The political question doctrine could be read narrowly or more broadly.

Read narrowly,
the political question doctrine should be invoked only when the issue presented to the
Court is one that "has been textually committed to another branch of
government." That is, if the framers of the Constitution made clear their intention that
the judiciary not resolve a particular question of constitutional interpretation, that
determination must be respected. More broadly, the political question doctrine might
be invoked when there is a lack of judicially manageable standards to decide the case
on the merits, when judicial intervention might show insufficient respect for other
branches of government, or when a judicial decision might threaten the integrity of the
judicial branch.

In Baker v Carr (1962), the Court concluded that the political question doctrine did not
bar courts from reaching the merits of a challenge brought against Tennessee's system
of apportioning its state legislature. Although the case was "political" in the sense that
it was about politics, and there were questions about how courts might grant relief if
Tennessee's apportionment scheme was declared unconstitutional, the Court saw
neither as reasons for invocation of the political question doctrine.

"Prominent on the surface of any case held to involve a political question is

found:
(1) a textually demonstrable constitutional commitment of the issue to a
coordinate political department;
(2) or a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards for
resolving it;
(3) or the impossibility of deciding without an initial policy determination of a
kind clearly for nonjudicial discretion;
(4) or the impossibility of a court's undertaking independent resolution without
expressing lack of the respect due coordinate branches of government;
(5) or an unusual need for unquestioning adherence to a political decision already
made;
(6) or the potentiality of embarrassment from multifarious pronouncements by
various departments on one question."
(Baker v Carr)