Cite as: 538 U. S. 254 (2003)
Opinion of O'Connor, J.
(10th ed. 1993) (defining "until" to mean "up to such time as" or "[b]efore"). The word "redistricted" also is not hard to comprehend. Id., at 980 (defining "redistrict" to mean "to divide anew into districts"); Black's Law Dictionary 1283 (7th ed. 1999) (defining "redistrict" to mean "[t]o organize into new districts, esp. legislative ones; reapportion"). While the Court employs dictionary definitions to interpret § 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, see ante, at 264, it notably refrains from using any dictionary definition for § 2a(c).
Section 2a(c) contains no imminence requirement. It is not credible to say that "until a State is redistricted in the manner provided by the law thereof after any apportionment" means: "[u]ntil . . . the election is so imminent that no entity competent to complete redistricting pursuant to . . . the mandate of § 2c [ ] is able to do so without disrupting the election process." Ante, at 275. The plurality characterizes § 2a(c) as a "stopgap provisio[n]," but the text of § 2a(c) is not so limited. Ibid. The plurality asks "[h]ow long is a court to await that redistricting before determining that § 2a(c) governs a forthcoming election?" Ibid. Yet the text provides no basis for why the plurality would ask such a question. Indeed, the text tells us "how long" § 2a(c) should govern: "[u]ntil a State is redistricted in the manner provided by the law thereof." (Emphasis added.) Under the plurality's reading, however, § 2a(c) would not apply even though § 2a(c) by its terms should apply, as the State has not yet "redistricted in the manner provided by the law thereof." The language of the statute cannot bear such a reading. Cf. Holloway v. United States, 526 U. S. 1, 14 (1999) (Scalia, J., dissenting) ("No amount of rationalization can change the reality of this normal (and as far as I know exclusive) English usage. The word in the statute simply will not bear the meaning that the Court assigns").
The dispositive question is what the text says it is: Has a State "redistricted in the manner provided by the law thereof"? 2 U. S. C. § 2a(c). "Until a State is redistricted
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