Most people who work on, or follow, civil rights issues in the U.S. woke up on Thursday, June 8, 2023, with a feeling of impending doom. That morning, the U.S. Supreme Court was expected to announce its ruling in the Allen v. Milligan case, which derived from a lawsuit challenging Alabama’s congressional map for diluting the voting power of Black voters in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA), the law’s most critical remaining provision. The Court’s decision would determine whether the VRA, one of the most important laws in U.S. history, remained in place in any meaningful form. Few, if any, thought it would survive.

By: Wesley Muller

The legal battle to determine the boundaries of Louisiana’s congressional districts is now taking place simultaneously at all three levels of the federal judiciary, and the parties involved are fighting on multiple fronts. The decision comes down to whether Black voters will hold a majority in one or two of the state’s six U.S. House districts.

As a federal judge in Baton Rouge prepares to draw her version of a map that will feature two majority-Black districts, an appellate court panel contemplates her ruling to reject a single-Black district map that Republican lawmakers approved in February. Meanwhile, GOP state leaders have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay the district judge’s original decision.