Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-1086_1co6.pdf
Page Number: 92

Cite as:  599 U. S. ____ (2023) 

47 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

single-member  districting  plan  is  not  a  “voting  qualifica-
tion,” a “prerequsite to voting,” or a “standard, practice, or 
procedure,”  as  the  Act  uses  those  terms.    One  way  or  an-
other, the District Court should be reversed. 
  The majority goes to great lengths to decline all of these 
options and, in doing so, to fossilize all of the worst aspects 
of our long-deplorable vote-dilution jurisprudence.  The ma-
jority recites Gingles’ shopworn phrases as if their meaning 
were self-evident, and as if it were not common knowledge 
that they have spawned intractable difficulties of definition 
and application.  It goes out of its way to reaffirm §2’s ap-
plicability to single-member districting plans both as a pur-
ported original matter and on highly exaggerated stare de-
cisis  grounds.    It  virtually  ignores  Alabama’s  primary 
argument—that,  whatever  the  benchmark  is,  it  must  be 
race  neutral—choosing,  instead, to  quixotically  joust with 
an  imaginary  adversary.    In  the  process,  it  uses  special 
pleading  to  close  the  door  on  the  hope  cherished  by  some 
thoughtful observers, see Gonzalez, 535 F. 3d, at 599–600, 
that  computational  redistricting  methods  might  offer  a 
principled, race-neutral way out of the thicket Gingles car-
ried us into.  Finally, it dismisses grave constitutional ques-
tions with an insupportably broad holding based on demon-
strably inapposite cases.22 
  I find it difficult to understand these maneuvers except 
as  proceeding  from  a  perception  that  what  the  District 
Court did here is essentially no different from what many 
courts  have  done  for  decades  under  this  Court’s  superin-
tendence, joined with a sentiment that it would be unthink-
able  to  disturb  that  approach  to  the  Voting  Rights  Act  in 
any way.  I share the perception, but I cannot understand 
the sentiment.  It is true that, “under our direction, federal 
—————— 

22 The Court does not address whether §2 contains a private right of 
action, an issue that was argued below but was not raised in this Court.  
See  Brnovich  v.  Democratic  National  Committee,  594  U. S.  ___,  ___ 
(2021) (GORSUCH, J., concurring) (slip op., at 1).