Appellant
City of Mobile Alabama, et al.
Appellee
Wiley L. Bolden, et al.
Appellant's Claim
That the city's at-large system of electing commissioners did not discriminate against African American citizens of the city.
Chief Lawyer for Appellant
Charles S. Rhyne
Chief Lawyer for Appellee
James U. Blacksher
Justices for the Court
Harry A. Blackmun, Warren E. Burger, Lewis F. Powell, Jr., William H. Rehnquist, John Paul Stevens, Potter Stewart (writing for the Court)
Justices Dissenting
William J. Brennan, Jr., Thurgood Marshall, Byron R. White
Place
Washington, D.C.
Date of Decision
22 April 1980
Decision
The Supreme Court held that the at-large election system did not discriminateagainst African American citizens, who could register and vote freely in Mobile.
Significance
The case was a strong blow against anti-discriminatory suits. It establishedthat discriminatory effects must be accompanied by intent.
Retreat from Civil Rights
Mobile v. Bolden was a widely criticized Supreme Court decision on theissue of racial discrimination. As part of a retreat from the wide-ranging reforms of the Civil Rights movement, the decision helped set the stage for adebate two years later over renewing the Voting Rights Act. Creating a stormof controversy, the Court rejected the idea that discriminatory effects wereenough to establish that an action was in violation of the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Amendment. Instead, the highly divided Court asserted, discriminatory purpose must be proved for an action to be judged unconstitutional. The Supreme Court thus overturned a U.S. district court judgment declaring Mobile's city government in violation of the Constitution.
Vote Dilution
The appellees claimed that the city's method of electing its commissioners discriminated against African Americans by diluting their votes. The Mobile City Commission consisted of three members elected at large from the entire city, rather than from particular districts. These three members jointly exercised all administrative, legislative, and executive power in the city. At the time the class action suit was brought against Mobile, no African American citizen had ever served on the commission, although the population of the city was approximately 35.4 percent African American.
The effect of the law had clearly been to keep African American citizens fromserving on the city commission. The appellees claimed that their voting rights under the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments had been denied. The SupremeCourt determined that the city had not denied African Americans their rightto vote under the Fifteenth Amendment, since African American citizens routinely registered and voted. The Fifteenth Amendment, declared Justice Stewart in the Court opinion, "imposes but one limitation on the powers of the states:it forbids them to discriminate against Negroes in matters having to do withvoting."
No Guarantee of Proportional Representation
More substantive were the appellees' claims under the Fourteenth Amendment, which guaranteed all citizens equal protection, due process, and all privileges and immunities of U.S. citizens. However, the Court declared that the cityhad not denied African Americans their rights under the Fourteenth Amendment,since there was no guarantee of proportional representation either stated orimplied in that amendment. The language was unambiguous: "The fact is that the Court has sternly set its face against the claim, however phrased, that the Constitution somehow guarantees proportional representation." The right toparticipate in elections guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment, wrote Stewart, "does not protect any `political group,' however defined, from electoral defeat."
The Court did not deny that the effect of Mobile's election laws had been tobar African Americans from participating in city government. However, in suchcases, the action could only be declared discriminatory if there was no other reason for it besides denying African Americans their right to vote. Referring to Guinn v. United States (1915), in which the Supreme Court struck down a literacy requirement's "grandfather clause," Stewart wrote that suchcases involved a statute in place for no possible reason other than disenfranchising African American citizens. No such exclusively discriminatory intentcould be established for Mobile's election laws, even if they did arise frompartly invidious motives.
Discriminatory Effect vs. Discriminatory Intent
Part of the controversy may have arisen from the strong language in which theCourt rejected past effects as a means of establishing discrimination. "Pastdiscrimination," wrote Stewart, "cannot, in the manner of original sin, condemn government action that is not itself unlawful." But most controversial was the Court's wholesale rejection of disproportionate effects as a means forestablishing discriminatory intent. Steward wrote that "disproportionate impact alone cannot be decisive, and courts must look to other evidence to support a finding of discriminatory purpose."
Justice Marshall wrote a lengthy and impassioned dissent, accusing the Courtof helping to perpetuate racial discrimination. If voting practices that ledto vote dilution were acceptable to the Court, Marshall wrote, "the right tovote provides the politically powerless with nothing more than the right to cast meaningless ballots." He did not mince words in implying that the consequences of such a position could be civil disobedience: "If this Court refusesto honor our long-recognized principle that the Constitution `nullifies sophisticated as well as simple-minded modes of discrimination' . . . it cannot expect the victims of discrimination to respect political channels of seeking redress."
Mobile v. Bolden was certainly a move away from the civil rights legislation of the preceding era, and toward the retreat from reform that dominated the 1980s. The controversy surrounding the decision lasted for some time, and contributed toward the extension in 1982 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Opposed by the Reagan administration, which wanted to allow the Voting Rights Act to expire completely, the amended section two of the act allowed for limited use of an effects standard, giving plaintiffs the right to challenge a voting practice by proving discrimination in its effects, based on a totality ofevidence. The language of the amended act, however, is careful to disallow the use of section two to establish racial quotas or allow any claim to a right to proportionate representation.
Related Cases
City of Mobile Alabama, et al.
Appellee
Wiley L. Bolden, et al.
Appellant's Claim
That the city's at-large system of electing commissioners did not discriminate against African American citizens of the city.
