Dear Commons Community,
The U.S. Supreme Court, in a surprise decision, ruled yesterday that Alabama had diluted the power of Black voters in drawing a congressional voting map, reaffirming a landmark civil rights law that had been thought to be in peril.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who has often voted to restrict voting rights and is generally skeptical of race-conscious decision making by the government, wrote the majority opinion in the 5-to-4 ruling, stunning election-law experts. In agreeing that race may play a role in redistricting, the chief justice was joined by Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh and the court’s three liberal members, Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.
Voting rights advocates had feared that the decision would further undermine the Voting Rights Act of 1965, a central legislative achievement of the civil rights movement whose reach the court’s conservative majority has eroded in recent years. Instead, the law appeared to emerge unscathed from its latest encounter with the court.
The case concerned a voting map redrawn by Republican lawmakers after the 2020 census, leaving only one majority Black congressional district in a state with seven districts and a Black voting-age population that had grown to about 26 percent. As reported by The New York Times.
The impact of the decision, which required the Legislature to draw a second district in which Black voters have the opportunity to elect representatives of their choice, will not be limited to Alabama. Other states in the South, notably Louisiana and Georgia, may also have to redraw their maps to bolster Black voting power, which could, among other things, help Democrats in their efforts to retake the House.
The chief justice wrote that there were legitimate concerns that the law “may impermissibly elevate race in the allocation of political power within the states.” He added: “Our opinion today does not diminish or disregard these concerns. It simply holds that a faithful application of our precedents and a fair reading of the record before us do not bear them out here.”
Justice Clarence Thomas filed a slashing dissent. The majority’s approach, he wrote, “does not remedy or deter unconstitutional discrimination in districting in any way, shape or form.”
“On the contrary,” he added, “it requires it, hijacking the districting process to pursue a goal that has no legitimate claim under our constitutional system: the proportional allocation of political power on the basis of race.”
In all, he wrote, the majority ruled “that race belongs in virtually every redistricting.”
Justice Thomas’s bitter tone suggested deep disappointment with Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kavanaugh and profound regret over a missed opportunity. Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr., Neil M. Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett joined all or large parts of Justice Thomas’s dissent.
In a concurring opinion, Justice Kavanaugh wrote that it was possible that “the authority to conduct race-based redistricting cannot extend indefinitely into the future.”
Justice Thomas responded that his colleague had nonetheless voted “to sustain a system of institutionalized racial discrimination in districting — under the aegis of a statute that applies nationwide and has no expiration date — and thus to prolong the lasting harm to our society
rights leaders say the redistricting process often disadvantages growing minority communities. Republican state officials say the Constitution allows only a limited role for the consideration of race in drawing voting districts.
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland welcomed the ruling. “Today’s decision rejects efforts to further erode fundamental voting rights protections, and preserves the principle that in the United States, all eligible voters must be able to exercise their constitutional right to vote free from discrimination based on their race,” he said in a statement.
Good news – good decision!
Tony
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