High Court Sticks With Flawed Racial ‐​Redistricting Standard

Walter OlsonIn a  long line of cases on race and redistricting, the Supreme Court has generally ruled thatsome race ‐​conscious line drawing is okay in applying the federal Voting Rights Act, so long as things don’t go overboard with crazy lines and such. “Racial gerrymandering, even for remedial purposes, may balkanize us into competing racial factions,” warned Justice Sandra Day O’Connor in the firs t case in this series,Shaw v. Reno (Shaw I, 1993). A  1995 case,Miller v. Johnson, further established that a  map will generally be struck down if race was the “overriding, predominant” force in its inception.These rules, together with the interpretive framework laid out in a  1986 case calledGingles, have long been open to a  practical and a constitutional objection. The practical objection is that they have proved incoherent in operation, with lower courts deciding cases inconsistently and the outcome of cases hard to predict. What, exactly, does it mean for race to be “predominant” as a force? The constitutiona l objection is that the nation’s governing document disfavors treating voters and citizens differently according to race, and that what exceptions there may be to this principle, such as remedial use of race to correct past violations, are fading in significance. If race is an improper ground for government action, why should it be approved or even required in redistricting so long as it stops short of being “predominant”?In Allen v. M...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs