Davis v. Mann, 69
| Decision Date | 15 June 1964 |
| Docket Number | No. 69,69 |
| Citation | 12 L.Ed.2d 609,377 U.S. 678,84 S.Ct. 1441 |
| Parties | Levin Nock DAVIS, Secretary, State Board of Elections, et al., Appellants, v. Harrison MANN et al |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Va., for appellants.
Edmund D. Campbell, Arlington, Va., and Henry E. Howell, Jr., Norfolk, Va., for appellees.
Archibald Cox, Sol. Gen., for the United States, as amicus curiae, by special leave of Court.
Presented for decision in this case is the validity, under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution, of the apportionment of seats in the legislature of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
Plaintiffs below, residents, taxpayers and qualified voters of Arlington and Fairfax Counties, filed a complaint on April 9, 1962, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, in their own behalf and on behalf of all voters in Virginia similarly situated, challenging the apportionment of the Virginia General Assembly. Defendants, sued in their representative capacities, were various officials charged with duties in connection with state elections. Plaintiffs claimed rights under provisions of the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983, 1988 and asserted jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1343(3).
The complaint alleged that the present statutory provisions apportioning seats in the Virginia Legislature, as amended in 1962, result in indivious discrimination against plaintiffs and 'all other voters of the State Senatorial and House districts' in which they reside, since voters in Arlington and Fairfax Counties are given substantially less representation than voters living in other parts of the State. Plaintiffs asserted that the discrimination was violative of the Fourteenth Amendment as well as the Virginia Constitution, and contended that the requirements of the Equal Protection Clause of the Federal Constitution, and of the Virginia Constitution, could be met only by a redistribution of legislative representation among the counties and independent cities of the State 'substantially in proportion to their respective populations.' Plaintiffs asserted that they 'possess an inherent right to vote for members of the General Assembly * * * and to cast votes that are equally effective with the votes of every other citizen' of Virginia, and that this right was being diluted and effectively denied by the discriminatory apportionment of seats in both houses of the Virginia Legislature under the statutory provisions attacked as being unconstitutional. Plaintiffs contended that the alleged inequalities and distortions in the allocation of legislative seats prevented the Virginia Legislature from 'being a body representative of the people of the Commonwealth,' and resulted in a minority of the people of Virginia controlling the General Assembly.
The complaint requested the convening of a three-judge District Court. With respect to relief, plaintiffs sought a declaratory judgment that the statutory scheme of legislative apportionment in Virginia, prior as well as subsequent to the 1962 amendments, contravenes the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and is thus unconstitutional and void. Plaintiffs also requested the issuance of a prohibitory injunction restraining defendants from performing their official duties relating to the election of members of the General Assembly pursuant to the present statutory provisions. Plain- tiffs further sought a mandatory injunction requiring defendants to conduct the next primary and general elections for legislators on an at-large basis throughout the State.
A three-judge District Court was promptly convened. Residents and voters of the City of Norfolk were permitted to intervene as plaintiffs against the original defendants and against certain additional defendants, election officials in Norfolk. On June 20, 1962, all of the plaintiffs obtained leave to amend the complaint by adding an additional prayer for relief which requested that, unless the General Assembly 'promptly and fairly' reapportioned the legislative districts, the Court should reapportion the districts by its own order so as to accord the parties and others similarly situated 'fair and proportionate' representation in the Virginia Legislature.
Evidence presented to the District Court by plaintiffs included basic figures showing the populations of the various districts from which senators and delegates are elected and the number of seats assigned to each. From that data various statistical comparisons were derived. Since the 1962 reapportionment measures were enacted only two days before the complaint was filed and made only small changes in the statutory provisions relating to legislative apportionment, which had been last amended in 1958, the evidence submitted covered both the present and the last previous apportionments. Defendants introduced various exhibits showing the numbers of military and military-related personnel in the City of Norfolk and in Arlington and Fairfax Counties, disparities from population-based representation among the various States in the Federal Electoral College, and results of a comparative study of state legislative apportionment which show Virginia as ranking eighth among the States in population-based legislative representativeness, as reapportioned in 1962.
On November 28, 1962, the District Court, with one judge dissenting, sustained plaintiffs' claim and entered an interlocutory order holding the apportionment of the Virginia Legislature violative of the Federal Constitution. 213 F.Supp. 577. The Court refused to dismiss the case or stay its action on the ground, asserted by defendants, that plaintiffs should be required first to procure the views of the state courts on the validity of the apportionment scheme. Instead, it held that, since neither the 1962 legislation nor the relevant state constitutional provisions were ambiguous, no question of state law necessitating abstention by the Federal District Court was presented. In applying the Equal Protection Clause to the Virginia apportionment scheme, the Court stated that, although population is the predominant consideration, other factors may be of some relevance 'in assaying the justness of the apportionment.' Stating that the Federal Constitution requires a state legislative apportionment to 'accord the citizens of the State substantially equal representation,' the Court held that the inequalities found in the statistical information relating to the population of the State's various legislative districts, if unexplained, sufficiently showed an 'individious discrimination' against plaintiffs and those similarly situated. The Court rejected any possibility of different bases of representation being applicable in the two houses of the Virginia Legislature, stating that, in Virginia, each house has 'a direct, indeed the same, relation to the people,' and that the principal present-day justification for bicameralism in state legislatures in to insure against precipitate action by imposing greater deliberation upon proposed legislation. Because of the gross inequalities in representation among various districts in both houses of the Virginia Legislature, the Court put the burden of explanation on defendants, and found that they had failed to meet it. Consequently, the Court concluded that the discrimina- tion against Arlington and Fairfax Counties and the City of Norfolk was a grave and 'constitutionally impermissible' deprivation, violative of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
With respect to relief, the Court stated that, while it would have preferred that the General Assembly itself correct the unconstitutionality of the 1962 apportionment legislation, it would not defer deciding the case until after the next regular session of the Virginia Legislature in January 1964, because senators elected in November 1963 would hold office until 1968 and delegates elected in 1963 would serve until 1966. Deferring action would thus result in unreasonable delay in correcting the injustices in the apportionment of the Senate and the House of Delegates, concluded the Court.
The District Court's interlocutory order declared that the 1962 apportionment violated the Equal Protection Clause and accordingly was void and of no effect. It also restrained and enjoined defendants from proceeding with the conducting of elections under the 1962 legislation, but stayed the operation of the injunction until January 31, 1963, so that either the General Assembly could act or an appeal could be taken to this Court, provided that, if neither of these steps was taken, plaintiffs might apply to the District Court for further relief. Finally, the court below retained jurisdiction of the case for the entry of such orders as might be required.
An appeal to this Court was timely noted by defendants. On application by appellants, THE CHIEF JUSTICE, on December 15, 1962, granted a stay o the District Court's injunction pending final disposition of the case by this Court. Because of this stay, the November 1963 election of members of the Virginia Legislature was conducted under the existing statutory provisions. We noted probable jurisdiction on June 10, 1963. 374 U.S. 803, 83 S.Ct. 1692, 10 L.Ed.2d 1029.
The Virginia Constitution provides for a Senate of not more than 40 nor less than 33 members, in Art. IV, § 41, and for a House of Delegates of not more than 100 nor less than 90 seats, in Art. IV, § 42. Senators are elected quadrennially and delegates biennially. At all relevant times, state statutes have fixed the number of senators at 40 and the number of delegates at 100. Pursuant to the state constitutional requirement of legislative reapportionment at least decennially, contained in Art. IV, § 43,...
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