 740].) We are “jealously [to] guard” this “precious” right. As mandated in section 1, article IV, of the state Constitution, “The legislative power of this State is vested in the California Legislature, ... but the people reserve to themselves the powers of initiative and referendum.” (Italics added.)
Second, as the majority is forced to concede, article II, section 10, subdivision (a), of the California Constitution mandates a stay of legislation challenged, as here, by a qualified referendum. This subdivision recites: “If a referendum petition is filed against a part of a statute the remainder shall not be delayed from going into effect.” By negative implication, if the referendum petition as here is directed to the entire statute, the statute is stayed.
Third, again as conceded by the majority, reapportionment statutes are subject to the referendum process. (Silver v. Brown (1965) 63 Cal.2d 270, 277-278 [46 Cal.Rptr. 308, 405 P.2d 132]; Yorty v. Anderson (1963) 60 Cal.2d 312, 316-317 [33 Cal.Rptr. 97, 384 P.2d 417]; Boggs v. Jordan (1928) 204 Cal. 207, 211 [267 P. 696]; Ortiz v. Board of Supervisors (1980) 107 Cal.App.3d 866, 872 [166 Cal.Rptr. 100].)
Despite the mandatory nature of the foregoing principles of law, however, the majority refuses to stay any of the three challenged reapportionment statutes, for purposes of the 1982 elections, relying instead upon what the majority conceives to be overriding federal principles. As I develop below, while a federal statute may require our temporary adoption of the 1981 congressional redistricting statute, neither any statute nor overriding principle justifies the majority’s complete disregard of the constitutionally ordained stay or the immediate imposition of the stayed legislation upon state legislative districts. In ordering the use of these latter districts for the 1982 elections, the majority at the same time both ignores article II, section 10, subdivision (a), of the Constitution, and deliberately thwarts the will of those hundreds of thousands of California voters whose signatures have already qualified the referendum petitions for election to approve or disapprove the reapportionment statutes. The Constitution requires that there be a stay, but the majority refuses to honor it.
The majority finds it anomalous that a “mere” 5 percent of the voters can effectively postpone the Legislature’s reapportionment plan. The *682answer, of course, is that this was the people’s own decision to fix the qualification at 5 percent. In actuality the signatures were in excess of 12 percent and these were speedily obtained. Moreover, this feature of the referendum is no more anomalous than permitting a single vote (that of the Governor) to accomplish the same result. (See Reinecke I, supra, 6 Cal. 3d, at p. 601, wherein we rejected the argument that the Legislature’s reapportionment statutes are exempt from the Governor’s veto.) The majority’s quarrel on this score is more appropriately directed to the framers of the state Constitution and to the people themselves who, in adopting the provision, authored the dual protections of gubernatorial veto and referendum stay as safeguards against legislative abuses.
The majority argues that a stay coupled with the continued use of voting district boundaries created by us in 1973, would violate federal “one person, one vote” principles incorporated in article XXI of the state Constitution. This conclusion is incorrect for reasons which I now develop with reference to the election, respectively, of members of the Assembly, Senate and House of Representatives.
A. The Assembly
The present boundaries of Assembly districts were drawn by masters appointed by us in 1973 in Legislature v. Reinecke (Reinecke IV) (1973) 10 Cal.3d 396 [110 Cal.Rptr. 718, 516 P.2d 6], We adopted as our plan these boundaries following a gubernatorial veto of one plan and the failure of the Legislature to adopt another. The present Assembly districts are based on 1970 census figures and, accordingly, do not accurately reflect recent population trends as disclosed by the 1980 census.
While the majority accepts the contestants’ view that the referendum stay cannot properly override “one person, one vote” principles, there is no irreconcilable conflict between those principles and the constitutionally mandated stay.
First, nothing contained in article XXI (adopted in 1980) purports to immunize the Legislature’s reapportionment statutes from the usual constitutional checks and balances upon the legislative process, including both the Governor’s veto and a referendum challenge accompanied by the immediate stay of the operation of such statutes pending the voters’ decision. Article XXI simply requires the Legislature to adopt a *683plan readjusting voting district boundaries in the year following each national census. Moreover, application of the people’s review by the referendum process will not frustrate the purpose of article XXI so long as we retain, as we do, the authority to provide an interim, temporary plan pending that review as discussed below.
