By a 7–2 decision, the Supreme Court sided with
Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach, reversed the District Court, and held that Section 4(e) was constitutional. Writing the majority opinion, Justice
Brennan stressed that
Section 5 of the 14th Amendment is "a positive grant of legislative power authorizing Congress to exercise its discretion in determining the need for and nature of legislation to secure Fourteenth Amendment guarantees." Justice Brennan applied the appropriateness standard of
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819) to determine whether the legislation passed constitutional muster. Section 4(e) arguably expanded rights beyond what the Court had recognized in
Lassiter, but Brennan ruled that Section 4(e) was appropriate. In doing so, he has often been credited with introducing the "ratchet theory" for congressional legislation enacted under Section 5 of the 14th Amendment. It held that Congress could
ratchet up civil rights beyond what the Court had recognized, but Congress could not ratchet down judicially recognized rights. The "ratchet theory" essentially set judicially recognized rights as a support on which Congress could expand if it so chose. According to the theory, Brennan's opinion allowed for multiple interpreters of the Fourteenth Amendment, as opposed to just that of the judiciary. In dissent, Justice
Harlan criticized the "ratchet theory" and the idea of multiple interpreters of the 14th Amendment. Harlan relied on the separation of powers doctrine to argue that allowing Congress to interpret the 14th Amendment undercut the power of the judiciary. He objected to Congress having the power to interpret the 14th Amendment substantively (to create new rights). Harlan argued that the appropriate use of the Section 5 of the 14th Amendment power was the enforcement of judicially-recognized 14th Amendment rights. ==Significance==