The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued an unsigned, one-paragraph order in two Louisiana redistricting cases. Robinson v.Calle and Landry v.Calle. The court granted the application for a stay of execution. Judges Sotomayor and Kagan would deny the petition, with Judge Jackson writing a two-page dissent. Most readers probably think that a conservative Supreme Court helps Republican voters, while progressive justices do the opposite. Not completely. In fact, this is one of the most confusing emergency cases I’ve ever seen. The upshot of the case is that there will be two black districts in the 2024 elections, both of which will almost certainly fall to Democratic candidates. Many media reports have struggled to understand the case and the split.Why the Court’s Progressives objection?
Rick Pildes describes these cases succinctly:
Two separate federal courts issued two rulings that left Los Angeles without a valid congressional map. The First Federal Court said Los Angeles’ original map violated the Voting Rights Act; the Second Federal Court said Los Angeles’ new map created to correct VRA violations itself violated the Constitution.
Today, the court upheld the second verdict. The impact of this stop is that the state’s remediation map – which created 2 VRA zones instead of just the 1 the state originally created – will become the map used by Los Angeles this fall.
Let’s summarize. White voters believed the First Court’s map violated the Equal Protection Clause and wanted the Second Court’s map to go into effect. But Louisiana and black voters asked the court to stay the second ruling to avoid confusion so that the first court’s map could take effect in the upcoming 2024 election.The Supreme Court upheld the Second Court hearing on the grounds that Purcell in principle. Louisiana and black voters won, white voters lost.
Shouldn’t this be a unanimous decision? So why did Justices Sotomayor and Kagan deny the stay? Why did Justice Jackson dissent?They really don’t like it Purcell. So much so that they would allow the lower court proceedings to continue in the 5th Circuit (check notes) to avoid setting a new emergency case precedent (if such a thing could even exist). To be sure, the Troika will likely find the First Court’s map to be constitutional and step in later. But they were unwilling to accept a unanimous decision if doing so would set a precedent for invocation. Purcell The election is about six months away.
The most interesting question is this: What would happen if Justices Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch refused to grant a stay on the grounds that the First Court’s map was unconstitutional? Roberts, Kavanaugh and Barrett did not have enough votes to retain their seats on the second court. At that point, I suspect Justices Sotomayor and Kagan will quietly build a majority that will allow Justice Jackson to uphold this principle in a dissent. But that didn’t happen.Justices Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch are committed to Purcell, even if it means using potentially unconstitutional maps in congressional elections. Whoever insists this is an all-Republican court should scrutinize this order.