Nor are federal one person, one vote principles irreconcilable with the people’s right of referendum. As will be seen, the application of these principles need not be instant, immediate and absolute. Rather, of necessity, states are permitted reasonable flexibility in adopting and implementing their reapportionment plans, thus permitting reasonable delays attributable to referendum challenges. We have so held before under very similar circumstances in Reinecke I, supra, wherein we formulated a temporary reapportionment plan for the 1972 elections in which we specifically employed then existing legislative district boundaries despite their failure to comply with the constraints of one person, one vote principles. No different result is required in this case.
In Reinecke I, the Legislature had adopted a current reapportionment plan, but the Governor had vetoed it, thereby creating the immediate need for some plan for the forthcoming elections. We expressly acknowledged that population shifts had occurred and that “the present legislative and congressional apportionments no longer meet the one man, one vote requirement ....” (6 Cal. 3d, at p. 601.) Nonetheless, rather than temporarily use a vetoed, although current plan, or hastily attempt to prepare an entirely new one of our own without public participation, we specifically permitted the preexisting legislative boundaries to remain in effect for purposes of the 1972 elections. Speaking through then Chief Justice Wright, we said: “We believe that it will be far less destructive of the integrity of the electoral process to allow the existing legislative districts, imperfect as they may be, to survive for an additional two years than for this court to accept, even temporarily, plans that are at best truncated products of the legislative process. [Citations.]” (P. 602, italics added.) Our reasoning was clear and unmistakable. It should control the result in the case before us. Despite our express acknowledgment of one person, one vote principles, we held that a temporary relaxation of those goals as to legislative districts would be consistent with preserving the integrity of the electoral process.
It is interesting that real parties have asserted, without contradiction, that the population variances in the present districts are less than those *684which we perpetuated in Reinecke I. It is equally clear that, in terms of the “integrity of the electoral process,” a reapportionment plan which is now subject to a referendum challenge qualified for the June 1982 Primary Election, is comparable to one which, although legislatively authored, has failed to receive the Governor’s approval. In each instance the plan is inoperable and stayed. Because the ultimate sovereignty rests in the people, no reason appears for elevating analytically the Governor’s veto power above the people’s reserved referendum authority, given the independent constitutional foundation of each.
Moreover, Reinecke I was fully consistent with federal cases which have held that the application of one person, one vote principles may be temporarily postponed while a state is proceeding in a good faith effort toward reapportionment. (See Ely v. Klahr (1971) 403 U.S. 108, 114-115 [29 L.Ed.2d 352, 356-357, 91 S.Ct. 1803]; Lucas v. Colorado Gen. Assembly (1964) 377 U.S. 713, 737 [12 L.Ed.2d 632, 647, 84 S.Ct. 1472]; Reynolds v. Sims (1964) 377 U.S. 533, 583-585 [12 L.Ed.2d 506, 539-541, 84 S.Ct. 1449]; Skolnick v. Illinois State Electoral Board (N.D.Ill. 1969) 307 F.Supp. 691, 697.) In Reynolds, the high court carefully explained that although decennial reapportionment would satisfy equal protection standards, the governing principle is that the states should adopt “a reasonably conceived plan for periodic readjustment of legislative representation. While we do not intend to indicate that decennial reapportionment is a constitutional requisite, compliance with such an approach would clearly meet the minimal requirements for maintaining a reasonably current scheme of legislative representation.” (Pp. 583-584 [12 L.Ed.2d pp. 539-540], italics added.) The precise language of the high court which has direct relevancy to the problems before us is as follows: “.. . under certain circumstances, such as where an impending election is imminent and a State’s election machinery is already in progress, equitable considerations might justify a court in withholding the granting of immediately effective relief, in a legislative apportionment case, even though the existing apportionment scheme was found invalid. In awarding or withholding immediate relief, a court is entitled to and should consider the proximity of a forthcoming election and the mechanics and complexities of state election laws, and should act and rely upon general equitable principles.” (P. 585 [12 L.Ed.2d p. 541].)
In similar fashion, in the matters before us the pendency of a speedily qualified referendum challenge to a reapportionment plan which will be resolved by the people in just over four months likewise amply justifies *685temporary use of the existing legislative districts for the forthcoming elections. Here, “an impending election is imminent” and “the state’s election machinery is already in progress.” Indeed, certain preelection filing deadlines have already been passed, and the Secretary of State and county clerks implore us to act speedily so as not further to disrupt the statutory election machinery. The matters before us are cases to which the foregoing Supreme Court language has precise and unique application.
