78
Opinion of the Court
in view of the position the initiative sponsors advanced before this Court on the meaning of Article XXVIII.
At oral argument on December 4, 1996, counsel for petitioners AOE and Park informed the Court that, in petitioners' view, the Attorney General's reading of the Article was "the correct interpretation." Tr. of Oral Arg. 6; see id., at 5 (in response to the Court's inquiry, counsel for petitioners stated: "[W]e agree with the Attorney General's opinion as to [the] construction of Article XXVIII on [constitutional] grounds."). The Ninth Circuit found AOE's "explanations as to the initiative's scope . . . confused and self-contradictory," 69 F. 3d, at 928, n. 12, and we agree that AOE wavered in its statements of position, see, e. g., Brief for Petitioners 15 (AOE may "protect its political and statutory rights against the State and government employees"), 32-39 (Article XXVIII regulates Yniguez's "language on the job"), 44 ("AOE might . . . sue the State for limiting Art. XXVIII"). Nevertheless, the Court of Appeals understood that the ballot initiative proponents themselves at least "partially endorsed the Attorney General's reading." 69 F. 3d, at 928, n. 12. Given the novelty of the question and its potential importance to the conduct of Arizona's business, plus the views of the Attorney General and those of Article XXVIII's sponsors, the certification requests merited more respectful consideration than they received in the proceedings below.
Federal courts, when confronting a challenge to the constitutionality of a federal statute, follow a "cardinal principle": They "will first ascertain whether a construction . . . is fairly possible" that will contain the statute within constitutional bounds. See Ashwander v. TVA, 297 U. S. 288, 348 (1936) (Brandeis, J., concurring); Ellis v. Railway Clerks, 466 U. S. 435, 444 (1984); Califano v. Yamasaki, 442 U. S. 682, 692-693 (1979); Rescue Army, 331 U. S., at 568-569. State courts, when interpreting state statutes, are similarly equipped to apply that cardinal principle. See Knoell v. Cerkvenik-
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