Voting Rights Act Never Mandated Racial Districts

by Rod Williams, May 20, 2026 - While there has been outrage that the Supreme Court has made it possible for states to end racial Gerrymandering, I have not shared that outrage. Allowing states to draw Congressional district lines without carving out a Black district seems like an advance for democracy, not a step back.  This decision by the Court has been portrayed as a return to Jim Crow and an era when literacy tests and poll taxes disenfranchised African Americans. 

Let me be clear: I am disappointed with the Gerrymandering we are seeing. I would like professional planners to draw the lines based on a set of criteria that emphasize compactness, districts of shared interest, and historical identity. Counties and cities should only be split to the degree necessary to make each district of equal population. Of course, such a map of redrawn districts would still need to be adopted by the State legislature and perhaps some slight modification here and there could be made by legislators, but in general, the process would be guided by established criteria. Under this criterion, Nashville and Memphis would have members of Congress. I would also like for redistricting to occur only following a new census.

Since we do not have the process in place for the type of redistricting I prefer, I do not see the logic of saying all other districts can be sliced anyway you want, but Black voters should be entitled to a majority Black district. Some have made the argument that since Blacks make up 12.36% of the population, that percentage of Congress should be Black. Approximately 20% of the population is Hispanic, yet no one makes the argument that Hispanics should be guaranteed proportional representation in Congress. We don't have Catholic seats in Congress, nor Baptist seats, nor Women's seats, nor gay seats, nor seats for people younger than 30, and in my view, we should not.

The article below from Real Clear Politics makes the case that the Voting Rights Act never mandated creating racial Congressional Districts and mandating racial districts conflicts with the equal protection provisions of the 14th Amendment. 

Voting Rights Act Never Mandated Racial Districts

by Frank Miele, Real Clear Politics, May 20, 2026 - Ever since the recent decision of the Supreme Court limiting the use of race in drawing congressional districts, there has been a steady drumbeat of criticism claiming that the ruling somehow took away the rights of blacks and other minorities.

But nothing could be further from the truth.

As Justice Samuel Alito explained in his majority opinion, the prevailing interpretation of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 as requiring states to create congressional districts along racial lines actually undermined the constitutional rights of other citizens by colliding with the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.

Unfortunately, the legal language of Alito’s opinion is difficult for the average reader to penetrate, so it is worth stepping back and looking at the actual language of the Voting Rights Act itself. The part of the law at issue is Section 2. As originally passed in 1965, Section 2 simply said:

No voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure shall be imposed or applied by any State or political subdivision to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color.

This was a just and appropriate guarantee that no state could use devices such as literacy tests or other discriminatory practices to prevent citizens of a particular race from voting.

And in 1965, those concerns were tragically real. ...  it was not understood to require was racial engineering of congressional districts.

There was no suggestion in the original text that states would someday be expected to create congressional districts designed primarily around race in order to increase minority representation in Congress.

That interpretation arose largely after Congress amended Section 2 in 1982 ... The statute then adds an important limitation: Nothing in this section establishes a right to have members of a protected class elected in numbers equal to their proportion in the population. .. The revised Voting Rights Act never explicitly required states to create majority-minority congressional districts. Nor did it establish a right to proportional representation. ....

The Equal Protection Clause does not permit states to sort citizens primarily by race absent an extraordinarily compelling justification. ... Every state elects its senators statewide. In almost every state, minority voters routinely vote in elections where most candidates are white. Yet courts have never suggested that Senate elections violate the Voting Rights Act simply because minority voters do not always elect their preferred candidates.

... Contrary to the claims of critics, the court did not take away anyone’s right to vote. Nor did it repeal the Voting Rights Act. What it did was recognize that the Constitution places limits on how far government may go in using race as a political tool – even for ostensibly benevolent purposes. (to read it all follow this link)

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