Those, cases which are relied upon by contestants in support of the proposition that one person, one vote principles override the people’s referendum right are plainly distinguishable. (See, e.g., Lucas v. Colorado Gen. Assembly, supra, 377 U.S. 713, 734-737 [12 L.Ed.2d 632, 645-647]; Silver v. Jordan (S.D.Cal. 1964) 241 F.Supp. 576, 580-583, affd. sub nom. Jordan v. Silver (1965) 381 U.S. 415, 419-420 [14 L.Ed.2d 689, 691-692, 85 S.Ct. 1572].) These cases quite properly hold that the people’s approval (through an initiative or referendum) of a reapportionment plan which is violative of Baker v. Carr (1962) 369 U.S. 186 [7 L.Ed.2d 663, 82 S.Ct. 691], is constitutionally irrelevant and cannot itself sustain such a plan. Here, an entirely different question is presented, namely, are one person, one vote principles to be so strictly applied as to deny the people themselves their own right to approve or disapprove reapportionment legislation before such legislation takes effect? As we have seen on the highest authority, reasonable leeway is permitted in such a case to protect the people’s exercise of their precious referendum right. Such a procedure is as soundly established in precedent as it is in principle.
It is urged by the majority that it would be less “disruptive” of, and more “deferential” to, the legislative process were we to purport to acknowledge the vitality of the referendum process on the one hand, while at the same time adopting the very 1981 reapportionment statutes which are challenged and stayed as part of a court-ordered temporary plan for the 1982 elections. The referendum process, however, is necessarily a disruptive, undeferential procedure by which the people halt in their tracks the operation of duly enacted statutes. Nonetheless, the Constitution guarantees that the people’s voice shall be both heard and obeyed. It clearly mandates the stay to preserve the effect of the people’s will. Any attempt to circumvent such a stay in order to preserve the “orderly” conduct of elections in deference to the Legislature or the Governor, necessarily frustrates and defies the sovereign people. We should be ever mindful that those same democratic values which sus*686tained the high court pronouncement of “one person, one vote” principles in Baker v. Carr, supra, also form the very foundation for the constitutionally authorized referendum and initiative.
Nor should we under the guise of “judicial restraint” adopt the 1981 reapportionment statutes in the face of a qualified referendum challenge which has stayed those very statutes.
In terms of judicial restraint, the choice before us in this case is similar to the choice we confronted in Reinecke I. As here, the choice in Reinecke I was between old, malapportioned districts and a new reapportionment plan that had been adopted by a majority of the state’s elected legislative representatives. In Reinecke I, of course, the new districts were not effective because the Governor had vetoed the plan, while here the new districts are not effective because the referendum process has stayed the plan; in both instances, however, the legislative process contemplated by the California Constitution did not result in an effective reapportionment plan.
In Reinecke I we did not view the adoption of the “truncated” legislative plan as a choice properly dictated by any considerations of “judicial restraint” even though the plan had been passed by a majority of the state’s elected representatives and was closer to one person, one vote principles than the old districts. On the contrary, we emphasized: “Only the most compelling considerations would impel us to disregard the solemn vetoes of the Governor and to adopt the plans passed by the Legislature as court plans, at least in the absence of a complete hearing, . .. which would allow us to exercise a fully informed and independent judgment with respect to those plans. Insofar as reapportionment of the Legislature is concerned, we find no such compelling considerations.” (6 Cal. 3d, at p. 602.) Should we now accord less “solemn” weight to the people’s proscription of the statutes than a Governor’s veto? Not under any system in which the people are sovereign.
