Supreme Court Tosses North Carolina Electoral Maps

North Carolina's electoral maps may be headed back to the drawing board - the US Supreme Court has thrown them out for relying too much on race.

At issue is whether Republican lawmakers packed too many black voters in too few districts when they drew the maps after taking over the General Assembly in 2011.

The state Supreme Court – which had upheld the maps – must now review them again. Anita Earls is lead attorney for the plaintiffs. She says the State Supreme Court had struggled with the race issue when it upheld the maps last year and Monday's ruling will give them more direction.

“When a government uses race in decision making, particularly in something as fundamental as deciding how our election districts are going to be drawn, there needs to be a compelling governmental interest, and that's the standard I think that the North Carolina districts don't satisfy,” she says.

Earls believes new maps can be drawn in time for the 2016 elections.

The Chairmen of the General Assembly's Redistricting Committee, Rep. David Lewis and Sen. Bob Rucho, released a statement in response to Monday's ruling.

“Since 2011, every court that has issued an opinion and the Obama Justice Department has reached the same conclusion – North Carolina's redistricting maps are constitutional. Today's procedural ruling is not unexpected and we are confident that our state Supreme Court will once again arrive at the same result and the U.S. Supreme Court will affirm its decision.”

In an interview with WFDD in November, Rucho denied that the maps were gerrymandered. He said then that the maps had to be drawn the way they were to meet the requirements of the Federal Voting Act, which prohibits maps that dilute the voting strengths of minorities.

“We don't have a choice because the law is clear: that districts that have a population that can comprise of 50-percent-plus of that district, have to be able to have a majority of minority voters,” he says.

The Supreme Court's decision comes in the wake of a similar decision in March on race-based districts in Alabama.

Jane Pinsky, director of the non-partisan North Carolina Coalition for Lobbying and Government Reform, says the ruling sends a message that North Carolina needs a new way to draw districts.

"It's time for North Carolina to have a non-partisan system that creates fair, impartial districts," she says.

There's a bill in the legislature now that would establish such a system - House Bill 92. Pinsky urged the General Assembly to move forward with the bill.