Chief Lawyer for Appellant
Charles S. Rhyne
Chief Lawyer for Appellee
James U. Blacksher
Justices for the Court
Harry A. Blackmun, Warren E. Burger, Lewis F. Powell, Jr., William H. Rehnquist, John Paul Stevens, Potter Stewart (writing for the Court)
Justices Dissenting
William J. Brennan, Jr., Thurgood Marshall, Byron R. White
Place
Washington, D.C.
Date of Decision
22 April 1980
Decision
The Supreme Court held that the at-large election system did not discriminateagainst African American citizens, who could register and vote freely in Mobile.
Significance
The case was a strong blow against anti-discriminatory suits. It establishedthat discriminatory effects must be accompanied by intent.
Retreat from Civil Rights
Mobile v. Bolden was a widely criticized Supreme Court decision on theissue of racial discrimination. As part of a retreat from the wide-ranging reforms of the Civil Rights movement, the decision helped set the stage for adebate two years later over renewing the Voting Rights Act. Creating a stormof controversy, the Court rejected the idea that discriminatory effects wereenough to establish that an action was in violation of the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Amendment. Instead, the highly divided Court asserted, discriminatory purpose must be proved for an action to be judged unconstitutional. The Supreme Court thus overturned a U.S. district court judgment declaring Mobile's city government in violation of the Constitution.
Vote Dilution
The appellees claimed that the city's method of electing its commissioners discriminated against African Americans by diluting their votes. The Mobile City Commission consisted of three members elected at large from the entire city, rather than from particular districts. These three members jointly exercised all administrative, legislative, and executive power in the city. At the time the class action suit was brought against Mobile, no African American citizen had ever served on the commission, although the population of the city was approximately 35.4 percent African American.
The effect of the law had clearly been to keep African American citizens fromserving on the city commission. The appellees claimed that their voting rights under the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments had been denied. The SupremeCourt determined that the city had not denied African Americans their rightto vote under the Fifteenth Amendment, since African American citizens routinely registered and voted. The Fifteenth Amendment, declared Justice Stewart in the Court opinion, "imposes but one limitation on the powers of the states:it forbids them to discriminate against Negroes in matters having to do withvoting."
No Guarantee of Proportional Representation
More substantive were the appellees' claims under the Fourteenth Amendment, which guaranteed all citizens equal protection, due process, and all privileges and immunities of U.S. citizens. However, the Court declared that the cityhad not denied African Americans their rights under the Fourteenth Amendment,since there was no guarantee of proportional representation either stated orimplied in that amendment. The language was unambiguous: "The fact is that the Court has sternly set its face against the claim, however phrased, that the Constitution somehow guarantees proportional representation." The right toparticipate in elections guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment, wrote Stewart, "does not protect any `political group,' however defined, from electoral defeat."
The Court did not deny that the effect of Mobile's election laws had been tobar African Americans from participating in city government. However, in suchcases, the action could only be declared discriminatory if there was no other reason for it besides denying African Americans their right to vote. Referring to Guinn v. United States (1915), in which the Supreme Court struck down a literacy requirement's "grandfather clause," Stewart wrote that suchcases involved a statute in place for no possible reason other than disenfranchising African American citizens. No such exclusively discriminatory intentcould be established for Mobile's election laws, even if they did arise frompartly invidious motives.
Discriminatory Effect vs. Discriminatory Intent
Part of the controversy may have arisen from the strong language in which theCourt rejected past effects as a means of establishing discrimination. "Pastdiscrimination," wrote Stewart, "cannot, in the manner of original sin, condemn government action that is not itself unlawful." But most controversial was the Court's wholesale rejection of disproportionate effects as a means forestablishing discriminatory intent. Steward wrote that "disproportionate impact alone cannot be decisive, and courts must look to other evidence to support a finding of discriminatory purpose."
Justice Marshall wrote a lengthy and impassioned dissent, accusing the Courtof helping to perpetuate racial discrimination. If voting practices that ledto vote dilution were acceptable to the Court, Marshall wrote, "the right tovote provides the politically powerless with nothing more than the right to cast meaningless ballots." He did not mince words in implying that the consequences of such a position could be civil disobedience: "If this Court refusesto honor our long-recognized principle that the Constitution `nullifies sophisticated as well as simple-minded modes of discrimination' . . . it cannot expect the victims of discrimination to respect political channels of seeking redress."
Mobile v. Bolden was certainly a move away from the civil rights legislation of the preceding era, and toward the retreat from reform that dominated the 1980s. The controversy surrounding the decision lasted for some time, and contributed toward the extension in 1982 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Opposed by the Reagan administration, which wanted to allow the Voting Rights Act to expire completely, the amended section two of the act allowed for limited use of an effects standard, giving plaintiffs the right to challenge a voting practice by proving discrimination in its effects, based on a totality ofevidence. The language of the amended act, however, is careful to disallow the use of section two to establish racial quotas or allow any claim to a right to proportionate representation.
Related Cases
- Ex parte Yarbrough, 110 U.S. 651 (1884).
- Guinn v. United States, 238 U.S. 347 (1915).
- Ashwander v. Tennessee Valley Authority, 297 U.S. 288 (1936).
- Gomillion v. Lightfoot, 364 U.S. 339 (1960).
- Wright v. Rockefeller, 376 U.S. 52 (1964).
- Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533 (1964).
- Whitcomb v. Chavis, 403 U.S. 124 (1971).
- Personal Administrator of Massachusetts v. Feeney, 442 U.S. 256 (1979).
User Comments Add a comment…