In reaching our conclusion in Reinecke I, we implicitly recognized that our court’s automatic adoption of a “truncated” or incomplete legislative proposal would not represent appropriate judicial deference to a product of the state’s constitutionally contemplated legislative process which, as of then, was incomplete. Similarly, in the cases before us our adoption of the 1981 plans amounts to judicial intervention into that process, thereby undermining the checks and balances which our state Constitution has consciously built into the legislative scheme to guard *687against a tyranny of a temporary representative majority. In each instance, these checks and balances on the actions of the Legislature—the gubernatorial veto in Reinecke I, the reserved referendum power here —serve the important purpose of moderating the actions of a current majority of lawmakers, helping to ensure that the interests of a broad range of affected individuals are considered in the enactment of legislation. (See generally, The Federalist, No. LXXIII (Hamilton) (1942 ed.) Book II, pp. 72-74.) Moreover, it seems clear that these checks and balances are at least as significant with respect to reapportionment statutes as with respect to other legislation, for in the reapportionment context there is a particularly serious danger that narrow partisan considerations may be given undue weight by a current legislative majority at the expense of the general citizenry’s broader interest in competitive districts and electorally responsive representatives. (See Reinecke IV, supra, 10 Cal.3d 396, 402-403, 416-417.)
When a court accords automatic “deference” to a legislative plan that has been “checked” by one of the constitutionally designed checks and balances, it inevitably diminishes the salutary tempering effect served by the constitutional safeguard. Thus, for example, if we had automatically adopted the vetoed state legislative reapportionment in Reinecke I as an interim plan, we would have lessened the incentive or need of the majority party to take into account the interests of minority party or independent voters so as to secure the signature of the “minority party” Governor. Similarly, when in the present case we adopt the incomplete legislative plan despite the operation of the referendum stay provision, we inevitably reduce this check on self-serving political action that is provided by the referendum power. On the other hand, if we respect and give effect to the referendum provision, and if the Legislature recognizes that this power may be utilized by the people to prevent a narrowly partisan plan from taking effect, legislators in the future are more likely to attempt to ensure that the fairness of the plan they adopt is generally apparent to the public at large. That is one important purpose of the reserved referendum power.
In sum, contrary to the majority’s analysis, we do not exercise proper “judicial restraint” or appropriate “deference to the legislative process” when we ignore the constitutionally mandated stay and adopt the 1981 legislative redistricting plans.
For all of the foregoing reasons, I conclude that the state Assembly boundaries which were adopted by us and based on our masters’ plan, *688rather than the new challenged and stayed ones, should govern the 1982 elections. I emphasize, however, that I would not foreclose the Legislature, if it deems it practical, from adopting in good faith a reapportionment plan substantially different from that adopted in 1981, for purposes of the 1982 and subsequent elections. (See Reinecke I, supra, 6 Cal.3d, at pp. 602-604; Martin v. Smith (1959) 176 Cal.App.2d 115, 118-119 [1 Cal.Rptr. 307].)
B. The Senate
The Senate petition (S.F. 24356) recites that the Senate was elected from 40 districts drawn by us in 1973 in Reinecke IV, and that because of population growth and shifts these districts no longer assure compliance with one person, one vote principles.
Although all 40 senatorial districts were redrawn by a statute challenged by the Senate referendum petition (Stats. 1981, ch. 536), a subsequent amendment thereto (ch. 538) purported to redraw further 12 of these districts. This later amendment was not included in the referendum attack. The Senate contestants argue that the referendum cannot preserve the existing Senate district boundaries, because some of these boundaries are irreconcilable with the 12 new, unchallenged district boundaries.
It is conceded, however, that these 12 new districts interlock with the boundaries drawn in challenged chapter 536 and, accordingly, are wholly dependent upon the validity of those remodeled boundaries. If the referendum successfully abrogates chapter 536, then chapter 538 must, of necessity, likewise fail. An examination of the two statutes discloses that chapter 538 readopts almost all of the boundaries previously adopted by chapter 536, making only very minor changes in the 12 districts affected. In fact, chapter 538 evidently was introduced only as a “trailer” or “clean-up” bill designed to correct minor typographical errors in chapter 536 rather than to achieve a substantive revision thereof. Because the alterations made by chapter 538 were minor, and because the boundaries drawn in that chapter were dependent upon the boundaries drawn in the original statute, real parties are correct in assuming that chapter 538 should stand or fall with chapter 536. The referendum process should not be rendered ineffective by the mere reenactment of a challenged plan coupled with inconsequential amendments thereto. The correct test within this context is well established. It is “whether the second legislative enactment is essentially the same as the first,” al*689though the legislative body may “‘deal further with the subject matter of the suspended ordinance, by enacting an ordinance essentially different from the ordinance protested against ....’” (Martin v. Smith, supra, 176 Cal.App.2d 115, 118-119, italics added; see Reagan v. City of Sausalito (1962) 210 Cal.App.2d 618, 629-630 [26 Cal.Rptr. 775]; In re Stratham (1920) 45 Cal.App. 436, 439-440 [187 P. 986]; Annot. (1954) 33 A.L.R.2d 1118, 1131-1134; Comment (1949) 49 Colum. L.Rev. 705, 706-707.) Martin also requires legislative “good faith” and “‘no intent to evade the effect of the referendum petition....’” (P. 119.) The foregoing principles are sound and should apply in assessing the effect of chapter 538 under the circumstances of this case.
