In a 6-2 decision, the Court established the justiciability of constitutional challenges to state reapportionment, based on the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. This decision, affirming the role of judicial review over the redistricting process, had far-reaching consequences.
Full Answer
Reapportionment is the official redistribution of representation in a ruling body, such as Congress. By Federal law, there are 435 total congressional districts that make up the House of Representatives.
In new and sensitive areas of policy such as civil rights and criminal procedure, the lower courts can exercise power over the Supreme Court by their resistance.
Reapportionment Act of 1929. The Reapportionment Act of 1929 was simply a new bill, and it did not address the requirements that had been written into prior apportionment acts, which required that districts be adjoining and condensed, and that their populations be generally equal across the board.
Anti-abortion activists protest at the Supreme Court in Washington, DC, June 15, 2022. The Supreme Court has yet to issue opinions in 18 of the cases argued before it this term, which began in early October and is expected to wrap up by the end of June or early July.
What is Reapportionment. Reapportionment is the official redistribution of representation in a ruling body, such as Congress. By Federal law, there are 435 total congressional districts that make up the House of Representatives. Every ten years, a census is taken of the United States’ population, and then the total number ...
Therefore, the major difference between reapportionment and redistricting is that reapportionment refers to a change in the number of representatives a state is allowed, and redistricting refers to a change in voting boundaries within the state.
While each state gets two seats in the U.S. Senate, each state is given a certain number of House seats based on its population; and every state is guaranteed at least one seat by the constitution, regardless of how many people live in that state. To explore this concept, consider the following reapportionment definition.
1850 – 1910: The formula for reapportioning congressional seats used here was originally proposed by Alexander Hamilton. Here, members would be first apportioned according to their state’s quota, and any fractional remainders would be disregarded.
In 1961, voters in Jefferson County, Alabama, challenged the apportionment in their state, when it became clear how unfairly the district lines had been drawn. The state’s constitution specified that each county would have a single Senator in the state legislature, regardless of the number of residents.
Some states actually prohibit their state officials from participating in redrawing district boundaries, and understandably so. However, even when politicians are not directly involved in the redrawing, they are still permitted to vote against any proposals with which they do not agree.
Concurring in the decision of the Court and essentially agreeing that partisan gerrymandering cannot be adjudicated under the Equal Protection Clause and the Fourteenth Amendment itself, Justice Kennedy declared that he was unwilling to accept Justice Scalia’s conclusion that partisan gerrymandering was not a constitutional issue. Instead, he brought up the notion that the “First Amendment may be the more relevant constitutional provision in future cases that allege unconstitutional partisan gerrymandering.” Pointing to the case of Elrod v. Burns (1976) (discussed below), he said that a First Amendment analysis would concentrate on whether partisan gerrymandering has the effect of burdening the rights of “voters for reasons of ideology, beliefs, or political association.” In his dissent in Vieth, Justice Stevens agreed with Kennedy and also mentioned Elrod and some related cases.
Under Article One, Section Four, of the Constitution, state legislatures have the first authority (and the Congress secondary authority) over the “Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives” for the United States Congress. For election of representatives, this includes the re-drawing of Congressional districts after each decennial census. As the result of federal legislation and Supreme Court rulings over the last sixty years, the power of the state legislatures has been qualified by the requirement that Congressional districts be of equal population and not discriminate by race. Until now, the “politics” of re-districting has never been a constitutional issue.
In its early years, the Court, over strenuous objection from the states, shaped our federal system and helped establish the national government's supremacy. The Court also had substantial effects on the economy, aiding in the creation of an American economic common market and providing opportunities for the private sector to develop. The Court's major effects on federalism and the economy subsided after the 1930s. However, its effect on civil rights, visible earlier with respect to slavery and its emasculation of reconstruction civil rights statutes, again became apparent as questions such as school desegregation came to the fore in the 1950s.
Acquiescence in the Court's rulings, which helps produce compliance, has been more common than active approval of the decisions. The public also has little information about the Court. Even many controversial decisions fail to penetrate the general public's consciousness.
Only a few—the eleventh amendment, civil war amendments, sixteenth amendment, and twentysixth amendment— have been both submitted and ratified.
Because the Court, "the least dangerous branch," lacks the capacity to enforce its rulings directly, assistance from those at whom a ruling is directed or from others ( legislatures, executive agencies, courts) is required.
Negative views about the Court are usually accounted for by reactions to the few specific decisions that catch the attention of large proportions of the public. Those salient decisions change with considerable rapidity, shifting in the 1960s from civil rights and school prayer to criminal procedure.
Impact includes all effects, direct and indirect, resulting from a ruling of the Court, regardless of whether those affected knew about the decision; it includes the results of rulings permitting but not requiring the adoption of certain policies.
The mass media, with the exception of a few newspapers, provide only sketchy information about the Court's decisions. Specialized media, for example, trade publications, provide only erratic coverage even of decisions relevant to the groups for which they are published.