Baker v. Carr, Civ. A. No. 2724.

• Decision Date: 22 June 1962
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 2724.
• Citation: 206 F. Supp. 341
• Parties: Charles BAKER et al., Plaintiffs, v. Joe C. CARR et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Middle District of Tennessee

206 F. Supp. 341

Charles BAKER et al., Plaintiffs, v. Joe C. CARR et al., Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 2724.

United States District Court M. D. Tennessee, Nashville Division.

June 22, 1962.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Z. T. Osborn, Jr., Nashville, Tenn., Walter Chandler, Memphis, Tenn., Hobart F. Atkins, Knoxville, Tenn., for original plaintiffs.

Ben West, Mayor, City of Nashville, Tenn., Harris Gilbert, Robert Jennings, Jr., City Atty., Z. T. Osborn, Jr., Nashville, Tenn., Charles S. Rhyne, Washington, D. C., for intervening plaintiffs.

E. K. Meacham, J. W. Anderson, City Atty., Chattanooga, Tenn., for City of Chattanooga, Tenn.

George F. McCanless, Atty. Gen., Milton P. Rice, David M. Pack, Asst. Attys. Gen., State of Tennessee, Nashville, Tenn., for original defendants.

Edwin F. Hunt, Nashville, Tenn., for intervenor defendant, Tennessee Farm Bureau Federation, Inc.

C. R. McClain, Director of Law, Knoxville, Tenn., City of Knoxville, Tenn.

Cecil Branstetter, Nashville, Tenn., Tennessee State Labor Council, AFL-CIO.

Before WEICK, Circuit Judge, and BOYD and MILLER, District Judges.

PER CURIAM.

This action is before the Court upon remand from the Supreme Court following its ruling that federal courts have jurisdiction of actions involving invidious discriminations in the distribution of state legislative seats. Baker et al. v. Carr et al., 369 U.S. 186, 82 S.Ct. 691, 7 L.Ed.2d 663. It was specifically held by the Supreme Court (a) that this Court possessed jurisdiction of the subject matter; (b) that a justiciable cause of action was stated upon which plaintiffs would be entitled to appropriate relief, and (c) that the plaintiffs have standing to challenge the Tennessee apportionment statutes.¹

Upon receipt of the mandate from the Supreme Court on April 23, 1962, notice was given by the Court to the attorneys of record that a pre-trial conference would be held on May 7, 1962, for the purpose of discussing and considering the issues of fact and law to be tried, amendments to pleadings, identification of exhibits and documents, possible stipulations of fact, and any additional matters calculated to expedite the conclusion of the litigation. The order calling for the pre-trial conference stated that the Court would consider at the time of the conference motions which any party desired to file.

At the conference the Attorney General of Tennessee, appearing for the original defendants, stated that he had been authorized to advise the Court that the Governor of Tennessee would issue a call for a special session of the General Assembly to consider the question of legislative reapportionment in view of the ruling of the Supreme Court in the present case. He thereupon moved for a stay of any further proceedings herein until the General Assembly of Tennessee had convened in special session and had acted upon the matter of legislative reapportionment. A ruling on this motion was reserved by the Court, and June 11, 1962 was set as the date for a further hearing to consider all questions involved, including motions by any party. In the meantime, a vacancy having occurred in the original three-judge court due to the death of Circuit Judge John D. Martin, the present three-judge court was constituted by the Chief Judge of the Sixth Circuit.

Pursuant to the call of the Governor the General Assembly convened in extraordinary session in Nashville on May 29, 1962, and enacted two separate acts reapportioning legislative seats. Public Chapter No. 1, Extraordinary Session of 1962, reapportioning seats in the House of Representatives, was passed on June 6, 1962. Public Chapter No. 3, reapportioning Senate seats, was also passed on June 6, 1962. Both acts were approved by the Governor on June 7, 1962.

The question now presented to the Court upon motion for summary judgment is whether the two 1962 statutes reapportioning legislative seats in the General Assembly of Tennessee are constitutional when measured in terms of the requirements of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution.²

Having heard extensive arguments by the attorneys for the respective parties on June 11, 1962, and having fully considered the record, our views with respect to each Act will be set forth followed by a statement as to the procedural steps to be taken to correct the deficiencies which have been found to exist in the respective statutes.

