The Voting Rights Act and the Callais Supreme Court Decision: Context and Analysis

The United States Supreme Court handed down its decision on Louisiana v. Callais in early May, and it’s impossible to understand this 6-3 ruling without having some background knowledge of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and how courts between then and now have interpreted it. Don’t get lost in the political rhetoric surrounding this case; learn the background for yourself and make up your own mind. Host: Jeff Sikkenga Executive Producer: Jeremy Gypton Subscribe: https://linktr.ee/theamericanidea Homepage: https://ashbrook.org/the-american-ide... 00:32 Jeff Sikkenga opens the episode and welcomes back Professor Josh Dunn of the Institute of American Civics at the Howard Baker School of Public Policy to discuss the Supreme Court's recent decision in Louisiana v. Callais and its interpretation of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. 02:46 Dunn explains that the Voting Rights Act was passed to give teeth to the 15th Amendment's guarantee against racial discrimination in voting, targeting Jim Crow-era practices like literacy tests, poll taxes, grandfather clauses, and "white approval" requirements that had blocked Black Americans from the ballot box. 05:25 The VRA required certain jurisdictions, mostly but not exclusively in the South, to obtain federal approval before changing voting procedures under Sections 4 and 5. In 2014, the Supreme Court ruled those pre-clearance requirements were outdated because Congress had not refreshed the coverage formula since 1965. 07:25 Section 2 first reshaped local government by ending at-large districts that locked out minority representation. By the 1980s the Thornburg v. Gingles test established three preconditions, compactness, political cohesion, and bloc voting by the majority, that effectively required states to draw majority-minority districts where possible. 12:23 In the 1990s a coalition of Black Democrats and white Republicans pushed for majority-minority districts in Southern states. Republicans benefited from packing Democratic voters into fewer districts, while Black legislators wanted descriptive representation. Dunn compares this debate to the Anti-Federalist versus Federalist arguments over the nature of representation. 18:14 After the 2020 census, Louisiana drew one majority-minority district. A group of Black voters sued, arguing a second was required under Section 2; lower courts agreed and the state complied. A second group of non-minority voters then sued, claiming the redrawn map violated the 14th and 15th Amendments. 22:40 Justice Alito's 6-3 majority opinion holds that race cannot be used to comply with the VRA unless it is overcoming clear, intentional past racial discrimination. Combined with Rucho v. Common Cause, states are now free to redraw lines for partisan advantage, even when that closely tracks racial voting patterns. 27:28 Justice Thomas concurs but goes further, arguing Section 2's text applies only to the act of voting itself, not to redistricting. Justice Kagan, joined by Sotomayor and Jackson, dissents, contending the majority misread its own precedents and that the ruling will sharply reduce minority representation in Congress. 31:23 Dunn predicts a mixed picture rather than uniform Republican gains. Tennessee has already moved to redistrict, but in states with narrower Republican majorities, eliminating majority-minority districts could backfire by spreading Republican voters too thin. Democratic-controlled states face their own tensions between preserving minority representation and maximizing partisan advantage. 36:29 Dunn frames the decision as the court partially heeding Justice Frankfurter's dissent in Baker v. Carr, which called redistricting a "political thicket and mathematical quagmire," and Justice Harlan's warning in Reynolds v. Sims that one-person-one-vote would simply shift gerrymandering from geography to partisanship. The court is not overturning those cases but is working to limit its involvement in redistricting fights.