Next time, they won't need an insurrection

The attacks on our democracy are growing more frequent and more pernicious. Lies are turning into laws as Republican state legislatures are enacting new voter suppression laws to combat fraud that does not exist. Election deniers are being recruited to work and even run our state and local elections. Legal theories to deny the right to vote and subvert election results have moved from the extreme fringe toward the mainstream.

[...]

Trump and his allies lost more than sixty separate lawsuits in their effort to overturn election results in more than a half dozen states. He lost before federal trial courts and state appeals courts. He lost before elected judges and those who were appointed, including by him. Most importantly, he lost before the U.S. Supreme Court — a court where he nominated three of the nine justices and where conservatives outnumber liberals 6-3.

[...]

Armed with the ability to interpret state law and to enforce both federal and state constitutions, state judges are in many instances best positioned to protect our democratic institutions and elections.

[...]

That is why so many of us who care about the future of democracy were alarmed to see the Supreme Court agree to consider Moore v. Harper, a North Carolina redistricting case that could shake the foundations of federalism and judicial review and undermine the tools available to protect future elections.

[...]

Republicans are advancing a radical legal theory — the independent state legislature (ISL) theory — that would limit state courts’ ability to interpret their own state’s laws and apply their state’s constitutions to federal elections.

  Democracy Docket

Yes, that's right. If you haven't already noticed, Republicans are only interested in States' rights and limited Federal government when it suits their agenda.

In 2011, the North Carolina Legislature drew a new congressional map that illegally used race to limit the influence of minority voters in congressional elections. After a federal court struck that map down, the Legislature drew an avowed partisan gerrymander to achieve the same result. When that map was challenged, a divided U.S. Supreme Court held in Rucho v. Common Cause that federal law and the U.S constitution did not provide standards for invalidating partisan gerrymanders. Thus, the map survived federal court review.

The easiest thing in the world to avoid racial gerrymandering is to call it political gerrymandering, which for some reason (let's think about it a second) is okay, by relying on the fact that the majority of black people are registered Democrats.

In 2021, North Carolina Republicans again redistricted its congressional maps and again engaged in egregious partisan gerrymandering. This time, taking its cue from the Supreme Court’s ruling in Rucho, plaintiffs sued in North Carolina state court. After significant briefing, expert analysis and testimony, the North Carolina Supreme Court ruled that the map enacted by the Legislature violated the state constitution’s “free and fair elections” clause. The Republican-controlled Legislature then refused to remedy its violation of the state constitution. Instead, its leadership sought Supreme Court review of the decision.

Moore v. Harper.

What makes Moore so potentially dangerous is the fact that Republicans are advancing a radical legal theory — the independent state legislature (ISL) theory — that would limit state courts’ ability to interpret their own state’s laws and apply their state’s constitutions to federal elections. The theory rests on the fact that the U.S. Constitution grants state legislatures the ability to set the “time, place and manner” of congressional elections, subject to an override by Congress. A similar provision gives state legislatures the power to set the “manner” of choosing presidential electors.

In Moore, North Carolina Republicans are arguing that power given to the “legislature” is exclusive to the legislature. In its strongest form, it would exclude a governor’s ability to veto an election bill. In the case of North Carolina, Republicans are arguing that it excludes meaningful judicial review by a state court interpreting its own constitution.

[...]

In 2021, at least 39 voting rights and redistricting lawsuits were decided at the state court level.

[...]

Stripping these courts of the authority to serve as a judicial check on hyper-partisan legislatures will embolden those legislatures to trample on the rights of their citizens and undermine elections. This is what Trump failed to achieve in 2020. An extreme form of the ISL theory is what John Eastman advanced in advising states to disregard the election results. It is not hyperbole to say that the Supreme Court’s decision in Moore may decide whether Eastman, or someone like him, succeeds next time.

[...]

Adoption of this radical theory would transform the power of legislatures to restrict voting rights and weaken democracy. There is no legal theory that is more connected to Trumpism and the failed Jan. 6 coup than ISL.

[...]

Judge Luttig, a measured conservative not known for overstatement recently wrote that “Trump and the Republicans can only be stopped from stealing the 2024 election at this point if the Supreme Court rejects the independent state legislature doctrine.” He is correct. It is that simple.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE: