Cite as: 538 U. S. 254 (2003)
Opinion of Scalia, J.
B
Having determined that in enacting 2 U. S. C. § 2c, Congress mandated that States are to provide for the election of their Representatives from single-member districts, and that this mandate applies equally to courts remedying a state legislature's failure to redistrict constitutionally, we confront the remaining question: what to make of § 2a(c)? As observed earlier, the texts of § 2c and § 2a(c)(5) are in tension. Representatives cannot be "elected only from districts," § 2c, while being elected "at large," § 2a(c). Some of the courts confronted with this conflict have concluded that § 2c repeals § 2a(c) by implication. See Shayer v. Kirkpatrick, 541 F. Supp., at 927; Assembly of State of Cal. v. Deukmejian, 30 Cal. 3d, at 663-664, 639 P. 2d, at 954. There is something to be said for that position—especially since paragraphs (1) through (4) of § 2a(c) have become (because of postenactment decisions of this Court) in virtually all situations plainly unconstitutional. (The unlikely exception is the situation in which the decennial census makes no districting change constitutionally necessary.) Eighty percent of the section being a dead letter, why would Congress adhere to the flotsam of paragraph (5)?
We have repeatedly stated, however, that absent "a clearly expressed congressional intention," Morton v. Mancari, 417 U. S. 535, 551 (1974), "repeals by implication are not favored," Universal Interpretive Shuttle Corp. v. Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Comm'n, 393 U. S. 186, 193 (1968). An implied repeal will only be found where provisions in two statutes are in "irreconcilable conflict," or where the latter Act covers the whole subject of the earlier one and "is clearly intended as a substitute." Posadas v. National City Bank, 296 U. S. 497, 503 (1936). So while there is a strong argument that § 2c was a substitute for § 2a(c), we think the better answer is that § 2a(c)—where what it prescribes is constitutional (as it is with regard to paragraph (5))—continues to apply.
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