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Page Number: 51.0

12 

RUCHO v. COMMON CAUSE 

KAGAN, J., dissenting 

partisan  gerrymandering  case  is  much  the  same,  except 
that  the  dilution  is  based  on  party  affiliation.    In  such  a 
case, too, the districters have set out to reduce the weight
of certain citizens’ votes, and thereby deprive them of their 
capacity  to  “full[y]  and  effective[ly]  participat[e]  in  the 
political process[ ].”  Id., at 565.  As Justice Kennedy (in a 
controlling  opinion)  once  hypothesized:  If  districters  de-
clared  that  they  were  drawing  a  map  “so  as  most  to  bur-
den  [the  votes  of]  Party  X’s”  supporters,  it  would  violate 
the Equal Protection Clause.  Vieth, 541 U. S., at 312.  For 
(in  the  language  of  the  one-person-one-vote  decisions)  it 
would  infringe  those  voters’  rights  to  “equal  [electoral] 
participation.”    Reynolds,  377  U. S.,  at  566;  see  Gray  v. 
Sanders,  372  U. S.  368,  379–380  (1963)  (“The  concept  of 
‘we  the  people’  under  the  Constitution  visualizes  no  pre-
ferred  class  of  voters  but  equality  among  those  who  meet 
the basic qualifications”). 

And  partisan  gerrymandering  implicates  the  First
Amendment  too.  That  Amendment  gives  its  greatest 
protection to political beliefs, speech, and association.  Yet 
partisan  gerrymanders  subject  certain  voters  to  “disfa-
vored  treatment”—again,  counting  their  votes  for  less—
precisely  because  of  “their  voting  history  [and]  their  ex-
pression of political views.”  Vieth, 541 U. S., at 314 (opin-
ion  of  Kennedy,  J.).  And  added  to  that  strictly  personal 
harm is an associational one.  Representative democracy is
“unimaginable  without  the  ability  of  citizens  to  band
together  in  [support  of]  candidates  who  espouse  their
political views.”  California Democratic Party v. Jones, 530 
U. S.  567,  574  (2000).    By  diluting  the  votes  of  certain 
citizens,  the  State  frustrates  their  efforts  to  translate 
those affiliations into political effectiveness.  See Gill, 585 
U. S., at ___ (KAGAN, J., concurring) (slip op., at 9) (“Mem-
bers  of  the  disfavored  party[,]  deprived  of  their  natural 
political  strength[,]  may  face  difficulties  fundraising,
registering  voters,  [and]  eventually  accomplishing  their