The Supreme Court/The Supreme Court.iso/mac/wordperf/1991/91_1618a/91_1618a.zs

Text File | 1993-03-02 | 8KB | 131 lines

 NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is being
done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.  The
syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared
by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.  See United                                                                     ______
States v. Detroit Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.______    ___________________

                       SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

                                    Syllabus

   VOINOVICH, GOVERNOR OF OHIO, ET AL. v. QUILTER, SPEAKER PRO TEMPORE OF OHIO                                      ____
                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, ET AL.

 APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF OHIO

         No. 91-1618.   Argued December 8, 1992 - Decided March 2, 1993

Pursuant to the Ohio Constitution's requirement that electoral districts for the
 state legislature be reapportioned every 10 years, appellant James Tilling
 drafted and the state apportionment board adopted in 1991 an apportionment
 plan that created several districts in which a majority of the population is a
 member of a specific minority group.  Appellees, Democratic board members who
 voted against the plan and others, filed suit in the District Court, asking
 that the plan be invalidated on the grounds that it violated S2 of the Voting
 Rights Act of 1965 and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments.   A three-
 judge district court ordered the board to reconsider the plan, holding that S2
 of the Voting Rights Act prohibits the wholesale creation of majority-minority
 districts unless necessary to remedy a S2 violation; the board, it held, had
 failed to show such a violation.  The District Court reaffirmed that holding
 when it reviewed the board's revised 1992 plan, rejecting appellants' argument
 that it should not have invalidated the 1991 plan without finding that, under
 the totality of the circumstances, the plan diluted minority voting strength.
 In addition, the court held that the board had violated the Fifteenth
 Amendment by applying the remedy of creating majority-minority districts
 intentionally and for the purpose of political advantage.  It further held
 that the plan violated the Fourteenth Amendment by departing from the
 requirement that all districts be of nearly equal population.

Held:  _____
   1.  The plan does not violate S2 of the Voting Rights Act.  Pp. 5-11.
    (a)  Appellees raise an ``influence-dilution'' claim.  They contend
















                                                                    I           II                            VOINOVICH v. QUILTER                                       ____

                                    Syllabus

 that, by packing black voters in a few districts with a disproportionately
 large black voter population, the plan deprived them of a larger number of
 districts in which they would have been an influential minority capable of
 electing their candidates of choice with the help of cross-over votes from
 white voters.  While this Court has not decided whether such a claim is viable
 under S2, the Court assumes for the purpose of resolving this case that
 appellees have stated a cognizable S2 claim.  Pp. 5-7.
    (b)  Plaintiffs can prevail on a S2 dilution claim only if they show that,
 under the totality of the circumstances, the State's apportionment scheme has
 the effect of diminishing or abridging the voting strength of the protected
 class.  The District Court erred in holding that S2 prohibits the creation of
 majority-minority districts unless such districts are necessary to remedy a
 statutory violation, since S2 contains no per se prohibitions against any                                           ______
 particular type of district.  Instead, it focuses exclusively on the
 consequences of apportionment.  The court also mistakenly placed the burden of
 justifying apportionment on Ohio by requiring appellants to justify the
 creation of majority-minority districts.  Section 2(b) places at least the
 initial burden of proving an apportionment's invalidity on the plaintiff's
 shoulders.  Although the federal courts may not order the creation of                          ______________
 majority-minority districts unless necessary to remedy a violation of federal
 law, that prohibition does not extend to the States.  The federal courts are
 barred from intervening in state apportionment in the absence of such a
 violation precisely because it is the domain of the States and not the federal
 courts to conduct apportionment in the first place.  Pp. 8-10.
    (c)  The District Court, had it applied the three-part vote-dilution test of
 Thornburg v. Gingles, 478 U. S. 30, 50-51, would have rejected appellees' S2 _________    ________
 claim on the ground that appellees failed to demonstrate Gingles' third                                                          _______
 precondition - sufficient white majority bloc voting to frustrate the election
 of the minority group's candidate of choice.  The court specifically found,
 and appellees agree, that Ohio does not suffer from racially polarized voting.
 Pp. 10-11.
   2.  The District Court's holding that the board violated the Fifteenth
 Amendment by intentionally diluting minority voting strength for political
 reasons is clearly erroneous.  Tilling's preference for federal over state law
 when he believed the two in conflict does not raise an inference of
 intentional discrimination; it demonstrates obedience to the Supremacy Clause.
 Nor does the fact that Tilling, a Republican, possessed Democratic documents
 speculating about possible discriminatory strategies Tilling might use
 demonstrate that Tilling in fact had such a discriminatory strategy.  Nothing
 in the record indicates that Tilling relied on those documents                              VOINOVICH v. QUILTER                           III                                       ____

                                    Syllabus

 in preparing the plan.  Indeed, the record indicates that Tilling and the
 board relied on sources, such as the National Association for the Advancement
 of Colored People, Ohio Conference of Branches, that were wholly unlikely to
 engage in or tolerate intentional discrimination against black voters.  This
 Court expresses no view on the relationship between the Fifteenth Amendment
 and race-conscious redistricting; it concludes only that the finding of
 intentional discrimination was clear error.  Pp. 11-13.
   3.  The District Court erred in holding that the plan violated the Fourteenth
 Amendment requirement that electoral districts be of nearly equal population.
 When the court found that the maximum total deviation from ideal district size
 exceeded 10%, appellees established a prima facie case of discrimination and
 appellants were required to justify the deviation.  They attempted to do so,
 arguing that the deviation resulted from Ohio's constitutional policy in favor
 of preserving county boundaries.  However, the District Court mistakenly held
 that total deviations in excess of 10% cannot be justified by a policy of
 preserving political subdivision boundaries.  On remand, the court should
 consider whether the deviations from ideal district size are justified using
 the analysis employed in Brown v. Thomson, 462 U. S. 835, 843-846, and Mahan                          _____    ________                             _____
 v. Howell, 410 U. S. 315, 325-330, which requires the court to determine    _______
 whether the plan could reasonably be said to advance the State's policy, and,
 if it could, whether the resulting population disparities exceed
 constitutional limits.  Pp. 13-14.

Reversed and remanded.

 O'CONNOR, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.