The Supreme Court on Monday made it harder for federal officials to reject proposed election law changes that hurt minority voting power.
The 7-2 ruling in a Louisiana case clarified the standards the Justice Department should apply in reviewing changes state or local governments make in district bound-aries or other voting procedures. Government lawyers must decide whether such changes comply with the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965.The ruling could hamper federal efforts to persuade state and local governments to try to maximize minority voting power when making such changes by drawing more majority-minority districts.
The justices set aside the decision of a three-judge court in Louisiana and told the lower court to restudy a Bossier Parish school board voting plan that included no majority-black districts.
The Voting Rights Act's Section 5 requires many state and local governments to receive federal approval for any election system change by showing it has no discriminatory purpose or effect.
That part of the law states that an electoral change must not leave minority voters worse off than they were before.
The act's Section 2, which applies nationwide, is more stringent. It prohibits any voting practice that would dilute minority voting strength.
At issue in the Louisiana case was whether Justice Department lawyers can consider any practice that violates Section 2 to be disqualified from approval under Section 5.
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote for the court that they cannot.
"The attorney general or a private plaintiff remains free to initiate a Section 2 proceeding if either believes that a jurisdiction's newly enacted voting (procedure) may violate that section," she said. "All we hold today is that preclearance under Section 5 may not be denied on that basis."
She was joined by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.
Justices Stephen G. Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg concurred in a separate opinion by Breyer, and Justices John Paul Stevens and David H. Souter dissented.
In other developments, the court:
- Agreed to referee a legal dispute that, although narrow, could affect some 8.7 million Americans covered by multiemployer pension plans.
- Rejected an appeal by a former Navy sailor who challenged the Clinton administration's "don't ask, don't tell" policy on homosexuals in the military.
- Turned down an appeal by a Wisconsin woman penalized because she refused to let a lesbian be her housemate and share the rent on her home.