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After Shelby County: Getting Section 2 Of The Vra To Do The Work Of Section 5, Christopher Elmendorf, Douglas Spencer
After Shelby County: Getting Section 2 Of The Vra To Do The Work Of Section 5, Christopher Elmendorf, Douglas Spencer
Christopher S. Elmendorf
Until the Supreme Court put an end to it in Shelby County v. Holder, Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act was widely regarded as an effective, low-cost tool for blocking potentially discriminatory changes to election laws and administrative practices. The provision the Supreme Court left standing, Section 2, is generally seen as expensive, cumbersome and almost wholly ineffective at blocking changes before they take effect. This paper argues that the courts, in partnership with the Department of Justice, could reform Section 2 so that it fills much of the gap left by the Supreme Court’s evisceration of Section …
Effective Representation And Multimember Districts, Michigan Law Review
Effective Representation And Multimember Districts, Michigan Law Review
Michigan Law Review
The Supreme Court has not decided a case involving an assertion of the claim that a multimember district denies the right of effective representation since Fortson and Burns. However, there have been several subsequent challenges in lower courts to the validity of such districts, and these challenges have generally failed because the factual evidence did not demonstrate conclusively that the voting strength of a legally cognizable racial or political element had been minimized or cancelled. In Chavis v. Whitcomb, however, a three-judge federal district court in Indiana found that the plaintiff had presented sufficient factual evidence to sustain …