Significant order entered by Judge Moore yesterday in the racial gerrymandering lawsuit filed against the City of Miami. After holding a bench trial back in January, Judge Moore ruled that the City violated the Constitution by drawing voting maps with the goal of having various districts in the City elect commissioners of certain races (specifically, three hispanic commissioners from the three majority Hispanic districts, a black commissioner from a majority Black district, and a white commissioner from a majority "Anglo" district).
The Court wrote: "[W]hether the City believed the pursuit of diversity in representation could justify racial gerrymandering is immaterial. The harm stems not from the City’s objective, but rather, from the City’s racial classification of every Miamian in pursuit of that goal. By sorting its citizens based on race, the City reduced Miamians to no more than their racial backgrounds, thereby denying them the equal protection of the laws that the Fourteenth Amendment promises."
Order excerpted below.
City of Miami Order (J. Moore) by John Byrne on Scribd
7 comments:
This is ultimately really common sense stuff. You can't have true racial equality if you reinforce racial differences and treat people differently based on race. Creating districts to protect racial representation has the perverse effect of multiplying racial division and ultimately perpetuating racial discrimination.
What will benefit racial minorities more than anything is ending the system that reinforces false and largely arbitrary racial differences based on deeply flawed 17th century thinking.
The color of a man's skin is of no greater significance than the color of his eyes. If the goal is to truly end racism, eliminate the words "black," "white," "anglo," "latino," "colored," etc. from your vocabulary as human descriptors.
What is mainly remarkable is how blatant the Miami politicians were about it. And that Judge Moore eviscerates the credibility of a Holland and Knight partner/redistricting "expert".
@Anomymous 10:11 am - Oh, I got it. The way to end racism is to ensure Black voters have no Black representatives on the city commish. Because we all know, and history has told us, that majority White and majority Hispanic communities in Miami will elect Black candidates if they only had the chance.
Hey! There will only be Hispanic. Don’t kid yourself. And by the way, that is okay too. They built this city, mine as well run it. I am a content gringo in this beautiful multicultural paradise. If I want to be governed by a bunch of crackers, I would move to some other county in Florida.
"partner/redistricting "expert"." There is a pejorative label for these types of experts. Leave it at that.
10:11's comments are truly astounding. I hope you are not a lawyer.
Arbitrary racial differences are 17th Century thinking? Jut one example, de facto school segration ended in Florida in 1970, about 50 years ago.
Skin color has the same significance as eye color? Have yound blue yeed men and women been begging to breathe or shot?
I do not doubt, however, your point that creating a majority-minority district to protect the right to vote multiplies racial division. Among white people.
Face it, Florida is a racist place..
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