Supreme Court's ruling will have broad impact

Monday's U.S. Supreme Court ruling on a North Carolina voting rights case could have a profound impact on the state's redistricting and voting process, and on Wilson County's elections. A five-member majority of the court found that the 1965 Voting Rights Act, as amended in 1982, did not require the creation of electoral districts that gave minority voters a substantial share of registered voters. Only when districts could be formed with a majority of minority voters, so-called majority-minority districts, would special consideration for minority voting rights be necessary, the court ruled. The case came out of Pender County, which was divided in order to create a district with 39 percent minority registration, even though the state constitution requires that counties not be divided in creating legislative districts.

This ruling will not affect majority-minority districts, such as the 12th or 1st congressional districts, but it will likely prohibit districts with a near-majority of minority voters when maps are redrawn after the 2010 census. (The much-litigated 12th District has a plurality of minority voters but not a majority.) The ruling could affect electoral districts drawn by cities and counties, including Wilson and Wilson County. The court's ruling might even hint at the court's willingness to reconsider the efficacy an applicability of one of the Voting Rights Act's key provisions, which requires federal approval of any change to voting laws or practices in areas that had few black voters nearly 50 years ago.

Both Democrats and Republicans have made accommodations to the Voting Rights Act. Democrats have used the law to establish safe minority districts that are also safely Democratic. Republicans have abetted the shepherding of Democratic-leaning minority voters out of other districts, leaving substantially safe Republican districts adjacent to the majority-minority districts.

The court's ruling might even give some impetus to changing the city of Wilson's voting districts. The city's population is roughly divided between white and black residents. Three City Council districts are majority white. Three are safely in minority hands. The seventh is roughly evenly divided. Ever since this arrangement was implemented, with the blessings of the U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, some Wilson voters have complained about being able to vote for only one council member. But few City Council members are willing to risk the political upheaval that a change would entail.

Wilson County, which has a larger percentage of whites, has divided the County Commission with three majority-minority districts and four majority-white districts. The Wilson County Board of Education uses the county's electoral districts.

In a nation that has just elected an African-American president, this concentration on the race of voters seems archaic. The court's majority admitted Monday that racial discrimination is not just a historical fact, but three of the five justices were unwilling to go too far in setting aside legislative seats for minorities. Justices Thomas and Scalia opposed all race-based considerations in redistricting.