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Election Law

University of Michigan Law School

Gerrymandering

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Full-Text Articles in Courts

Reviving The Right To Vote, Ellen D. Katz Jan 2007

Reviving The Right To Vote, Ellen D. Katz

Articles

Losers in partisan districting battles have long challenged the resulting districting plans under seemingly unrelated legal doctrines. They have filed lawsuits alleging malapportionment, racial gerrymandering, and racial vote dilution, and they periodically prevail. Many election law scholars worry about these lawsuits, claiming that they needlessly "racialize" fundamentally political disputes, distort important legal doctrines designed for other purposes, and provide an inadequate remedy for a fundamentally distinct electoral problem. I am not convinced. This Article argues that the application of distinct doctrines to invalidate or diminish what are indisputably partisan gerrymanders is not necessarily problematic, and that the practice may well …


The Three-Judge District Court In Voting Rights Litigation, Michael E. Solimine Oct 1996

The Three-Judge District Court In Voting Rights Litigation, Michael E. Solimine

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In recent Terms the Supreme Court has heard numerous appeals from the decisions of three-judge district courts in controversial Voting Rights Act cases as well as in challenges to congressional districts designed allegedly to facilitate the election of members of minority groups. Although the cases themselves have been followed closely, the institution of the three-judge district court itself has received relatively little attention, even though Congress passed legislation in 1976 that restricted the three-judge court's jurisdiction to reapportionment and certain Voting Rights Act cases. In this Article, Professor Solimine argues that numerous problems attend the formation and operation of such …