Discussion: Court Chooses Virginia Redistricting Map In Favor Of Democrats

[sparrowhawk]

The Supreme Court does not have to take it up, but the rest of your comment could equally apply to every federal court, and in general, we want federal courts to be available to correct state level abuses. Indeed, the reason why this is in federal court is because the state itself drew boundaries with a view towards maximizing Republican power, which includes the power to appoint members of the Virginia courts. In contrast, the redistricting litigation in Pennsylvania was squarely brought under the state’s own constitution, and THAT should be of only the most limited interest to federal courts, unless it directly violated a federal constitutional guarantee, such as equal protection. The position you are staking out is similar to what was used a generation ago to oppose federal intervention in school integration and other civil rights cases, including voting rights cases.

I’m not advocating for “State’s Rights” here, I’m just saying that local redistricting is generally the purview of the State and the Federal judiciary will generally be loath to interfere with that unless there’s clear evidence of malfeasance (even more so now that the VRA has been gutted by the Roberts Court). This case is different than the school integration cases because it’s already at a Federal level. If the Federal courts are involved, it should only be going further up the chain if there’s a valid reason for an appeal and the Supreme Court would have to find that the lower Federal court’s use of the Special Master was inappropriate or corrupted somehow in order to justify stepping in (as I see it), and I don’t think that they would have a valid argument for doing so.

I hadn’t realized this was already a Federal case and I admittedly didn’t articulate my position as clearly as I intended.

[ottnott]

“The modules selected by the Court target senior Republicans, myself
included, without a substantive basis in the law,” Cox said in a statement.

The districts drawn by the GOP legislature protected senior Republicans, myself
included, without a substantive basis in the law,” Cox forgot to mention in a
statement.

[someguy]

Yeah, my brush with greatness.