Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-1086_1co6.pdf
Page Number: 77

32 

ALLEN v. MILLIGAN 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

swer” to the question of how well any given algorithm ap-
proximates the correct benchmark.  Ante, at 27–28 (internal 
quotation marks omitted).  In the end, it concludes, “Section 
2 cannot require courts to judge a contest of computers” in 
which “there is no reliable way to determine who wins, or 
even where the finish line is.”  Ante, at 29. 
  The majority fails to recognize that whether vote-dilution 
claims require an undiluted benchmark is not up for debate.  
If §2 applies to single-member districting plans, courts can-
not dispense with an undiluted benchmark for comparison, 
ascertained by an objective and workable method.  Bossier 
Parish School Bd., 520 U. S., at 480; Holder, 512 U. S., at 
881 (plurality opinion).  Of course, I would be the last per-
son to deny that defining the undiluted benchmark is diffi-
cult.  See id., at 892 (opinion of THOMAS, J.) (arguing that 
it  “immerse[s]  the  federal  courts  in  a  hopeless  project  of 
weighing  questions  of  political  theory”).    But  the  “myriad 
considerations”  and  “[a]nswerless  questions”  the  majority 
frets about, ante, at 27, 29, are inherent in the very enter-
prise of applying §2 to single-member districts.  Everything 
the majority says about the difficulty of defining the undi-
luted  benchmark  with  computer  evidence  applies  with 
equal or greater force to the task of defining it without such 
evidence.  At their core, the majority’s workability concerns 
are an isolated demand for rigor against the backdrop of a 
legal regime that has long been “ ‘inherently standardless,’ ” 
and must remain so until the Court either discovers a prin-
cipled  and  objective  method  of  identifying  the  undiluted 
benchmark, Holder, 512 U. S., at 885 (plurality opinion), or 
abandons this enterprise altogether, see id., at 945 (opinion 
of THOMAS, J.). 
  Ultimately, the majority has very little to say about the 
appropriate  benchmark.    What  little  it  does  say  suggests 
that  the  majority  sees  no  real  alternative  to  the  District 
Court’s proportional-control benchmark, though it appears 
unwilling to say so outright.  For example, in a nod to the