However, the phrasing of irregularly drawn districts has left room for much interpretation, letting judges use their opinions rather than relying on Shaw. 77 0 obj The White North Carolina voters could not show that they were disenfranchised as a result of the second, oddly shaped majority-minority district, Justice White wrote. <<>> Did the questioned reapportionment (with the snakelike 12th district) provide an advantage to the minority groups or to the white voters? Since there is no justification for the departure here from the principles that continue to govern electoral districting cases generally in accordance with our prior decisions, I would not respond to the seeming egregiousness of the redistricting now before us by untethering the concept of racial gerrymander in such a case from the concept of harm exemplified by dilution. North Carolina's initial reapportionment effort included one district purposefully constructed to have a majority of black voters. Hirabayashi v. United States(1943). Racial gerrymandering, even for remedial purposes, may balkanize us into competing racial factions; it threatens to carry us further from the goal of a political system in which race no longer matters--a goal that the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments embody, and to which the Nation continues to aspire. Shaw v. Reno (1993) The principle of "one person, one vote" was established by the Supreme Court in the 1960s. It is for these reasons that race-based districting by our state legislatures demands close judicial scrutiny. Nor, because of the distinctions between the two categories, is there any risk that Fourteenth Amendment districting law as such will be taken to imply anything for purposes of general Fourteenth Amendment scrutiny about "benign" racial discrimination, or about group entitlement as distinct from individual protection, or about the appropriateness of strict or other heightened scrutiny. <> information, and professional opportunities. The fact that it now chooses to apply strict scrutiny when a law is meant to benefit a race that has been the subject of historical discrimination makes no sense. "Shaw v. Reno: Supreme Court Case, Arguments, Impact." In their complaint, appellants did not claim that the General Assembly's reapportionment plan unconstitutionally "diluted" white voting strength. This was to designed to prevent any discrimination by race and North Carolina thought this plan was completely aligned with the request of the General Assembly guidelines. Its central purpose is to prevent the states from purposefully discriminating between individuals on the basis of race. O'Connor, joined by Rehnquist, Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, This page was last edited on 13 April 2023, at 05:15. ?qwtl@Tdn@ [ Tw3Hd-@13Yp ]|3%l/Oonr?":)Qz8(qH OH`So@b%?9p)3~6$Z 85 0 obj It is against this background that we confront the questions presented here. It is ironic that it does so when white voters challenge a law that would have North Carolina send a black representative to Congress for the first time since Reconstruction.
