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As seen earlier, those sections have been invoked for the prosecution of election offenses which interfere with the rights of voters guaranteed by the second section of this article. The election laws, of the Reconstruction period were held invalid in part as applied to municipal elections,[143] but were found to be a constitutional exercise of the authority conferred by this section with respect to the election of members of Congress.[144] LEGISLATURE DEFINED While requiring the election of Representatives by districts, Congress has left it to the States to define the areas from which members should be chosen. This has occasioned a number of disputes concerning the validity of action taken by the States. In Ohio ex rel. Davis _v._ Hildebrant,[145] a requirement that a redistricting law be submitted to a popular referendum was challenged and sustained. After the reapportionment made pursuant to the 1930 census, deadlocks between the Governor and legislature in several States, produced a series of cases in which the right of the Governor to veto a reapportionment bill was questioned. Contrasting this function with other duties committed to State legislatures by the Constitution, the Court decided that it was legislative in character and hence subject to gubernatorial veto to the same extent as ordinary legislation under the terms of the State constitution.[146] PRESENT INEQUALITY OF ELECTION DISTRICTS The Reapportionment Act of 1929[147] omitted a requirement contained in the 1911 law[148] that Congressional districts be "composed of a contiguous and compact territory, * * * containing as nearly as practicable an equal number of inhabitants." Since the earlier act was not repealed it was argued that the mandate concerning compactness, contiguity and equality of population of districts was still controlling. The Supreme Court rejected this view.[149] In Colegrove _v._ Green,[150] the Illinois Apportionment law, which created districts now having glaringly unequal populations, was attacked as unconstitutional on the ground that it denied to voters in the more populous districts the full right to vote and to the equal protection of the laws. The Court dismissed the complaint, three Justices asserting that the issue was not justiciable, and a fourth that the case was one in which the Court should decline to exercise jurisdiction.[151] Justice Black, dissenting in an opinion in which Justices Douglas and Murphy
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