The Ninth Circuit affirmed, finding that Hawaii may rationally conclude that Hawaiians, being the group to whom trust obligations run and to whom OHA trustees owe a duty of loyalty, should be the group to decide who the trustees ought to be. Hawaii s denial of Rice s right to vote in OHA trustee elections violates the Fifteenth Amendment. The National Government and the States may not deny or abridge the right to vote on account of race. The Amendment reaffirms the equality of races at the most basic level of the democratic process, the exercise of the voting franchise. It protects all persons, not just members of a particular race.
Important precedents give instruction in the instant case.
Ancestry can be a proxy for race. It is that proxy here. For centuries Hawaii was isolated from migration. The inhabitants shared common physical characteristics, and by 1778 they had a common culture. The provisions at issue reflect the State s effort to preserve that commonality to the present day.