[EL] State And Local VRA objections

[Justin Levitt]

Hm.  Rick has the quote (in this article 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/24/us/states-reined-in-by-1965-voting-act-await-a-decision.html>) 
exactly right.  But that's not exactly what I said in the source.

The source article is here <http://ssrn.com/abstract=2265729> (or here 
<http://yalelawjournal.org/the-yale-law-journal-pocket-part/election-law/section-5-as-simulacrum/>). 
Footnote 47 is the compilation: 14% of _objections_ (not submissions) 
from 1982-2006 were for state laws or policies, 39% for county policies, 
48% for municipalities/school boards/special districts.  (The numbers 
add to 101% based on rounding: county and local objections were 38.5% 
and 47.5%, respectively.)

As for more recent _objection_ data, the numbers have shifted a bit from 
counties to municipalities, but are otherwise similar.  From 2000-2012, 
14% of the objections were statewide policies, 32% were countywide, and 
55% were local.  (Same caveat due to rounding.)  That's off of a much 
smaller pool: there were 73 objections in that period, and 602 
objections from 1982-2006.

For submission stats (rather than objection), I'm only aware of a 
compilation that's already been done for type of submission 
(redistricting, polling place change, etc.), not level of jurisdiction.  
That chart is here 
<http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/vot/sec_5/changes.php>. To compile 
level of jurisdiction, you'd need to go through and code each of the 
individual notices of submissions (archived here 
<http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/vot/notices/votarch.php> back to 1998, 
and I'm not sure if there's any online source for submissions before 
1998).  If anyone's done that, I'd also be interested in seeing the numbers.

Justin

-- 
Justin Levitt
Associate Professor of Law
Loyola Law School | Los Angeles
919 Albany St.
Los Angeles, CA  90015
213-736-7417
justin.levitt at lls.edu
ssrn.com/author=698321

On 6/24/2013 6:02 AM, Pildes, Rick wrote:
>   In today's NY Times article, Justin is cited for the helpful statistic that 85% of VRA submissions since 1982, 85% were from local governments.  Does anyone have information that would compare what percentage of submissions were objected to at the state versus local level?  I would prefer more recent data, starting with 2000 for example, since we know that in the 1980s, much of the action centered on breaking up at-large local government structures.  But I'll take any data that makes the state/local comparison in terms of rates of objections/submissions.
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