At the end of June, a
panel of the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed,
and convincingly, a 2017 Louisiana Middle District ruling
that declared the judicial election method used for the state’s 32nd
District unconstitutional. That district encompasses Terrebone Parish.
There, voters across the parish elect judges who run
in any of five slots. The at-large, parish-wide selection in five sections until
2014 had produced only white judges when a black Republican – like the other
four winners running unopposed – took a seat on the bench. Terrebone’s black
population makes up a bit under a quarter of the parish.
Despite the historic win, this perturbed the local
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People chapter enough to continue
suing the state, now represented by Republican Atty. Gen. Jeff Landry (Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards
declined to oppose), over the method, claiming it racially discriminatory. Such
a contention ran squarely against jurisprudence about judicial elections, which
had established that judicial districts, unlike those for majoritarian branch offices,
did not have to be drawn in a way to encourage minority representation without
exceptional evidence of racial animus as states had a legitimate interest in conducting
at-large judicial elections.
Yet the trial judge, the late James Brady who at
one time helmed Louisiana Democrats, bought it. In a classic case of judicial
activism where he inserted his own ideological beliefs, he drew a series of fantastical
conclusions which he alleged showed racist intent by the state and inflated
claims of the system hampering minority voters. Among other ridiculous
assertions, he maintained that funding for campaigns was racially biased, that
the black 2014 winner didn’t really represent blacks because he ran as a Republican,
and that the repeated refusals to change the selection method at the state
level by definition had to be racist.
In his most egregious overreach, Brady said the
whole system allowed racist voters to hold sway because one past judge (who has
since retired, replaced by the black Republican) was reelected after suspension
by the state’s Judiciary Commission for wearing blackface and an orange prison jumpsuit
at a party. He ruled the election system in violation and ordered the court to
draw a remediation plan, which his successor completed, that would create
minority sub-sections, an approach used in several other state districts.
Landry objected to its implementation, and the appeals
panel agreed. In its opinion, the court noted the weakness of the vote dilution
case didn’t come close to overcoming the state’s interest in avoiding any
appearance of bias toward the parochial interests of a narrow constituency by
its use of the sectional parish-wide method – which makes more sense than the election
subdistrict method because a case may be heard by any judge, so in those
judicial districts using the subdistrict method a person may have a case heard
by a judge he had no part in selecting.
It also trashed Brady’s insertion of his own political
worldview into his determination of racist intent. Specifically, it noted that his
reasoning that the state’s interest didn’t overcome the (weak) evidence of minority
vote dilution was entirely faulty and that Brady liberally had imputed racist motives
behind policy-maker actions with no hard evidence to back that.
That system may make it more difficult for minority
candidates to win, but it also has its benefits for all citizens and doesn’t inherently
connote racial motives behind its operation. That clear-headed judgment that
properly ascertains the role that race plays in policy-making could be of
benefit in a lot more places across the country right now.
No comments:
Post a Comment