GUIDING CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLES

In its opinion in the present case the Supreme Court, although not specifying exact standards or criteria under the equal protection clause for testing the sufficiency of legislative apportionments, did indicate certain guidelines which are applicable and controlling in assessing the 1962 statutes here in question. Thus in the majority opinion the Supreme Court, in referring to the plaintiffs' claim, stated that such claim was in substance "that the 1901 statute constitutes arbitrary and capricious state action, offensive to the Fourteenth Amendment in its irrational disregard of the standard of apportionment prescribed by the State's Constitution or of any standard, effecting a gross disproportion of representation to voting population." It was further stated that "the injury which appellants assert is that this classification disfavors the voters in the counties in which they reside, placing them in a position of constitutionally unjustifiable inequality vis-à-vis voters in irrationally favored counties." 369 U.S. at pp. 207-208, 82 S.Ct. at p. 698. The crux of the Court's ruling was that a claim so characterized presents a justiciable cause of action of which federal courts have jurisdiction. It would clearly appear, therefore, that if a state legislative classification for apportionment purposes is wholly irrational and arbitrary, supported neither by the standard of the state nor by any other standard, it is outside the permissible limits of the Fourteenth Amendment. This view of the test to be applied in the present case is borne out by the concurring opinion of Mr. Justice Douglas in his reference to "egregious injustices," by the concurring opinion of Mr. Justice Clark in which he states that while mathematical equality among voters is not required, "there must be some rational design to a state's districting," by the concurring opinion of Mr. Justice Stewart in which he states that the complaint in the present case asserts that "Tennessee's system of apportionment is utterly arbitrary — without any possible justification in rationality," and finally by the repeated references in the majority and concurring opinions to the proscription by the equal protection clause of "invidious discriminations."

It is in accordance with these governing principles that the apportionment statutes now in issue are to be evaluated. Do the statutes establish classifications predicated upon a rational basis, or are they utterly arbitrary and lacking in rationality? There can be no doubt that the majority of the Supreme Court ruled in this case, as stated by Mr. Justice Clark, at least sub silentio, that invidious discriminations were present in the 1901 reapportionment statute and that it fell far short of the standards of the equal protection clause. This was the view of the defendants at the pre-trial conference when they stated that they would not attempt to defend the 1901 statute, Acts 1901, c. 122.³

The question before us is whether the invidious discriminations, obviously present in the 1901 statute, have been removed by the 1962 reapportionment statutes. We consider, first, the Act reapportioning seats in the House of Representatives (Public Chapter No. 1, Extraordinary Session of 1962). While this Act eliminates or mollifies some of the most glaring inequities referred to in the Supreme Court's majority and concurring opinions, and while it can be explained in some of its major features upon a basis which we are not prepared to say at this time is within itself irrational, it nevertheless possesses some inequities and inequalities which in our opinion should be corrected or removed in order to avoid grave doubts as to its constitutionality.

THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

The Constitution of Tennessee, Article 2, Section 5, provides that the ninety-nine members of the House of Representatives, at the several periods of making the enumeration, shall be "apportioned among the several counties or districts, according to the qualified voters in each," with the proviso that any county having two-thirds of the ratio shall be entitled to one member.⁴ With some exceptions to be commented upon hereinafter, the act reapportioning the House follows the plan of the Tennessee Constitution in allotting to those counties having two-thirds the ratio⁵ a direct representative. The same two-thirds principle is extended by the 1962 Act to floterial districts comprising two or more counties.⁶ The result of this extension of the two-thirds rule to floterial districts is, of course, to take some seats away from larger counties and districts. One reason for the rule embodied in the Constitution of the state is to afford a measure of protection to governmental units or subdivisions of the state not having a sufficient number of voters to equal the full ratio but yet having a substantial population and possessing significant and substantial interests in state legislative policy. Such a state plan for distribution of legislative strength, at least in one house of a bicameral legislature, cannot, in our opinion, be characterized as per se irrational or arbitrary. And we think the same conclusion follows if this principle is extended in the same legislative house of a bicameral legislature so as to afford substantial representation to smaller counties by classifying or arranging them in floterial districts. We find no basis for holding that the Fourteenth Amendment precludes a state from enforcing a policy which would give a measure of protection and...