moot questions or abstract propositions, or to declare, for the government of future cases, principles or rules of law which cannot affect the result as to the thing in issue in the case before it.'" 253 U.S., at 116. The Court reversed the District Court's order and remanded the case to the District Court "with directions to dismiss the petition . . . without prejudice to the right of the complainants to assail in the future any order of the Commission prescribing bills of lading after the enactement of the new legislation." Id., at 116-117. Unless Alaska S. 8. Co., is to be overruled or ignored, the Court should act similarly here. Finally, I find the Court's disposition of this case mystifying, for I cannot understand what the District Court is to do upon remand. Since the District Court's order has been vacated, no injunction will be in effect. Presumably the District Court will have before it two groups of parties, one group urging that no order be entered and the other group claiming that no order is necessary because the likelihood of the legislature's resubmitting a new constitution is too remote. It is inconceivable to me that the District Court would be warranted in reinstating its injunction under the present facts. Of course, if circumstances changed, and there was a real, rather than a tenuous threat of further legislative action of the type originally complained of, the District Court, which has retained jurisdiction of this case, would be empowered to entertain an application for appropriate injunctive relief. However, I cannot understand the logic of the Court's decision in asking the District Court now to make a determination which, under the present circumstances, is rightfully our responsibility.

My Brother HARLAN suggests that, contrary to my view, "the Court does not remand the case to the District Court for a determination on the issue of mootness, but only to decide whether any injunctive relief is now appropriate in light of what has transpired since such relief was first granted." Ante, p. 624. But with due respect, I suggest that his interpretation of the Court's opinion is not justified by what the Court says or does. The Court explicitly sets forth appellees' contention that the case is moot because "[t]he situation has changed somewhat since the 1964 election," and "it is now highly speculative as to what the 1965 legislature will do" (ante, p. 622), and then the Court remands the case for reconsideration of the desirability of and need for the injunction in terms of the contentions raised by appellees, i.c., "in light of the results of the 1964 election and the representations of appellees." Ibid. This surely must mean that the Court is asking the District Court to consider appellees' contentions that the case is moot. Further, I might better understand my Brother HARLAN'S general distinction between determining whether a case is moot and whether an injunction is still appropriate if there were some issue in this case other than the power of the District Court to issue the injunction. But the only issue presented for decision on the merits is whether the District Court validly issued this type of injunction; thus to decide here whether, in light of the changed circumstances and the parties' present desires, continuance of the injunction is still appropriate is to decide the identical question as to whether, in light of these changed circumstances and the present contentions of the parties, the case has become moot. Determining the issue of mootness and deciding "whether any injunctive relief is now appropriate in light of what has transpired since such relief was first granted," both come down to the same thing-the question is whether, at this juncture, as appellees contend, "this appeal presents only an abstract, hypothetical controversy in which the 'lively conflict between antagonistic demands, actively pressed, which make resolution of the controverted issue a practical necessity' is lacking." The question is one for this Court to decide.

I believe that the proper result in this case would be to sustain the appellees' motion to dismiss for mootness and to enter an order vacating paragraph (2) of the District Court's order of June 30, 1964, prohibiting submission of a wholly new constitution to the voters by the legislature at the 1964 election or "at any subsequent election until [it] . . . is reapportioned in accordance with constitutional standards." Thus this portion of the slate would be wiped clean, United States v. Munsingwear, supra, without any necessity for further proceedings below to try the mootness issue. In view of the parties' stipulations before this Court that they accept the modifications entered by the District Court on November 3, 1964. I believe that the Court is correct in not passing upon the validity of paragraph (3) of the District Court's order of June 30, 1964-that portion of the order which appellants took as limiting the powers of the 1965 legislature. However, because of doubts expressed as to the jurisdiction of the District Court to enter its modified order while appeal is pending in this Court, see Schempp v. School District, 184 F. Supp. 381 (D. C. E. D. Pa.), the Court ought also to vacate para

graph (3) of the June 30, 1964, order on the assumption that the District Court will re-enter its modified order of November 3, 1964, in accordance with the agreement of the parties.

The federal district courts have enough to do in deciding ripe reapportionment cases without our requiring them to decide stale ones.

APPENDIX A TO OPINION OF MR. JUSTICE GOLDBERG, DISSENTING

FINAL ORDER OF THE COURT OF JUNE 30, 1964

Revised Order

All parties having consented thereto, the order of the Court dated June 24, 1964, is hereby revised to read as follows:

It is now Ordered, Adjudged and Decreed as follows:

(1) Article III, Section III, Paragraph I (Code Section 2-1501) of the Constitution of Georgia of 1945, is hereby declared to be null, void and inoperative, as being in conflict with the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

Section 47-101 of the Code of Georgia, as amended, is hereby declared to be prospectively null, void and inoperative, as being in conflict with the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, for elections to the House of Representatives after the General Election to be held in November of 1964.

(2) The defendants are hereby enjoined from placing on the ballot to be used in the General Election to be held on November 3, 1964, or at any subsequent election until the General Assembly is reapportioned in accordance with constitutional standards, the question whether a constitutional amendment purporting to amend the present state constitution by substituting an entirely new constitution therefor shall be adopted; provided, however, nothing in this order shall prevent the submission of amendments to the Constitution of the State of Georgia which are separate as to subject matter, in accordance with Article XIII, Section I, Article 1, of the Constitution of the State of Georgia, 1945. (See Hammond v. Clarke, 136 Ga. 313, for a discussion by the Georgia Supreme Court of what constitutes separate amendments). Nor shall anything in this order prevent the calling by the General Assembly of a "convention of the people to revise, amend or change the constitution" if the representation "in the convention is based on population as near as practicable" with the members being elected by the people (see Article XIII, Section I, Article 2). Constitution of the State of Georgia, 1945.

