We definitely need election systems that prohibit racially discriminatory practices. In 1965, it was not difficult to identify the discriminatory practices creating the need for the Voting Rights Act: poll taxes, literacy tests, grandfather clauses and voter intimidation. However, the modern era is anything but crystal clear on recent claims before the courts on Section 2 cases.
A review of U.S. Supreme Court rulings shows it is obvious the justices over the years have had a difficult time distinguishing what is and is not constitutional. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, in the plurality opinion for Bush v. Vera, stated that “the application of the principles that I have outlined” in determining compliance with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act “sometimes requires difficult exercises of judgment.” She added, “That difficulty is inevitable.”
It is difficult to determine just how far the law allows a jurisdiction to manipulate voting districts to justify what some deem as extreme measures to gain a majority-minority district.
In Georgia State Conference NAACP v. Fayette County Board of Commissioners, a majority-minority district can be achieved only through excessive gerrymandering, and even then, a “majority” is achieved by a mere 35 voters.
The judicial rule of thumb is the Gingles tripartite test (from Thornburg v. Gingles, 1985), stating the minority group must show “that it is sufficiently large and geographically compact” to “constitute a majority in a single-member district.” Consequently, the district snaking down a road and picking up an African-American household here, excluding adjacent property, snaking down another road and picking up another African-American household there, is not geographically compact and demonstrates the population is not sufficiently large.
Nonetheless, the day is coming when Fayette will meet the genuine criteria for creating a majority-minority district as the African-American population grows, readily accepted by our Board of Commissioners. It is a shame we cannot wait to reach that point in time, creating a Gingles minority district, one that is a tribute to our integrity and our respect for the law.
On the other hand, please know that a majority of our commissioners last year offered a full district voting settlement to the NAACP very similar to a plan they previously accepted from our Board of Education, and it was rejected.
So now we end up with an obnoxious gerrymandered plan forced upon us through the federal court.
With the permission of my board, I offered to meet with the plaintiffs without our attorneys prior to the judge’s ruling, to see if we could work to an end. That offer was also rejected.
To be perfectly honest, I weep for both sides. My wife is black, and so are my children. I pity our national culture where we first seek to divide to get our way.
I am also a former Fayette NAACP member, leaving the organization in 2005 after some of the membership began writing what I considered race-baiting letters on the need for district voting at a time it was impossible to create a majority-minority district, even with gerrymandering.
Perhaps our mostly segregated churches have forgotten Mark 12:31: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Likewise, I get angry when some of our whites use racial slurs, and I get depressed when our affluent blacks move to all-black neighborhoods, telling me they only want to live around people like them. This is not only Fayette County; this is metro Atlanta.
Our Voting Rights Act, Section 2 lawsuit is a small question, but it is part of a much larger problem.
Steve Brown is chairman of the Fayette County Commission.
