Watson v. Republican National Committee · ¶29
By setting the day for the “election,” these statutes set the day when the electorate must make its choice. It is a “fundamental canon of statutory construction that words generally should be interpreted as taking their ordinary meaning at the time Congress enacted the statute.” New Prime Inc. v. Oliveira, 586 U. S. 105, 113 (2019) (internal quotation marks and ellipses omitted). The election-day statutes were enacted and amended across almost two centuries. At all relevant times, the word “election” was understood to mean “[t]he act of choosing a person to fill an office.” N. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language 433 (C. Goodrich & N. Porter eds. 1869) (Webster 1869); see, e.g., N. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language 288 (rev. ed. 1844) (“[t]he act of choosing a person to fill an office”); Webster’s New International Dictionary 706 (1914) (“[a]ct…Read in context ›
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