Based upon the same reasons which support the foregoing analysis of the Assembly petitions, I conclude that the newly adopted senatorial boundaries are similarly stayed by the qualification of the referendum petition which directly challenges them. The masters’ boundaries previously adopted by us should be used temporarily for the purposes of conducting the 1982 senatorial elections.
C. The House of Representatives
Although agreeing with the majority’s conclusion to use the 1981 legislative plan for congressional districts, I explain the reasons which distinguish congressional from state legislative elections. The House petition (S.F. 24354) alleges that according to the 1980 census, California is entitled to 45 House members, 2 more than those authorized by the 1970 census figures. The 1981 House reapportionment law (Stats. 1981, ch. 535) divides the state into 45 new districts reapportioned in accordance with changes in population reflected by the new census. According to the House contestants, continued use of the forty-three old voting district boundaries would not only violate one person, one vote principles, but also would deprive California of two new House seats. However, a serious challenge is directed both to the underlying fairness of the 1981 congressional boundaries as drawn by the Legislature and to their compliance with article XXI, section 1, subdivisions (c) and (e).
In Reinecke I, supra, 6 Cal.3d 595, facing a very similar problem, we adopted a temporary plan for the 1972 elections which retained the preexisting boundaries for the legislative districts but used the new, although vetoed, congressional boundaries. We observed in that case that California was entitled to five new House seats which, in the absence of a valid legislative reapportionment, “will either have to be left *690unfilled or filled by statewide elections.” (6 Cal.3d, at p. 603.) We rejected the latter option, reasoning that “to conduct statewide elections to fill five congressional seats in a state of California’s geographical size and large population would not only tremendously increase the burdens and expenses of effective campaigning but, by increasing the choices confronting the electorate from the candidates for one to the candidates for six congressional seats, would seriously impede the casting of informed ballots.” (Ibid.) We further stressed that although the Legislature’s congressional reapportionment plan had been vetoed by the Governor, it had bipartisan support from all members of the House. (Ibid.)
Real parties distinguish Reinecke I from the present case on two grounds: (1) Only two, not five, additional House seats are involved, very substantially reducing the burdens, expense and confusion of a statewide election, and (2) the plan involved here enjoys no visible bipartisan support. (I note, however, that both the Republican and Democratic members of the California congressional delegation are united in their opposition to the continued use of old congressional boundaries.)
I believe, however, that aside from the practical considerations disfavoring at large elections of new congressional representatives, and contrary to the case of state legislative elections, federal law expressly forbids at large congressional elections. Thus, in Reinecke I we noted that “Congress has expressly provided that California shall elect [its representatives] from . .. single member districts.” (6 Cal.3d, at p. 603, fn. omitted.) We relied in this regard on section 2c of title 2 of the United States Code, which provides that “In each State entitled in the Ninety-first Congress or in any subsequent Congress thereafter to more than one Representative under an apportionment made pursuant to section 2a(b) of this title, there shall be established by law a number of districts equal to the number of Representatives to which such State is so entitled, and Representatives shall be elected only from districts so established .. .. ” (Italics added.)
Real parties rely, however, upon 2 United States Code, section 2a(c), which mandates that “Until a State is redistricted in the manner provided by the law thereof after any apportionment, the Representatives to which such State is entitled under such apportionment shall be elected in the following manner: .. . (2) if there is an increase in the *691number of Representatives, [they] shall be elected from the State at large and the other Representatives from the districts then prescribed by the law of each State-, .. .. ” (Italics added.) Real parties urge that this section supports the temporary use of the former House district boundaries, coupled with statewide election of two additional members serving at large. Under this analysis, section 2a(c), is invoked before a redistricting plan has been adopted, while section 2c applies only after such adoption.
