Opinion ID: 1538756
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Validity of the Plan

Text: Calvert contends that the application of a county residency requirement to the nomination of candidates for election to the House of Delegates from Legislative District 34 would result in a patent violation of the one-man one-vote principle articulated by the Supreme Court in Reynolds v. Sims [, 377 U.S. 533, 84 S.Ct. 1362, 12 L.Ed.2d 506 (1964),] and its progeny, and that this Court's decision in Secretary of State v. Bryson, 244 Md. 418 [, 224 A.2d 277] (1966), presenting an indistinguishably similar attempt to compromise the one-man one-vote principle, has not been diluted or abrogated since 1966 and is dispositive of this case. The trial judge concluded that since Cecil County has 61% of the population, Queen Anne's County 21% of the population, and Kent County 18% of the population, permitting each County [to] elect one delegate ... does not approximate the concept of one man  one vote and is an invidiously wide disparity in population. In Bryson, Maryland Code (1957) Art. 40, § 42E (A-2), as repealed and re-enacted by Chapter 2 of the Acts of the Special Session of 1965, provided that in any senatorial district comprising more than one county and having two Senators, not more than one resident of any one county [might] be nominated by one political party at the primary election, unless the population of that one county exceed[ed] the population of all the remaining counties in the district in the aggregate. It was further provided that any senatorial candidate had to be voted upon at large within the entire district at the primary election and that the provisions of the subsection should not apply to general elections for the office of state senator. Two state senators were to be elected from District 2, composed of Frederick and Carroll Counties. In the Republican primary the two candidates receiving the highest number of votes were both from Carroll County. Since Frederick County by the 1960 census had a population of 71,930 to Carroll County's 52,785, only one Republican candidate resident in Carroll County could be nominated if the section were valid. Upon the strength of Davis v. Dusch, 361 F.2d 495, 497 (4th Cir.1966), this Court observed that it is the distribution of representatives rather than the method of distributing them that must satisfy the demands of the Equal Protection Clause. It said Fortson v. Dorsey, 379 U.S. 433, 85 S.Ct. 498, 13 L.Ed.2d 401 (1965), and Reed v. Mann, 237 F. Supp. 22 (N.D. Ga. 1964), were not apposite since in each case there was no allegation or evidence that the districts were unequal as to population. Judge Oppenheimer said for the Court: The invalidity of the Section, under the one-man one-vote principle, is clear. Frederick and Carroll Counties have populations in the respective approximate proportions of 7 to 5. Under the operation of the Section, Frederick County could have two nominees in the primary of one party while Carroll County would have none. Id. at 428. Believing, as it was put in Herring v. Christensen, 252 Md. 240, 242, 249 A.2d 718 (1969), that consistency and stability in this Court's rulings ... are necessary for our citizens to know their respective rights and obligations, that the General Assembly is the branch of government vested with legislative power, and that that body at its periodic meetings by appropriate legislation can take steps to alter a decision of ours with which it may disagree, this Court has consistently adhered to the doctrine of stare decisis. We do not feel bound under that doctrine by the decision in Bryson, however, because that case involved a determination based upon the Court's understanding of what the Supreme Court of the United States had held by way of an interpretation of the Constitution of the United States after its revolutionary holdings in Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 82 S.Ct. 691, 7 L.Ed.2d 663 (1962), and Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 84 S.Ct. 1362, 12 L.Ed.2d 506 (1964). By the decisions of that Court since Bryson we have been provided with additional light and, therefore, view the matter somewhat differently. As has been noted, the decision in Bryson relied upon Davis v. Dusch, supra . That decision was reversed in Dusch v. Davis, 387 U.S. 112, 87 S.Ct. 1554, 18 L.Ed.2d 656 (1967), decided after Bryson. Dusch involved election of a city council for Virginia Beach. After a United States District Court had held the allocation of members of the city council invalid as denying voter equality, the city charter was amended. The council was composed of 11 members. Four were elected at large without regard to residence. Seven were elected by the voters of the entire city, one being required to reside in each of the seven boroughs. The population of the boroughs ranged from a low of 733 to a high of 29,048. Mr. Justice Douglas there said for the Court: The fact that each of the seven councilmen must be a resident of the borough from which he is elected, is not fatal. In upholding a residence requirement for the election of state senators from a multi-district county we said in Fortson v. Dorsey, 379 U.S. 433, 438: `It is not accurate to treat a senator from a multi-district county as the representative of only that district within the county wherein he resides. The statute uses districts in multi-district counties merely as the basis of residence for candidates, not for voting or representation. Each district's senator must be a resident of that district, but since his tenure depends upon the county-wide electorate he must be vigilant to serve the interests of all the people in the county, and not merely those of people in his home district; thus in fact he is the county's and not merely the district's senator.' By analogy the present consolidation plan uses boroughs in the city `merely as the basis of residence for candidates, not for voting or representation.' He is nonetheless the city's, not the borough's, councilman. In Fortson there was substantial equality of population in the senatorial districts, while here the population of the boroughs varies widely. If a borough's resident on the council represented in fact only the borough, residence being only a front, different conclusions might follow. But on the assumption that Reynolds v. Sims controls, the constitutional test under the Equal Protection Clause is whether there is an `invidious' discrimination. Id. at 115-16.    