| Venue: | SCOTUS |
| Facts: | A succession of racial gerrymanders in Texas. |
| Posture: | There has been a lot of litigation; prior courts finding for defendants. |
| Issue: | Is this unconstitutional (1A, equal protection, and voting rights act)? |
| Holding: | Affirmed on District 24, reversed and remanded on District 23. |
| Rule: | There's nothing inherently suspect about re-districting mid-decade. The defendants aren't doing any legally impermissible classification of voters. A state violates the voting rights act if, based on the totality of the circumstances, it's shown that the electoral process isn't equally open to all races: that's where district 23 runs foul. |
| Reasoning: | Equal protection gerrymanders are justiciable. A lawful, legislatively drawn districting is preferable to a court one. But there has been a lot of racial discrimination throughout TX history. |
| Dicta: | Stevens (concurring and dissenting): a bare desire to harm a politically
disfavored group is not a legitimate interest.
Souter (concurring and dissenting): we should not have taken this case, since there's no majority on any single issue. Roberts (concurring and dissenting): there's no reliable standard for detecting unconstitutional political gerrymanders. It's not our role to figure out which mizes of minority voters should count. Scalia (concurring and dissenting): partisan gerrymandering is not justiciable. |