Although the question is close, I am persuaded that section 2c, enacted in 1967, was intended to replace, and has implicitly repealed, section 2a(c). By its very terms section 2c adopted a new procedure governing the 91st and subsequent congressional sessions whereby any additional representatives to which a state became entitled under its reapportionment plan were to be elected only from single member districts. In the present case, although the Legislature’s own redistricting has been stayed by operation of law, this court, in fashioning our own interim plan for the 1982 elections, must abide by the apparent federal mandate reflected in section 2c.
Considerably less flexibility is permitted in applying one person, one vote principles to congressional voting boundaries. (See White v. Weiser (1973) 412 U.S. 783, 790-793 [37 L.Ed.2d 335, 343-345, 93 S.Ct. 2348]; Kirkpatrick v. Preisler (1969) 394 U.S. 526, 531, 533-536 [22 L.Ed.2d 519, 524, 526-528, 89 S.Ct. 1225].) Although a reasonable delay in implementing an updated plan for state legislative boundaries is expressly allowed by the high court in appropriate cases (Reynolds v. Sims, supra, 377 U.S. 533, 583-584 [12 L.Ed.2d 506, 539-541]), it is much less clear that such a delay is permissible in establishing new congressional districts. There is thus a clear distinction between congressional elections, on the one hand, and state legislative districts, on the other.
In Reinecke I, we acknowledged that “We regret, of course, that the only readily available congressional reapportionment plan is one that has been vetoed by the Governor.” (6 Cal.3d, at p. 603.) In similar fashion, in the present case I regret that the only readily available congressional plan is one which is clouded by a pending, qualified referendum challenge. Yet, under federal supremacy principles, we must abide by the mandate of applicable federal law in controlling federal elections.
*692D. Conclusion
Thus, I conclude that although the 1981 congressional reapportionment plan must govern the 1982 elections, we should not use the 1981 legislative boundaries for that purpose.
Two more practical consequences make the majority’s rejection of our previous Reinecke I solution most unwise. The majority seriously errs in assuming (ante, p. 668) that utilizing the challenged and stayed 1981 reapportionment plans somehow “minimizes the potential disruption of the electoral process.” By following our Reinecke I precedent, we do not invite “the worst possible scenario” as asserted by the majority. (Ante, p. 669.) To the contrary, that dubious distinction belongs to the majority, for it would switch from our old Reinecke IV masters’ districts to the 1981 legislative plans, and if the people reject those plans in their referenda vote, we would switch to a third plan for the 1984 elections. Thus, each voter will have voted, and candidates will have run, in three differently constituted districts in the space of four years and one day. That is real disruption. That is the “worst possible scenario.”
Moreover, the majority creates an absolutely intolerable anomaly if the voters reject the 1981 redistricting laws. The new districts that will be effective for the remainder of the decade will almost certainly be drawn by a Legislature which has been elected on the basis of a reapportionment scheme which the voters have just rejected. This factor would make it even less likely that the next reapportionment plan will be the result of compromise or that the Legislature will recognize the general electorate’s interest in competitive districts and electorally responsive representatives. As a direct consequence, repeated referenda are a near certainty. Moreover, by imposing the stayed 1981 legislatively created boundaries, candidates for both the 1982 Primary and General Elections will then be running in districts, the boundaries of which are nonexistent because they have been rejected by the people. The districts then would draw life only from our fiat issued in defiance of the people’s recently expressed will.
Believing that we cannot improve upon it, I would follow the path carefully defined by us in Reinecke I and order that, for purposes of the 1982 elections, the existing legislative boundaries and the new congressional boundaries should be used. The majority’s ruling, which requires the use of all three challenged reapportionment plans for the forthcom*693ing elections, totally defeats the reserved referendum power of the people and the constitutional mandate requiring an immediate and continuing stay of the legislation. It also frustrates the self-evident intent of hundreds of thousands of our citizens who in good faith and pursuant to law signed the referendum petitions to permit a review and a public vote upon these plans before they take effect. These plans, like those in Reinecke J, are merely incomplete products of the legislative process; they will become final and effective only if, as, and when the people have expressed their sovereign will. We should not interrupt that process by a judicial device. The legislative districts should remain exactly as they were until the people have spoken.
Mosk, J., and Kaus, J., concurred.