Opinion ID: 727396
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Sufficiently large and geographically compact

Text: 21 The first question, whether the minority group is sufficiently large and geographically compact to constitute a majority in a single-member district, simply asks whether any remedy is possible in the first instance. As Gingles noted: 22 The reason that a minority group making such a challenge must show, as a threshold matter, that it is sufficiently large and geographically compact to constitute a majority in a single-member district is this: Unless minority voters possess the potential to elect representatives in the absence of the challenged structure or practice, they cannot claim to have been injured by that structure or practice. 23 478 U.S. at 50 n. 17, 106 S.Ct. at 2766 n. 17 (emphasis in original). As a corollary, if the minority group is small and dispersed, no single member district could be created to remedy its grievance. 24 Hence, the first prerequisite asks about the existence of a legally cognizable injury. NAACP, Inc. v. City of Niagara Falls, N.Y., 65 F.3d 1002, 1011 (2d Cir.1995). As such, this element of proof assists a court in finding a reasonable alternative practice as a benchmark against which to measure the existing voting practice. Holder v. Hall, 512 U.S. 874, ----, 114 S.Ct. 2581, 2585, 129 L.Ed.2d 687 (1994). 12 The inquiries into remedy and liability, therefore, cannot be separated: A district court must determine as part of the Gingles threshold inquiry whether it can fashion a permissible remedy in the particular context of the challenged system. Nipper v. Smith, 39 F.3d 1494, 1530-31 (11th Cir.1994), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 115 S.Ct. 1795, 131 L.Ed.2d 723 (1995). 25 Because Gingles advances a functional evaluation of whether the minority population is large enough to form a district in the first instance, the Circuits have been flexible in assessing the showing made for this precondition. 26 The first Gingles precondition does not require some aesthetic ideal of compactness, but simply that the black population be sufficiently compact to constitute a majority in a single-member district. Moreover, plaintiffs' proposed district is not cast in stone. It was simply presented to demonstrate that a majority-black district is feasible.... If a § 2 violation is found, the county will be given the first opportunity to develop a remedial plan. 27 Clark v. Calhoun County, Miss., 21 F.3d 92, 95 (5th Cir.1994) (citations omitted); see also Houston v. Lafayette County, Miss., 56 F.3d 606, 611 (5th Cir.1995) (Compactness is not as narrow a standard as the district court construed it to be.). 28 Geographical compactness, then, does not implicate constitutional principles. The Constitution does not mandate regularity of district shape, the Court recently stated in Bush v. Vera, --- U.S. at ----, 116 S.Ct. at 1953 (citing Shaw v. Reno, 509 U.S. 630, 647, 113 S.Ct. 2816, 2826-27, 125 L.Ed.2d 511 (1993)) (Shaw I ). Instead, Justice Kennedy clarified, The first Gingles condition refers to the compactness of the minority population, not to the compactness of the contested district. Id. at ----, 116 S.Ct. at 1971, (Kennedy, J., concurring). Stating the concept in a different way, we must determine whether the affected minority is diffused and thus politically ineffective, not whether the area by which it is bound is geographically dense. 29 Nevertheless, as we shall see in this case, and as demonstrated recently in Shaw II and Bush, compactness is the conceptual point at which the tension between the traditional American commitment to territorial districting and the VRA concern for fair representation of group interests must be resolved. Richard H. Pildes & Richard G. Niemi, Expressive Harms, Bizarre Districts, and Voting Rights: Evaluating Election District Appearances after Shaw v. Reno, 92 Mich. L.Rev. 483, 535 (1993) [hereinafter Expressive Harms ]. And, as Shaw I warned, appearances do matter, 509 U.S. at 647, 113 S.Ct. at 2827, triggering, as they do, Fourteenth Amendment equal protection scrutiny.