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To all,

I was able to attend the arguments today, and am willing to give my impression, albeit from political science eyes.  There was not much sympathy for the argument that a mid-decade redistricting for purely political purposes is unconstitutional.  A majority of the judges seemed reluctant to restrict the ability of legislatures to re-do redistricting, particularly one re-doing a court drawn plan.  Absent a clear standard of political unfairness, they were open to the argument that the Republican legislative plan merely redressed the perceived
residual unfairness of the Democratic plan that was perpetuated by the Court. Given that and given that redistricting is first and foremost a legislative task, it seemed that most of the Justices did not want to restrict the right of the legislatures to "fix" problems mid-decade.
After all the courts ask legislatures to fix problems mid-decade, why shouldn't the legislatures have the right to decide that themselves?

The one ray of hope for the plaintiffs seemed to be the section 2 argument about district 23.  By my estimate, there might be five votes for saying that seat violates section 2, but even here, I would not bet the bank.  The fact that 30% of the Latinos voted for a Republican Hispanic seemed to raise questions about how cohesive the Laitno bloc voting is, and Roberts pushed very hard on the question of what, if not 51% Latino, was the definition of a real opportunity seat.

Even if the paintiffs prevail on the section 2 issue, it seems to me the legislature could fix that and keep the Republican biases in place. I certainly could if given the charge.  All in all, not a good day for the opponents of mid-decade redistrictings from where I sat.


Bruce Cain

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