White v. Regester
412 U.S. 755 (1973)
Premium Feature
Subscribe to Lexplug to listen to the Case Podcast.
Rule of Law:
Minor population deviations of less than 10% among districts in a state legislative apportionment plan are insufficient, on their own, to establish a prima facie case of invidious discrimination. However, multimember electoral districts are unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause if, based on the totality of the circumstances, they operate to minimize or cancel out the voting strength of racial or ethnic minorities.
Facts:
- Following the 1970 census, the Texas Legislative Redistricting Board promulgated a reapportionment plan for the Texas House of Representatives.
- The plan provided for a mix of single-member and multimember districts, designating the entirety of Dallas County and Bexar County as large multimember districts.
- In Dallas County, a white-dominated organization called the Dallas Committee for Responsible Government (DCRG) effectively controlled the Democratic Party's candidate slating process.
- Since Reconstruction, only two Black representatives had been elected from Dallas County, both of whom were slated by the DCRG, which was found to use racial campaign tactics against candidates supported by the Black community.
- In Bexar County, the Mexican-American community was largely concentrated in a specific area known as the Barrio, which was characterized by poor housing and low income.
- Mexican-Americans in Bexar County faced significant cultural and language barriers and had a history of suffering from official discrimination that hindered their participation in the political process.
- Voter registration among Mexican-Americans in Bexar County remained very low, and since 1880, only five Mexican-Americans had been elected to the legislature from the county.
- The Bexar County legislative delegation was found to be insufficiently responsive to the interests and needs of the Mexican-American community.
Procedural Posture:
- Several plaintiffs filed four consolidated lawsuits in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, challenging the Texas Legislative Redistricting Board's 1970 plan for the state House of Representatives.
- A three-judge District Court was convened to hear the case.
- The District Court found the House plan unconstitutional, citing both impermissible population deviations from the one-person, one-vote standard and the discriminatory effect of the multimember districts in Dallas and Bexar Counties.
- The District Court ordered the multimember districts in Dallas and Bexar counties to be redrawn as single-member districts for the 1972 election and gave the state legislature a deadline to adopt a new statewide plan.
- The State of Texas (appellants) filed a direct appeal of the District Court's judgment to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Premium Content
Subscribe to Lexplug to view the complete brief
You're viewing a preview with Rule of Law, Facts, and Procedural Posture
Issue:
Does a state legislative reapportionment plan violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment if it results in a total population deviation of up to 9.9% and utilizes multimember districts that are found to dilute the voting strength of racial and ethnic minorities?
Opinions:
Majority - Justice White
Yes, in part. While population deviations under 10% in a state legislative apportionment plan do not, by themselves, establish a prima facie case of invidious discrimination, the use of multimember districts is unconstitutional where plaintiffs prove that the political process is not equally open to participation by a racial minority group. Regarding population variance, state reapportionment plans are not subject to the same strict standards as congressional plans. Citing Gaffney v. Cummings, the Court held that relatively minor population deviations, such as the 9.9% total variation in this case, do not substantially dilute individual votes and thus do not establish a prima facie violation of the Equal Protection Clause. However, multimember districts, while not per se unconstitutional, are invalid if used to invidiously cancel out or minimize the voting strength of racial groups. The burden is on plaintiffs to show that the political processes for nomination and election were not equally open to them. In Dallas County, the evidence of historical discrimination, the control of the candidate slating process by the white-dominated DCRG, and the use of racial campaign tactics was sufficient to prove the Black community was effectively excluded from the political process. Similarly, in Bexar County, the totality of the circumstances—including a history of invidious discrimination, cultural and language barriers, low political participation, and a legislative delegation unresponsive to Mexican-American interests—supported the finding that the multimember district unconstitutionally excluded Mexican-Americans from effective political participation.
Concurring-in-part-and-dissenting-in-part - Justice Brennan
Yes. While the Court correctly invalidates the multimember districts in Dallas and Bexar Counties, it wrongly concludes that population deviations of up to 9.9% do not require justification by the state. This decision marks a substantial retreat from the principles established in prior cases like Reynolds v. Sims and Kirkpatrick v. Preisler, which require states to make a good-faith effort to construct districts 'as nearly of equal population as is practicable.' The Court effectively creates a de minimis exception for deviations under 10%, which encourages legislators to strive for a tolerable range of variance rather than for true equality. This approach undermines the individual right to an equal vote by allowing states, without any justification, to deliberately weight some persons' votes more heavily than others, jeopardizing the substantial gains made in achieving voting equality.
Analysis:
This decision established a significant two-part standard for evaluating state reapportionment plans. First, it created a jurisprudential safe harbor for state legislative plans with total population deviations under 10%, greatly reducing the state's burden to justify such variances. Second, it provided the first clear, successful application of the 'totality of the circumstances' test from Whitcomb v. Chavis to invalidate multimember districts on the grounds of racial vote dilution. This fact-intensive framework, focusing on historical and local evidence of exclusion from the political process, became the primary legal standard for vote dilution claims under the Fourteenth Amendment and heavily influenced the subsequent enactment and interpretation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.
