The Supreme Court takes important voting rights cases

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court is considering Alabama reapportionment case which could have far-reaching consequences for minority voting in the United States.

On Tuesday, the justices will hear arguments in the highest court’s last case over the federal Voting Rights Act, a lawsuit aimed at forcing Alabama to create a second majority-black congressional district. About 27% of Alabamians are black, but they are the majority in only one of the state’s seven electoral districts.

Conservatives on the court blocked the lower court’s decision by a 5-4 vote in February that would require a second black district before the 2022 midterm elections.

A similar decision to create an additional black-majority district in Louisiana was also delayed.

The high court’s conservative majority made it difficult for racial minorities to use the Voting Rights Act in ideologically divisive decisions in 2013 year and 2021 year. The state’s ruling in the new case could weaken another powerful tool that civil rights groups and minority voters have used to challenge racial discrimination in redistricting.

The case also has an overlay of partisan politics. Republicans, who dominate elected office in Alabama, have resisted creating a second black-majority, Democratic-leaning district that could send another Democrat to Congress.

Two of President Donald Trump’s appointees sat on a three-judge panel that unanimously ruled that Alabama likely violated a landmark 1965 law by reducing the black vote.

The justices found that Alabama concentrated black voters in one district while distributing them among others to make it impossible for them to elect the candidate of their choice.

The justices found that Alabama’s black population is large enough and geographically compact enough to create a second district.

The state has argued that the lower court’s decision would force it to sort voters by race, insisting it takes a “race-neutral” approach to redistricting.

That argument may resonate with conservative justices, including Chief Justice John Roberts. He opposed greater consideration of race in voting both as a judge and in his time as a lawyer in Republican presidential administrations.

Tuesday’s arguments are the first Supreme Court case involving the fight to appoint Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first black female justice.

The College Admissions Affirmative Action Challenge is set for arguments on October 31st.