Syllabus
(2) Alabama argues that absent a benchmark, the Gingles framework ends up requiring the racial proportionality in districting that §2(b) forbids. The Court’s decisions implementing §2 demonstrate, however, that when properly applied, the Gingles framework itself imposes meaningful constraints on proportionality. See Shaw v. Reno, 509 U. S. 630, 633–634; Miller v. Johnson, 515 U. S. 900, 906; Bush v. Vera, 517 U. S. 952, 957 (plurality opinion). In Shaw v. Reno, for example, the Court considered the permissibility of a second majority-minority district in North Carolina, which at the time had 12 seats in the U. S. House of Representatives and a 20% black voting age population. 509 U. S., at 633–634. Though North Carolina believed §2 required a second majority-minority district, the Court found North Carolina’s approach an impermissible racial gerrymander because the State had “concentrated a dispersed minority population in a single district by disregarding traditional districting principles such as compactness, contiguity, and respect for political subdivisions.” Id., at 647.
The Court’s decisions in Bush and Shaw similarly declined to require additional majority-minority districts under §2 where those districts did not satisfy traditional districting principles.
The Court recognizes that reapportionment remains primarily the duty and responsibility of the States, not the federal courts. Section 2 thus never requires adoption of districts that violate traditional redistricting principles and instead limits judicial intervention to “those instances of intensive racial politics” where the “excessive role [of race] in the electoral process … den[ies] minority voters equal opportunity to participate.” S. Rep. No. 97–417, pp. 33–34. Pp. 18–22.
(c) To apply its race-neutral benchmark in practice, Alabama would require plaintiffs to make at least three showings. First, Alabama would require §2 plaintiffs to show that the illustrative maps adduced for the first Gingles precondition are not based on race. Alabama would next graft onto §2 a requirement that plaintiffs demonstrate, at the totality of circumstances stage, that the State’s enacted plan contains fewer majority-minority districts than what an “average” race-neutral plan would contain. And finally, Alabama would have plaintiffs prove that any deviation between the State’s plan and a race-neutral plan is explainable “only” by race. The Court declines to adopt any of these novel requirements.
