[EM] U.S. high court limits federal voting rights power

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U.S. high court limits federal voting rights power

By James Vicini
  
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A sharply divided Supreme Court Monday restricted the 
federal government's power under the voting rights law to reject some 
proposed redistricting changes in state and local elections. 

The high court, by a 5-4 vote, said the Justice Department's approval cannot 
be withheld when the new redistricting plan was adopted with a discriminatory 
purpose, but does not make matters worse for minority voters. 

At issue was one section of the voting rights law, which  allowed the Justice 
Department to reject proposed changes if they were deemed to have a 
discriminatory ``purpose or effect.'' 

Writing for the court majority, Justice Antonin Scalia said that part of the 
law does not extend to a purpose that was discriminatory, but not 
retrogressive -- which does not leave minority voters worse off than they are 
under a current plan. 

The ruling involved the Bossier Parish school board in Louisiana, which for 
years has had its members elected to four-year terms from 12 different 
districts. 

About 20 percent of the parish's population is black, concentrated in two 
areas. But none of the 12 districts has a black majority. 

As of 1990, no black ever had been elected to the school  board. After the 
1990 census required a redrawing of the       school board election map, the 
local NAACP chapter proposed creating two black-majority districts. 

The school board opted instead for a new map in 1992 with no such district, 
drawing a Justice Department objection. 

Justice Department lawyers decided the plan would dilute minority voting 
strength. But a special three-judge federal court disagreed and upheld the 
1992 plan. 

The Justice Department and the president of the local NAACP chapter appealed 
to the Supreme Court. 

Scalia said the judges were correct in upholding the plan. He was joined by 
the court's other conservative members -- Chief Justice William Rehnquist and 
Justices Sandra Day O'Connor, Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas. 

The court's more liberal members -- Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter, 
Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer 

dissented. 

Stevens said the Justice Department in administering the voting rights law 
for the past 25 years has consistently taken a different interpretation than 
the view imposed by the court. 

Souter said, ``The behavior of Bossier Parish is a plain effort to deny the 
voting equality that the Constitution just as plainly guarantees.'' 

He said the federal government now will be forced to approve ``illegal and 
unconstitutional voting schemes patently intended to perpetuate 
discrimination.'' 

The case produced a Supreme Court ruling in 1997, when the justices made it 
harder for federal officials to reject proposed changes in district 
boundaries. 

13:37 01-24-00
---------------------------
RENO v. BOSSIER PARISH SCHOOL BD. (98-405)

Web-accessible at:

    http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/98-405.ZS.html


Argued April 26, 1999  -- Decided January 24, 2000*

[* Together with No. 98-406, Price et al. v. Bossier Parish

School Bd., also on appeal from the same court. ]


Opinion author: Scalia


===============================================================

    

Bossier Parish, Louisiana, a jurisdiction covered by sect.5 of

the Voting Rights Act of 1965, is thereby prohibited from

enacting any change in a "voting qualification[,]

prerequisite[,] standard, practice, or procedure" without first

obtaining preclearance from either the Attorney General or the

District Court.  When, following the 1990 census, the Bossier

Parish School Board submitted a proposed redistricting plan to

the Attorney General, she denied preclearance. The Board then

filed this preclearance action in the District Court.  Section

5 authorizes preclearance of a proposed voting change that

"does not have the purpose and will not have the effect of

denying or abridging the right to vote on account of race or

color."  Appellants conceded that the Board's plan did not have

a prohibited "effect" under sect.5, since it was not

"retrogressive," i.e., did not worsen the position of minority

voters, see Beer v. United States, 425 U.S. 130, but claimed

that it violated sect.5 because it was enacted for a

discriminatory "purpose."  The District Court granted

preclearance.  On appeal, this Court disagreed with the

District Court's proposition that all evidence of a dilutive

(but nonretrogressive) effect forbidden by sect.2 was

irrelevant to whether the Board enacted the plan with a

retrogressive purpose forbidden by sect.5.  Reno v. Bossier

Parish School Bd., 520 U.S. 471, 486-487 (Bossier Parish I). 

