Law Commons^™

Still Lost In The Political Thicket (Or Why I Don't Understand The Concept Of Vote Dilution), Larry Alexander

Vanderbilt Law Review

I still don't get it. I can see why as partisans of this or that set of policies we will still care about how district lines are drawn, even if each district has an equal number of voters. We might wish to maximize black representation. We might wish to elect Democrats, or liberals, or incumbents. What I cannot see, however, is why the Constitution, or a supposedly nonpartisan measure like the Voting Rights Act,I should be enlisted in these partisan battles.

Professor Karlan does an admirable job of exploring whether and to what extent blacks benefit politically from being concentrated …

The Unwelcome Judicial Obligation To Respect Politics In Racial Gerrymandering Remedies, Jeffrey L. Fisher

Michigan Law Review

Like it or not, the attack on "bizarrely" shaped majority-minority electoral districts is now firmly underway. Nearly four years have passed since the Supreme Court first announced in Shaw v. Reno that a state's redistricting plan that is "so extremely irregular on its face that it rationally can be viewed only as an effort to segregate the races for purposes of voting" may violate the Equal Protection Clause. Such a district, the Court held, reinforces racial stereotypes, carries us further from the goal of a political system in which race no longer matters, and "threatens to undermine our system of …