Colegrove v. Green

• Decision Date: 10 June 1946
• Docket Number: No. 804,804
• Parties: COLEGROVE et al. v. GREEN et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

328 U.S. 549

66 S.Ct. 1198

90 L.Ed. 1432

COLEGROVE et al.

v GREEN et al.

No. 804.

Argued March 7, 8, 1946.

Decided June 10, 1946.

Rehearing Denied Oct. 28, 1946.

See 67 S.Ct. 118.

Appeal from the District Court of the United States for the Northern District of Illinois.

Mr. Urban A. Lavery, of Chicago, Ill., for appellants.

Mr. William C. Wines, of Chicago, Ill., for appellees.

Mr. Abraham W. Brussell, of Chicago, Ill., for Better Government Assn., amicus curiae.

Mr. Justice FRANKFURTER announced the judgment of the Court and an opinion in which Mr. Justice REED and Mr. Justice BURTON concur.

This case is appropriately here, under § 266 of the Judicial Code, 28 U.S.C. § 380, 28 U.S.C.A. § 380, on direct review of a judgment of the District Court of the Northern District of Illinois, composed of three judges, dismissing the complaint of these appellants. Petitioners are three qualified voters in Illinois districts which have much larger populations than other Illinois Congressional districts. They brought this suit against the Governor, the Secretary of State, and the Auditor of the State of Illinois, as members ex officio of the Illinois Primary Certifying Board, to restrain them, in effect, from taking proceedings for an election in November 1946, under the provisions of Illinois law governing Congressional districts. Illinois Laws of 1901, p. 3. Formally, the appellees asked for a decree, with its incidental relief, § 274d Judicial Code, 28 U.S.C. § 400, 28 U.S.C.A. § 400, declaring these provisions to be invalid because they violated various provisions of the United States Constitution and § 3 of the Reapportionment Act of August 8, 1911, 37 Stat. 13, 2 U.S.C.A. § 3, as amended, 2 U.S.C. § 2a, 2 U.S.C.A. § 2a, in that by reason of subsequent changes in population the Congressional districts for the election of Representatives in the Congress created by the Illinois Laws of 1901, Ill.Rev.Stat.Ch. 46, 1945, §§ 154—156, lacked compactness of terri- tory and approximate equality of population. The District Court, feeling bound by this Court's opinion in Wood v. Broom, 287 U.S. 1, 53 S.Ct. 1, 77 L.Ed. 131, dismissed the bill. 64 F.Supp. 632.

The District Court was clearly right in deeming itself bound by Wood v. Broom, supra, and we could also dispose of this case on the authority of Wood v. Broom. The legal merits of this controversy were settled in that case, inasmuch as it held that the Reapportionment Act of June 18, 1929, 46 Stat. 26, as amended, 2 U.S.C. § 2a, 2 U.S.C.A. § 2a, has no requirements 'as to the compactness, contiguity and equality in population of districts.' 287 U.S. at page 8, 53 S.Ct. at page 3, 77 L.Ed. 131. The Act of 1929 still governs the districting for the election of Representatives. It must be remembered that not only was the legislative history of the matter fully considered in Wood v. Broom, but the question had been elaborately before the Court in Smiley v. Holm, 285 U.S. 355, 52 S.Ct. 397, 76 L.Ed. 795, Koening v. Flynn, 285 U.S. 375, 52 S.Ct. 403, 76 L.Ed. 805, and Carroll v. Becker, 285 U.S. 380, 52 S.Ct. 402, 76 L.Ed. 807, argued a few months before Wood v. Broom was decided. Nothing has now been adduced to lead us to overrule what this Court found to be the requirements under the Act of 1929, the more so since seven Congressional elections have been held under the Act of 1929 as construed by this Court. No manifestation has been shown by Congress even to question the correctness of that which seemed compelling to this Court in enforcing the will of Congress in Wood v. Broom.

But we also agree with the four Justices (Brandeis, Stone, Roberts, and Cardozo, JJ.) who were of opinion that the bill in Wood v. Broom, supra, should be 'dismissed for want of equity.' To be sure, the present complaint, unlike the bill in Wood v. r oom, was brought under the Federal Declaratory Judgment Act which, not having been enacted until 1934, was not available at the time of Wood v. Broom. But that Act merely gave the federal courts competence to make a declaration of rights even though no decree of enforcement be immediately asked. It merely permitted a freer movement of the federal courts within the recognized confines of the scope of equity. The Declaratory Judgment Act 'only provided a new form of procedure for the adjudication of rights in conformity' with 'established equitable principles.' Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co. v. Huffman, 319 U.S. 293, 300, 63 S.Ct. 1970, 1074, 87 L.Ed. 1407. And so, the test for determining whether a federal court has authority to make a declaration such as is here asked, is whether the controversy 'would be justiciable in this Court if presented in a suit for injunction * * *.' Nashville C. & St. L. Ry. v. Wallace, 288 U.S. 249, 262, 53 S.Ct. 345, 348, 77 L.Ed. 730, 87 A.L.R. 1191.

