Alabama Redistricting Decision Gives Hope To Voting-Rights Activists

Voting-rights advocates in North Carolina are watching a Supreme Court decision about redistricting in Alabama. In a 5 to 4 vote, the justices sent the case back to a lower court over concerns that the maps cluster too many black voters in too few districts.

North Carolina's voting maps have also been the subject of a lawsuit based on similar arguments against districts drawn in 2011 by the Republican-led legislature.

Anita Earls is lead attorney for the plaintiffs in Dickson v. Rucho. She says relying on race as a criteria leads to unfair elections.

“In some neighborhoods, apartment complexes on one side of the street are in one district and on the other they're in another district and it's explicitly racially based," she says. "And it continues this notion for voters and candidates and communities that their interests fall on racial lines when in fact people across racial lines have very similar interests and concerns and want the same thing.”

The 2011 North Carolina districts have been approved by the state supreme court. The plaintiffs have appealed to the U.S Supreme Court. Earls says she expects to know next month if the Supreme Court will hear the case.