The Alabama conference of the NAACP alleges violations of the Voting Rights Act in state judicial elections, in a lawsuit filed Wednesday morning.
The suit claims the state’s at-large method of electing judges deprives minority voters of electing candidates of their choice — all 19 elected judges on the Alabama appeals courts are white. No African American has been elected to a judicial post in Alabama in more than a decade. Blacks account for a quarter of the state’s population.
“In 2016, Alabama’s appellate courts are no more diverse than they were when the Voting Rights Act (VRA) was signed more than 50 years ago,” said Kristen Clarke, executive director of the public interest law group representing the plaintiffs. “It is time for the highest courts in the state of Alabama to reflect the diversity of the communities they serve.”
The coalition contends that the at-large voting method effectively disenfranchises the state’s black population. Currently, appellate judges are elected on a statewide basis. Plaintiffs allege that whites outvote blacks by casting ballots as a bloc (whites account for around 70 percent of all Alabama voters) ensuring an ethically homogeneous judiciary. On this point, the group’s brief pulls no punches. “The at-large method of electing judges to the three high courts submerges African-American voters so that they are rendered ineffective electoral minorities in every election,” it reads. (RELATED: Supreme Court Turns Down North Carolina’s Request To Enforce Voting Restrictions Law)
Such vote dilution, they claim, is unlawful. Lawyers told a press call with reporters that the U.S. Supreme Court established that the VRA is applicable against state judicial elections in Chisom v. Roemer. “We have not seen tremendous enforcement of the Voting Rights Act in this area historically,” Clarke told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “The Lawyers’ Committee and our co-counsel are committed to using the Voting Rights Act as a tool to ensure that those courts across our country that continue to elect judges and not appoint them use election systems that provide an equal opportunity for all voters to elect judges of their choice.”
The plaintiffs propose that the state be divided into separate districts with separate elections to attain an enduring minority presence in the state appeals courts and on the Alabama Supreme Court. A similar suit is currently under way in Texas.
The suit was brought by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, in conjunction with attorneys from Crowell & Moring and Stroock & Stoock & Lavan. The plaintiffs are the Alabama NAACP and four other individuals.
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