This Court vacated and remanded for further proceedings as to

the Board's purpose in adopting its plan, id., at 486, leaving

for the District Court the question whether the sect.5 purpose

inquiry ever extends beyond the search for retrogressive

intent, ibid.  On remand, the District Court again granted

preclearance.  Concluding, inter alia, that there was no

evidence of discriminatory but nonretrogressive purpose, the

court left open the question whether sect.5 prohibits

preclearance of a plan enacted with such a purpose.


Held:

1. The Court rejects the Board's contention that these

cases are mooted by the fact that the 1992 plan will never

again be used because the next scheduled election will occur in

2002, when the Board will have a new plan in place based upon

data from the 2000 census.  In at least one respect, the 1992

plan will have probable continuing effect: it will serve as the

baseline against which appellee's next voting plan will be

evaluated for preclearance purposes.  Pp. 5-6.

2.  In light of sect.5's language and Beer's holding,

sect.5 does not prohibit preclearance of a redistricting plan

enacted with a discriminatory but nonretrogressive purpose. 

Pp. 7-20.

    (a)  In order to obtain preclearance, a covered

jurisdiction must establish that the proposed change "does not

have the purpose and will not have the effect of denying or

abridging the right to vote on account of race or color."  The

covered jurisdiction bears the burden of persuasion on both

points.  See, e.g., Bossier Parish I, supra, at 478.  In Beer,

the Court concluded that, in the context of a sect.5

vote-dilution claim, the phrase "abridging the right to vote on

account of race or color" limited the term "effect" to

retrogressive effects. 425 U.S., at 141.  Appellants'

contention that in qualifying the term "purpose," the very same

phrase does not impose a limitation to retrogression, but means

discrimination more generally, is untenable.  See BankAmerica

Corp. v. United States, 462 U.S. 122, 129.  Richmond v. United

States, 422 U.S. 358, 378-379, distinguished.  Appellants argue

that subjecting both prongs to the same limitation produces a

purpose prong with a trivial reach, covering only "incompetent

retrogressors."  If this were true--and if it were adequate to

justify giving the very same words different meanings when

qualifying "purpose" and "effect"--there would be instances in

which this Court applied such a construction to the innumerable

statutes barring conduct with a particular "purpose or effect,"

yet appellants are unable to cite a single case.  Moreover, the

purpose prong has value and effect even when it does not cover

conduct additional to that of a so-called incompetent

retrogressor: the Government need only refute a jurisdiction's

prima facie showing that a proposed voting change does not have

a retrogressive purpose, and need not counter the

jurisdiction's evidence regarding actual retrogressive effect. 

Although virtually identical language in sect.2(a) and the

Fifteenth Amendment has been read to refer not only to

retrogression, but to discrimination more generally, giving the

language different meaning in sect.5 is faithful to the

different context in which in which the term "abridging" is

used.  Appellants' reading would exacerbate the "substantial"

federalism costs that the preclearance procedure already

exacts, Lopez v. Monterey County, 525 U.S. 266, 282, perhaps to

the extent of raising concerns about sect.5's

constitutionality, see Miller v. Johnson, 515 U.S. 900,

926-927.  The Court's resolution of this issue renders it

unnecessary to address appellants' challenge to the District

Court's factual conclusion that there was no evidence of

discriminatory but nonretrogressive intent.  Pp. 7-16.

    (b)  The Court rejects appellants' contention that,

notwithstanding that Bossier Parish I explicitly "le[ft] open

for another day" the question whether sect.5 extends to

discriminatory but nonretrogressive intent, 520 U.S., at 486,

two of this Court's prior decisions have already reached the

conclusion that it does.  Dictum in Beer, 425 U.S., at 141, and

holding of Pleasant Grove v. United States, 479 U.S. 462,

distinguished. Pp. 16-20. 


7 F. Supp. 2d 29, affirmed.


Scalia, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, Part II of

which was unanimous, and Parts I, III, and IV of which were

joined by Rehnquist, C. J., and O'Connor, Kennedy, and Thomas,

JJ.  Thomas, J., filed a concurring opinion.  Souter, J., filed

an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part, in which

Stevens, Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ., joined.  Stevens, J., filed

a dissenting opinion, in which Ginsburg, J., joined.  Breyer,

J., filed a dissenting opinion.