Voting Rights Act of 1965

The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument in Evenwel v. Abbott on Tuesday, the Texas “one person, one vote” case. The transcript of the oral argument is here (.pdf).

There has been some very good analysis of the oral argument, which I have collected at length below.

Let’s begin with Lyle Denniston at SCOTUSblog, Argument analysis: The choice — be bold or practical:

The argument in Evenwel v. Abbott involves as fundamental an issue for a democracy as can be imagined:  is everyone represented in elected governments, or are those eligible to vote entitled to special influence and the political power making that possible?  The reason that such a choice is just now arising is that it is controlled by the half-century-old constitutional principle of “one person, one vote,” but the Supreme Court has never specified how to measure that equality.

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I posted about Arizona’s redistricting case before the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday. Here is what is going on elsewhere in the nation.

Alabama

Federal judges last week ordered black legislators challenging Alabama’s legislative maps to come up with their own boundary lines. Redistricting case: Plaintiffs must provide map proposals:

The judges ruled in 2013 that the Legislature’s map did not violate the Voting Rights Act. The U.S. Supreme Court remanded the case back to the panel last March, saying the judges needed to reconsider how race affected the maps.

The three-judge panel Friday told the Legislative Black Caucus and the Alabama Democratic Conference to develop redistricting maps that follow the guidelines established by the Legislature in 2012.

The proposal must be filed by Sept. 25. Plaintiffs have the option of filing together or creating different plans. The state will have 28 days to respond.

The new proposals will not be the final word on the state’s district lines. The judges will consider the maps as part of plaintiffs’ broader argument that the 2012 map had racial biases.

“It’s an exercise, as we understand it, to help show whether the state was trying to target black percentages in each district, and thus sorting white and black voters by race,” James Blacksher, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said Tuesday. “We believe our maps will show they could have accomplished all their objectives in a way that would not have split any precincts or sorted black voters from white voters.”

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