addition the Legislative Assembly shall, at the first regular session after each federal decennial census, proceed to apportion the balance of the members of the House of Representatives to be elected from the several senatorial districts, within the limits prescribed by this Constitution, according to the population of the several senatorial districts. If any Legislative Assembly whose duty it is to make an apportionment shall fail to make the same as herein provided it shall be the duty of the chief justice of the supreme court, attorney general, secretary of state, and the *55 majority and minority leaders of the House of Representatives within ninety days after the adjournment of the legislature to make such apportionment and when so made a proclamation shall be issued by the chiefdecision, an action was brought to reapportion the North Dakota Legislature. That proceeding was brought for the purpose of setting aside the then existing plan of apportionment of members of the North Dakota Legislative Assembly and for the purpose of having declared unconstitutional the provisions of the North Dakota Constitution upon which our system of apportionment was based, to wit, Sections 26, 29, and 35, and Section 54-03-01, North Dakota Century Code. The contention of the relators who brought that action was that the provisions of the Constitution referred to, and the above statute, were in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. A three-judge Federal court was convened to hear and determine the issues raised in that suit.
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