We are of opinion that the petitioners ask of this Court what is beyond its competence to grant. This is one of those demands on judicial power which cannot be met by verbal fencing about 'jurisdiction.' It must be resolved by considerations on the basis of which this Court, from time to time, has refused to intervene in controversies. It has refused to do so because due regard for the effective working of our Government revealed this issue to be of a peculiarly political nature and therefore not meet for judicial determination.

This is not an action to recover for damage because of the discriminatory exclusion of a plaintiff from rights enjoyed by other citizens. The basis for the suit is not a private wrong, but a wrong suffered by Illinois as a polity. Compare Nixon v. Herndon, 273 U.S. 536, 47 S.Ct. 446, 71 L.Ed. 759 and Lane v. Wilson, 307 U.S. 268, 59 S.Ct. 872, 83 L.Ed. 1281, with Giles v. Harris, 189 U.S. 475, 23 S.Ct. 639, 47 L.Ed. 909. In effect this is an appeal to the federal courts to reconstruct the electoral process of Illinois in order that it may be adequately represented in the councils of the Nation. Because the Illinois legislature has failed to revise its Congressional Representative districts in order to reflect great changes, during more than a generation, in the distribution of its population, we are asked to do this, as it were, for Illinois.

Of course no court can affirmatively remap the Illinois districts so as to bring them more in conformity with the standards of fairness for a representative system. At best we could only declare the existing electoral system invalid. The result would be to leave Illinois undistricted and to bring into operation, if the Illinois legislature chose not to act, the choice of members for the House of Representatives on a state-wide ticket. The last stage may be worse than the first. The upshot of judicial action may defeat the vital political principle which led Congress, more than a hundred years ago, to require districting. This requirement, in the language of Chancellor Kent, 'was recommended by the wisdom and justice of giving, as far as possible, to the local subdivisions of the people of each state, a due influence in the choice of representatives, so as not to leave the aggregate minority of the people in a state, though approaching perhaps to a majority, to be wholly overpowered by the combined action of the numerical majority, without any voice whatever in the national councils.' 1 Kent, Commentaries (12th ed., 1873) *230-31, n. (c). Assuming acquiescence on the part of the authorities of Illinois in the selection of its Representatives by a mode that defies the direction of Congress for selection by districts, the House of Representatives may not acquiesce. In the exercise of its power to judge the qualifications of its own members, the House may reject a delegation of Representatives-at-large. Article I, § 5, Cl. 1. For the detailed system by which Congress supervises the election of its members, e e e.g., 2 U.S.C. §§ 201—226, 2 U.S.C.A. §§ 201—226; Bartlett, Contested Elections in the House of Representatives (2 vols.); Alexander, History of the Procedure of the House of Representatives (1916) c. XVI. Nothing is clearer than that this controversy concerns matters that bring courts into immediate and active relations with party contests. From the determination of such issues this Court has traditionally held aloof. It is hostile to a democratic system to involve the judiciary in the politics of the people. And it is not less pernicious if such judicial intervention in an essentially political contest be dressed up in the abstract phrases of the law.

The petitioners urge with great zeal that the conditions of which they complain are grave evils and offend public morality. The Constitution of the United States gives ample power to provide against these evils. But due regard for the Constitution as a viable system precludes judicial correction. Authority for dealing with such problems resides elsewhere. Article I, section 4 of the Constitution provides that 'The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for * * * Representative, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, * * *.' The short of it is that the Constitution has conferred upon Congress exclusive authority to secure fair representation by the States in the popular House and left to that House determination whether States have fulfilled their responsibility. If Congress failed in exercising its powers, whereby standards of fairness are offended, the remedy ultimately lies with the people. Whether Congress faithfully discharges its duty or not, the subject has been committed to the exclusive control of Congress. An aspect of government from which the judiciary, in view of what is involved, has been excluded by the clear intention of the Constitution cannot be entered by the federal courts because Congress may have been in default in exacting from States obedience to its mandate.

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