The Seven-Four Plan seems to reflect a detente between urban and rural communities that may be important in resolving the complex problems of the modern megalopolis in relation to the city, the suburbia, and the rural countryside. Finding no invidious discrimination we conclude that the judgment of the Court of Appeals must be and is Reversed. Id. at 117. Although Mr. Justice Douglas in Davis said that there was substantial equality of population in [the] senatorial districts in Fortson, we note that in his dissent in Fortson he referred to the three senatorial districts in DeKalb County, stating that District 41 contain[ed] 75,117 voters, that District 42 contain[ed] 95,032 voters, and that District 43 contain[ed] 86,633 voters. The contest in Fortson was directed not at population disparity, but at the validity of a plan under which 33 senatorial districts were made up of from one to eight counties with senators elected on a district-wide basis and the remaining 21 senatorial districts were allotted in groups of from two to seven among the seven most populous counties, with senators elected on a county-wide basis rather than on a district-wide basis. A three-judge court had held this to be a discrimination as between voters in the two classes. The Supreme Court reversed. If one were to think of our Legislative District 34 as being a Georgia county required to elect a representative from each of the subdistricts comprising Cecil, Kent, and Queen Anne's Counties but on a district-wide basis, one would have an analogous situation to that ruled upon and upheld in Fortson. In Mahan v. Howell, 410 U.S. 315, 321, 93 S.Ct. 979, 35 L.Ed.2d 320 (1973), the Court referred to its statement in Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 84 S.Ct. 1362, 12 L.Ed.2d 506 (1964): A consideration that appears to be of more substance in justifying some deviations from population-based representation in state legislatures is that of insuring some voice to political subdivisions, as political subdivisions. Several factors make more than insubstantial claims that a State can rationally consider according political subdivisions some independent representation in at least one body of the state legislature, as long as the basic standard of equality of population among districts is maintained. Local governmental entities are frequently charged with various responsibilities incident to the operation of state government. In many States much of the legislature's activity involves the enactment of so-called local legislation, directed only to the concerns of particular political subdivisions. And a State may legitimately desire to construct districts along political subdivision lines to deter the possibilities of gerrymandering. However, permitting deviations from population-based representation does not mean that each local governmental unit or political subdivision can be given separate representation, regardless of population. 377 U.S. at 580-81. In Mahan a three-judge United States District Court had struck down the apportionment of the Virginia House of Delegates because of a 16.4% variation from the ideal district population, variances which the district court noted were traceable to the desire of the General Assembly to maintain the integrity of traditional county and city boundaries. With one exception, the delegate districts followed political jurisdictional lines of the counties and cities. That exception, Fairfax County, was allotted 10 delegates, but was divided into two five-member districts. The Court said in Mahan: We are not prepared to say that the decision of the people of Virginia to grant the General Assembly the power to enact local legislation dealing with the political subdivisions is irrational. And if that be so, the decision of the General Assembly to provide representation to subdivisions qua subdivisions in order to implement that constitutional power is likewise valid when measured against the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The inquiry then becomes whether it can reasonably be said that the state policy urged by Virginia to justify the divergences in the legislative reapportionment plan of the House is, indeed, furthered by the plan adopted by the legislature, and whether, if so justified, the divergences are also within tolerable limits. For a State's policy urged in justification of disparity in district population, however rational, cannot constitutionally be permitted to emasculate the goal of substantial equality. Id. at 325-26. The Court held: The policy of maintaining the integrity of political subdivision lines in the process of reapportioning a state legislature, the policy consistently advanced by Virginia as a justification for disparities in population among districts that elect members to the House of Delegates, is a rational one. It can reasonably be said, upon examination of the legislative plan, that it does in fact advance that policy. The population disparities that are permitted thereunder result in a maximum percentage deviation that we hold to be within tolerable constitutional limits. We, therefore, hold the General Assembly's plan for the reapportionment of the House of Delegates constitutional and reverse the District Court's conclusion to the contrary. Id. at 329-30. Kent County has adopted the home rule provisions provided by Maryland Constitution art. XI-F and Code (1957, 1973 Repl. Vol.) Art. 25B. Maryland Manual 1973-1974, 465 (1974). Neither Cecil County nor Queen Anne's County has home rule, thus necessitating the enactment of local legislation for those counties by the General Assembly. In fact, the voters of Cecil County rejected home rule at a referendum on the subject. The governmental powers and functions of the counties of Maryland were set forth for this Court by Judge Henderson in Maryland Committee v. Tawes, 229 Md. 406, 412, 184 A.2d 715 (1962). Judge Barnes in his dissenting opinion in Hughes v. Maryland Committee, 241 Md. 471, 498-503, 217 A.2d 273 (1966), correctly reviewed the functions of counties in greater depth. To say that a delegate elected by the voters of all three counties but required for election to reside, for instance, in Kent County will be concerned only with the interest of Kent County in the General Assembly is to pay little heed to the realities of political life. Since he is elected by all of the voters in the district, it seems safe to say that one who sees fit to ignore a substantial portion of his constituency undoubtedly will be rebuked when he is next obliged to face the electorate. Historically, the lower house of legislative bodies has been the one with the larger membership and regarded as closer to the people. Political scientists have taught that it is for precisely that reason that appropriations bills in the Congress of the United States must originate in the House of Representatives. The General Assembly when it convenes in January, 1975, will not have members elected on a county basis for the first time since the adoption of the Constitution of 1776. See generally J. Michener, The History of Legislative Apportionment in Maryland, 25 Md. L. Rev. 1 (1965). As we have previously indicated, the geography of this area is unusual. We believe that there is a legitimate state interest in scattering the delegates through the legislative district in such manner that no voter will be far removed from a delegate. Without this provision it would be entirely possible for all three delegates to be concentrated in the uppermost regions of Cecil County in an area where the travel time by automobile from, for instance, Stevensville or Queen Anne in Queen Anne's County would be in excess of one hour each way. With the insight provided by Dusch and Mahan and relying upon the rational bases set forth by the Supreme Court in Reynolds and Fortson, we overrule Bryson and hold the district validly established.