Opinion of the Court
time was City of Mobile v. Bolden, which involved a claim by black voters that the City’s at-large election system effectively excluded them from participating in the election of city commissioners. 446 U. S. 55 (1980). The commission had three seats, black voters comprised one-third of the City’s population, but no black-preferred candidate had ever won election.
The Court ruled against the plaintiffs. The Fifteenth Amendment—and thus §2—prohibits States from acting with a “racially discriminatory motivation” or an “invidious purpose” to discriminate. Id., at 61–65 (plurality opinion). But it does not prohibit laws that are discriminatory only in effect. Ibid. The Mobile plaintiffs could “register and vote without hindrance”—“their freedom to vote ha[d] not been denied or abridged by anyone.” Id., at 65. The fact that they happened to lose frequently was beside the point. Nothing the City had done “purposeful[ly] exclu[ded]” them “from participati[ng] in the election process.” Id., at 64.
Almost immediately after it was decided, Mobile “produced an avalanche of criticism, both in the media and within the civil rights community.” T. Boyd & S. Markman, The 1982 Amendments to the Voting Rights Act: A Legislative History, 40 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 1347, 1355 (1983) (Boyd & Markman). The New York Times wrote that the decision represented “the biggest step backwards in civil rights to come from the Nixon Court.” N. Y. Times, Apr. 23, 1980, p. A22. And the Washington Post described Mobile as a “major defeat for blacks and other minorities fighting electoral schemes that exclude them from office.” Washington Post, Apr. 23, 1980, p. A5. By focusing on discriminatory intent and ignoring disparate effect, critics argued, the Court had abrogated “the standard used by the courts to
prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure shall be imposed or applied by any State or political subdivision to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color.” 42 U. S. C. §1973 (1970 ed.).
