Last week, the Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision in Rucho v. Common Clause ruled that partisan gerrymandering is a political question to be settled by state governments. Federal courts, it follows, cannot intervene in partisan gerrymandering cases.

Some on the Left implied that the Supreme Court’s conservative judges were partisan hacks helping out their Republican buddies with this decision. But this criticism is completely unjustified. In reality, it is the liberal bloc that votes the same on almost every issue, whereas the conservative members of the court have frequently defied expectations and sided with their liberal colleagues.