Racial Gerrymandering
In 2024, a Supreme Court ruling made it easier for state legislatures to commit racial gerrymanders, drawing congressional maps that disempower voters of color.
Today the Supreme Court of the United States overturned a lower court’s ruling that South Carolina’s congressional map was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. This decision allows the state of South Carolina to continue using its congressional map that divides and reduces Black political voting power in the state, while increasing the burden on voters who challenge unconstitutional racial gerrymanders in federal court.
In an unexpected decision last June, Allen v. Milligan, the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) upheld Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and ruled that Alabama’s 2021 congressional map illegally diluted the voting power of Black Alabamians. Following SCOTUS’s ruling, Alabama defied the court’s order in an attempt to continue disempowering Black residents.
The League is invested in and carefully watching an important redistricting case, Alexander v. South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP. The case is an appeal from a ruling striking down South Carolina’s congressional map as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.
During the 2022 Supreme Court term, the League of Women Voters filed amicus briefs in four cases: Moore v. Harper, Allen v. Milligan, Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, and 303 Creative, LLC v. Elenis.
We recap the case and its impact on voting rights, discrimination, and redistricting.
Washington, DC — Today, the League of Women Voters of South Carolina (LWVSC) filed an amicus–or friend of the court–brief along with the Gullah Geechee Chamber of Commerce, the Charleston Branch of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, and the Circular Congregational Church in the case Alexander v. South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP, which will be heard by the US Supreme Court on October 11, 2023. The case is on appeal after a three-judge district court struck down South Carolina’s congressional map as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.
WASHINGTON, DC —Today, the League of Women Voters of the United States joined an amicus brief filed by the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law in Alexander v. South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP, a racial gerrymandering case to be heard before the Supreme Court of the United States this fall. The brief is also joined by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the Leadership Conference Education Fund, Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC, Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, Campaign Legal Center, Demos, and the Southern Coalition for Social Justice.
LWVUS and LWV of Alabama stood in solidarity with Alabama voters in Merrill v. Milligan as it was heard before the US Supreme Court. Both Leagues had previously submitted an amicus brief in support of the Milligan plaintiffs.
The 2021 redistricting cycle was the first one without the full protection of the Voting Rights Act. Without federal oversight, many states and local municipalities have used this advantage to implement racially gerrymandered maps, i.e. district lines that limit the voting power of voters of color.
Today the League of Women Voters of the United States CEO Virginia Kase Solomón and the League of Women Voters Alabama President Kathy Jones issued the following statements on the Supreme Court decision failing to rein in racial gerrymandering by allowing the Alabama congressional maps to stay in place.