Thornburg v. Gingles
United States Supreme Court
478 U.S. 30 (1986)
- Written by Philip Glass, JD
Facts
In 1982, North Carolina enacted a redistricting plan for the state’s legislature. The plan used several multimember districts, meaning districts that were represented by multiple representatives and were larger in area and population than single-member districts. Several Black citizens (plaintiffs), including Ralph Gingles, sued state officials (defendants), arguing that some of the multimember districts violated the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by submerging Black voters in a White majority and thus diluting the minority vote. The citizens presented evidence that each challenged district had a geographic concentration of politically cohesive Black citizens large enough to constitute a voting majority in a single-member district. Evidence also showed that minority candidates in the impacted areas had rarely secured office in past elections. Only in District 23 had past elections regularly resulted in minority representation proportional to the minority population. Further, North Carolina had a history of discriminatory voting laws, and past discrimination had created socioeconomic barriers to minority political participation. The district court held that the challenged districts violated the Voting Rights Act, and the state officials appealed directly to the United States Supreme Court.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Brennan, J.)
Concurrence (O’Connor, J.)
Concurrence (White, J.)
Concurrence/Dissent (Stevens, J.)
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