(3) The motion of the plaintiffs for further injunctive relief prior to the conduct of the party primaries or conventions and the General Election of November 3, 1964, is hereby denied at this time, provided, however, that notwithstanding anything in Article III, Section IV, Paragraph I (Code Section 2-1601) of the Constitution of Georgia of 1945 to the contrary, the service of the members of the House of Representatives of the General Assembly of the State of Georgia to be elected at the General Election in November, 1964, shall be limited to the enactment of such legislation as shall properly come before the said Legislature during the regular 1965 45-day session, as provided in the Georgia Constitution, including such legislation as may be necessary for the General Assembly to be reapportioned in accordance with constitutional requirements and as may be necessary to permit the holding of elections to the newly constituted General Assembly, said elections to be held at such times as may be necessary to permit the Members of such General Assembly to take office as soon as practicable, but in no event later than the second Monday in January, 1966.

APPENDIX B TO OPINION OF MR. JUSTICE GOLDBERG, DISSENTING

ORDER OF THE DISTRICT COURT OF NOVEMBER 3, 1964

Both parties agree that the motion for alternative relief should be granted. Therefore, paragraph 3 of the order of June 30, 1964, is hereby stricken and the following paragraph 3 is substituted in lieu thereof:

"(3) The motion of the plaintiffs for further injunctive relief prior to the conduct of the party primaries or conventions and the General Election of November 3, 1964, is hereby denied at this time, provided, however, that, notwithstanding anything in Article III, Section IV, Paragraph I (Code Section 2-1601) of the Constitution of Georgia of 1945 to the contrary, the service of the members of the

House of Representatives of the General Assembly of the State of Georgia to be elected at the General Election in November, 1964, shall be limited to a term of one year's duration and provided further that the plaintiffs shall have the right to reapply to this Court for further relief should the General Assembly, which convenes in January, 1965, fail to enact, during the regular 1965 45-day session, as provided in the Georgia Constitution, such legislation as may be necessary for the General Assembly to be reapportioned in accordance with Constitutional requirements and as may be necessary to permit the holding of elections to the newly constituted General Assembly during the calendar year 1965, which elections are to be held at such time as may be necessary to permit the members of such newly constituted General Assembly to take office no later than the second Monday in January, 1966. To the extent that state statutory and constitutional provisions might otherwise conflict with such legislative reapportionment, they are hereby declared to be void and of no effect."

This 3rd day of November, 1964.

Senator ERVIN. The subcommittee will recess subject to the call of the Chair.

(Whereupon, at 1 p.m., the subcommittee adjourned, to reconvene at the call of the Chair.)

APPENDIX

THE FEDERALIST No. 43 [42]1

JAMES MADISON

To the People of the State of New York.

January 23, 1788

THE fourth class comprises the following miscellaneous powers.

1. A power "to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for a limited time, to authors and inventors, the exclusive right, to their respective writings and discoveries."

The utility of this power will scarcely be questioned. The copy right of authors has been solemnly adjudged in Great Britain to be a right at common law. The right to useful inventions, seems with equal reason to belong to the inventors. The public good fully coincides in both cases, with the claims of individuals. The States cannot separately make effectual provision for either of the cases, and most of them have anticipated the decision of this point, by laws passed at the instance of Congress.

2. "To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such district (not exceeding ten miles square) as may by cession of particular States and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the Government of the United States; and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the Legislature of the States, in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards and other needful buildings."

The indispensible necessity of compleat authority at the seat of Government carries its own evidence with it. It is a power exercised by every Legislature of the Union, I might say of the world, by virtue of its general supremacy. Without it, not only the public authority might be insulted and its proceedings be interrupted, with impunity; but a dependence of the members of the general Government, on the State comprehending the seat of the Government for protection in the exercise of their duty, might bring on the national councils an imputation of awe or influence, equally dishonorable to the Government, and dissatisfactory to the other members of the confederacy. This consideration has the more weight as the gradual accumulation of public improvements at the stationary residence of the Government, would be both too great a public pledge to be left in the hands of a single State; and would create so many obstacles to a removal of the Government, as still further to abridge its necessary independence. The extent of this federal district is sufficiently circumscribed to satisfy every jealousy of an opposite nature. And as it is to be appropriated to this use with the consent of the State ceding it; as the State will no doubt provide in the compact for the rights, and the consent of the citizens inhabiting it; as the inhabitants will find sufficient inducements of interest to become willing parties to the cession; as they will have had their voice in the election of the Government which is to exercise authority over them; as a municipal Legislature for local purposes, derived from their own suffrages, will of course be allowed them; and as the authority of the Legislature of the State, and of the inhabitants of the ceded part of it, to concur in the cession, will be derived from the whole people of the State, in their adoption of the Constitution, every imaginable objection seems to be obviated.

The necessity of a like authority over forts, magazines &c. established by the general Government is not less evident. The public money expended on such places, and the public property deposited in them, require that they should be exempted from the authority of the particular State. Nor would it be proper for the places on which the security of the entire Union may depend, to be in any degree depend

1 From The Independent Journal, January 23, 1788. This essay appeared on January 25 in both The New-York Packet and The Daily Advertiser. It was numbered 43 in the McLean edition and 42 in the newspapers.