The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to hear a case that could determine how states are expected to draw equal legislative districts.
The case — Evenwel v. Abbott — stems from the 2013 redistricting of 31 seats in the Texas Senate, which was based on 2010 census population figures alone. Texas voters Sue Evenwel and Edward Pfenninger sued then-Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) and then-Texas Secretary of State Nandita Berry for allegedly violating the “one-person, one-vote” principle of the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause by not dividing districts in a manner that equalized both total population and voter population.
This principle requires that, “when members of an elected body are chosen from separate districts, each district must be established on a basis that will insure, as far as is practicable, that equal numbers of voters can vote for proportionally equal numbers of officials.”
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the state, which argued there was no legal basis for Evenwel and Pfenninger’s claims that the new election districts were unconstitutional.
In their decision, three appellate judges said the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution does not require states to use total population figures derived from the federal census as the standard for measuring equal districts, nor does it specify that voter population has to be considered.
“Instead, the court has explained that the limit on the metric employed is that it must not itself be the result of a discriminatory choice and that, so long as the legislature’s choice is not constitutionally forbidden, the federal courts must respect the legislature’s prerogative,” the judges said in their ruling.
Evenwel and Pfenninger are appealing the lower court’s decision. Current Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is named as the defendant in suit in place of Perry.