petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to grant ... - Election Law Blog

60aAppendix DPlaintiff has not employed an ad hoc procedure toconstruct the illustrative districts. See Kirkpatrick v.Preisler, 394 U.S. 526, 535, 89 S.Ct. 1225, 22 L.Ed.2d 519(1969) (post-Census population shifts may be consideredif they are “thoroughly documented and applied throughthe state in a systematic, not an ad hoc, manner”). Rather,Plaintiff determined that the 2000 Census figures nolonger apply, according to 2006 ACS data that showedrapid growth in Hispanic CVAP and a concurrent fall innon-Hispanic CVAP. Plaintiff then implemented a clearand direct way of estimating Hispanic CVAP and non-Hispanic CVAP in illustrative districts-applying city-widegrowth rates reflected in the ACS to the districts. Thus,the Court concludes that Plaintiff’s methodology was notad hoc, and the estimated HCVAP numbers for 2008 areclear, cogent, and convincing to override the presumptivecorrectness of the prior Census.3. CompactnessGingles requires that the proposed district advancedby the plaintiffs be geographically compact. See Shawv. Hunt, 517 U.S. 899, 916, 116 S.Ct. 1894, 135 L.Ed.2d207 (1996) (finding no Section 2 violation where “no onelooking at [that district] could reasonably suggest that thedistrict contains a ‘geographically compact’ population ofany race”). The Supreme Court has “refused to considera noncompact district as a possible remedy for a [Section2] violation.” LULAC, 548 U.S. at 431, 126 S.Ct. 2594(citing Shaw, 517 U.S. at 916, 116 S.Ct. 1894). The inquiryinto compactness should consider “traditional districtingprinciples such as maintaining communities of interestand traditional boundaries.” Id. (internal quotes omitted).