THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, July 1, 1995 TAG: 9507010500
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A8 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY WARREN FISKE, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium: 61 lines
A number of black-majority voting districts across Virginia could face constitutional challenges under a new U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
In striking down a congressional redistricting plan in Georgia, the high court ruled 5-4 Thursday that race should not be ``the predominant factor'' in drawing political district boundaries.
The decision, experts say, could threaten the future of the 3rd Congressional District, which runs from Norfolk to Richmond. The district, established in 1991, has a 64 percent AfricanAmerican population and is represented by Democrat Robert C. Scott, who is Virginia's first black congressman.
Also susceptible to challenge are many of the General Assembly's 17 majority-black districts and possibly several city and county council wards across the state.
``This is the most damaging civil rights decision in more than 30 years,'' said Kent Willis, director of the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which has pushed hard for expanded minority representation. ``This is a dramatic turning back of the clock.''
Willis said Scott's district and those of several black state lawmakers were created by the General Assembly in 1991 with the specific intent of increasing black representation. Former Gov. L. Douglas Wilder vetoed several redistricting plans that year until the legislature heeded his demand that it create the maximum-possible five black districts in the state Senate.
``The General Assembly interpreted the Voting Rights Act as saying, `If a black-majority district can be created, it must be created,' '' Willis said.
Willis said he does not expect an immediate challenge to Virginia's political boundaries. Redistricting lawsuits frequently cost more than $100,000, he said, and would be prohibitive to most citizens.
The state's political parties, he added, appear to have little incentive to file their own suits. All 17 majority-black districts in the General Assembly are represented by Democrats. For the Democratic Party, that means a challenge would be akin to taking on its own incumbents.
And the state Republican Party worked closely with the ACLU and the NAACP in 1991 to create as many black districts as possible. GOP leaders at the time acknowledged that the pooling of black votes into boundaries created a number of new white, conservative-leaning districts in the suburbs.
Willis said the impact of the Supreme Court's decision may not be felt in Virginia until 2001, when the General Assembly is next required to draw new congressional and legislative districts.
He suggested that the seat held by state Sen. L. Louise Lucas, D-Portsmouth, may be particularly vulnerable. Her majority-black district stretches 180 miles from the inner-city of Portsmouth to the farming regions of Halifax County. A suit charging that the district was racially gerrymandered was thrown out of court in 1991. ILLUSTRATION: Map
KEYWORDS: REDISTRICTING by CNB