Supreme Court of North Carolina

“ The General Assembly shall, from time to time, divide the State into a convenient number of local court districts and shall prescribe where the District Courts shall sit, but a District Court must sit in at least one place in each county. District Judges shall be elected for each district for a term of four years, in a manner prescribed by law. When more than one District Judge is authorized and elected for a district, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court shall designate one of the judges as Chief District Judge. Every District Judge shall reside in the district for which he is elected. ”

“ The judicial power of the State shall be vested in a Court for the Trial of Impeachments, a Supreme Court, Superior Courts, Courts of Justices of the Peace, and such other courts inferior to the Supreme Court as may be established by law. ”

“ Cox Broadcasting considered our exercise of jurisdiction where the “federal issue ... will survive and require decision regardless of the outcome of future state-court proceedings.” 420 U. S., at 480. Unlike cases in which we must anticipate what the future might hold, we now know the resolution of the anticipated state court proceedings. The record shows that Harper I finally decided the Elections Clause question, the judgment in that case continues to bind the parties before us, and the 2021 congressional maps would again take effect in North Carolina were we to reverse. ”

“ But the error that actually drives the majority’s conclusion is much deeper. The majority evidently thinks that when Harper I held the 2021 Act unconstitutional, it entered a “judgment” affecting the 2021 Act as a statute, independent of its application to the legal rights of the litigants in this case. And the majority thinks that to reverse Harper I’s “judgment” would “negate the force of its order striking down” the Act, thus “alter [ing] the presently operative statutes of North Carolina.” ”

“ State of Georgia, supra. Even if the North Carolina Supreme Court has power to make independent inquiry as to evidence proffered in the trial court but not included in the case on appeal, its decisions make clear that it has without exception refused to do so. ”

“ Harper I has been overruled, and plaintiffs-respondents’ claims have been dismissed in a final judgment. Nothing about this case prevents the State from either enacting or implementing any districting plan. If “the presently operative statutes of North Carolina” need to be “alter [ed] ,” that is the General Assembly’s job, not ours. Ante, at 7 (internal quotation marks omitted) . Regardless, petitioners have fully prevailed in this case, and plaintiffs-respondents have not obtained any enforceable relief that could affect the conduct of future elections. ”

“ The North Carolina Supreme Court denied certiorari. We granted certiorari to determine whether the rule of Griffin v. Illinois, 351 U.S. 12, 76 S.Ct. 585, 100 L.Ed. 891 (1956) , applies in this context. 401 U.S. 973, 91 S.Ct. 1204, 28 L.Ed.2d 322 (1971) . We conclude that it does, but that in the narrow circumstances of this case, no violation of that rule has been shown, and therefore we affirm. ”