US top court hands partial victory to challengers in Virginia voting case

[DonViejo]

Source: Reuters



01 MAR 2017 AT 10:47 ET

The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday handed a partial victory to voters who accused Virginia’s Republican-led legislature of trying to dilute the clout of black people at the ballot box, throwing out a lower court’s endorsement of how a series of legislative districts were drawn.

The voters who filed the legal challenge said the lawmakers unlawfully considered race as a factor when mapping voting districts for the state legislature. A federal district court in 2015 upheld 12 state House of Delegates districts, but the justices directed a three-judge panel of the lower court to take another look at 11 of those.

At issue was the state legislative map drawn by Republicans after the 2010 census.

Democrats have accused Republicans in Virginia and other states of crafting such legislative maps in a way that crams black and other minority voters into certain districts in order to reduce their overall sway in the state.

###

Read more: http://www.rawstory.com/2017/03/us-top-court-hands-partial-victory-to-challengers-in-virginia-voting-case/

[elleng]

1. Good.

[Gothmog]

2. This is good news

[Princess Turandot]

3. Six of them concurred in full, two concurred in part...

KENNEDY, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS, C. J., and GINSBURG, BREYER, SOTOMAYOR, and KAGAN, JJ., joined. ALITO, J., filed an opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment. THOMAS, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment in part and dissenting in part.

https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-680_c07d.pdf

I noticed this gem referenced in the opinion:

The State’s theory in this case is irreconcilable with Miller and Shaw II. The State insists, e.g., that the harm from racial gerrymandering lies not in racial line-drawing per se but in grouping voters of the same race together when they otherwise lack shared interests.

So if A likes cricket and B prefers curling, per Virginia Republicans, they apparently should have different representatives!