United States v. State of Louisiana, Civ. A. No. 2866.

• Decision Date: 20 September 1966
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 2866.
• Citation: 265 F. Supp. 703
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. STATE OF LOUISIANA et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Louisiana

265 F. Supp. 703

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. STATE OF LOUISIANA et al., Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 2866.

United States District Court E. D. Louisiana, Baton Rouge Division.

August 10, 1966.

Order August 11, 1966.

Order of Clarification August 12, 1966.

Second Order of Clarification September 20, 1966.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

John Doar, Washington, D. C., Louis C. LaCour, New Orleans, La., Frank Dunbaugh, David Norman, Washington, D. C., Thomas Smith, D. Robert Owen, Washington, D. C., Martin Glick, for the United States.

Jack P. F. Gremillion, Frank L. Dobson, Thomas McFerrin, James E. Phillips, Jr., Baton Rouge, La., for the State of Louisiana.

Sidney Provensal, Jr., Edmond Fitzmaurice, Jr., New Orleans, La., for the Governor of Louisiana.

Before WISDOM, Circuit Judge, and CHRISTENBERRY and WEST, District Judges.

WISDOM, Circuit Judge.

In October 1963 the United States filed the original complaint challenging the constitutionality of the Louisiana application form as a test or device in determining the qualifications of applicants to register for voting.¹ The court heard the case November 30, 1964. Important events affecting the litigation have occurred since then.

In June 1965, the State of Louisiana revised its form of Application for Registration. August 6, 1965, Congress adopted the Voting Rights Act of 1965. On that same day, in accordance with Section 4(b) of the Act, the Attorney General of the United States determined that the State of Louisiana had on November 14, 1964, maintained a test or device within the meaning of the Act; the Director of the Census determined that less than 50 per cent of the persons of voting age residing in Louisiana voted in the November 3, 1964, presidential election. In August, the Attorney General of the United States certified that in his judgment the appointment of examiners was necessary to enforce the guarantees of the Fifteenth Amendment in East Carroll, East Feliciana, West Feliciana, Ouachita, and Plaquemines Parishes, Louisiana. Federal examiners entered on duty in each of these parishes and, except in Plaquemines Parish where the operation was suspended for a period of time, because of natural disaster, they have performed their duties under the Voting Rights Act of 1965 until the present time. By the end of November, the examiners in the five parishes had listed approximately 13,258 persons as eligible to vote and had certified and transmitted the names of these persons to the respective parish registrars, who under the Voting Rights Act, have the duty to place these names on the official parish and municipal voting lists.

In three of the parishes—East Carroll, Plaquemines, and Ouachita—certain of the defendants filed suits in State courts² to enjoin the local registrars of voters from placing the names of persons listed by federal examiners on the official voting lists. In each instance the injunctions sought were entered. The registrars of voters in all five parishes where examiners are operating—East Carroll, East Feliciana, West Feliciana, Plaquemines, and Ouachita—refuse to place on the official voting lists of their respective parishes and municipalities the names of the persons certified and transmitted to them by the federal examiners.

November 15, 1965, the United States filed its Supplemental Complaint bringing before the court the changes in the law that occurred after this case was originally submitted and the events which followed those changes. The Supplemental Complaint requests that the defendants and their agents be restrained from (a) failing to place on the official voting lists the names of persons certified and transmitted by federal examiners, (b) complying with or giving force or effect to the state court injunctions, and (c) giving any force or effect to Louisiana statutes or constitutional sections which would prevent official listing of persons certified by federal examiners.

The defendants admit that they will continue to refuse to place on the official voting lists persons certified in the five parishes where examiners are operating—East Carroll, East Feliciana, West Feliciana, Plaquemines, and Ouachita. They contend that the principal operative provisions of the Voting Rights Act are unconstitutional, and in the alternative that the Director of the Bureau of Census, the Attorney General of the United States, and the Civil Service Commission have, in the event the Act is constitutional, misconstrued and misapplied its terms. The case was heard by this Court on December 21, 1965, and briefs were submitted by December 31, 1965.

At the time, the constitutionality of the Voting Rights Act was at issue in State of South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 1966, 383 U.S. 301, 86 S.Ct. 803, 15 L.Ed. 2d 769, then pending before the Supreme Court. The State of Louisiana and several other states participated in the proceeding as friends of the court. March 7, 1966, the Supreme Court announced its decision, holding certain provisions of the Act to be appropriate, constitutional means under the Fifteenth Amendment for carrying out the purposes of that amendment.

No facts peculiar to South Carolina or to Louisiana would alter the result reached as to the constitutionality of the particular sections³ of the Voting Rights Act the court considered. This is clear from frequent references by the court to arguments proposed by States participating as amicus curiae, by absence of reference to unique factual considerations existing in South Carolina,⁴ and by the broad sweep of the language employed by the Court in discussing the issues (see particularly 383 U.S. at 327-337, 86 S.Ct. 803).

As we read the State of South Carolina v. Katzenbach, the Supreme Court considered and rejected the States' argument on the following issues the defendants raise in the instant case:

(1) The Voting Rights Act of 1965 exceeds the power of Congress and encroaches on an area reserved to the States by the Constitution * * * (383 U.S. at 323-329, 86 S.Ct. 803)

(2) Suspension of tests and devices for five years is inappropriate * * * (383 U.S. at 333-334, 86 S.Ct. 803)

(3) The formula provision is inappropriate legislation⁵ * * * (383 U.S. at 329-333, 86 S.Ct. 803)

(4) Appointment of federal examiners is inappropriate * * * (383 U.S. at 335-337, 86 S.Ct. 803)

(5) The formula provision violates the principle of equality of States, denies due process by employing an invalid presumption and by barring judicial review of administrative findings, constitutes a forbidden bill of attainder, and impair the separation of powers by adjudicating guilt through legislation * * * (383 U.S. at 323-324, 86 S.Ct. 803)

(6) Limiting litigation to the District Court for the District of Columbia is inappropriate * * * (383 U.S. at 331-335, 86 S.Ct. 803)⁶

(7) The non-review provisions of the Act are arbitrary and deprive the States of due process * * * (383 U.S. at 323-337, 86 S.Ct. 803)

(8) The Director of the Bureau of Census and the Attorney General have misconstrued and misapplied the formula provision and the voting examiner provision * * * (383 U.S. at 323, 332-333, 335-337, 86 S.Ct. 803)

(9) The challenge procedure is arbitrary * * * (383 U.S. at 334-335, 86 S.Ct. 803)

The only issues remaining relate to the defendants' contentions that the Voting Rights Act was maladministered in Louisiana with respect to:

1. Administrative procedures for obtaining identifying data, and

2. Age and residency requirements for registration.

The Louisiana procedures for identification of applicants for registration are not in conflict with the Voting Rights Act. "The applicant shall in all cases be able to establish that he is the identical person whom he represents himself to be when applying for registration. If the registrar has good reason to believe that he is not the same person, he may require the applicant to produce two credible registered voters of his precinct to make oath to that effect." LSA-R.S. 18:37. See also La.Const.1921, art. 8, § 1(e). As long ago as 1952, however, Judge Gaston Louis Porterie held that the identification procedure could not be used in an arbitrary or discriminatory manner to prevent Negroes registering to vote; the court granted an injunction against a registrar of voters requiring him to register the Negro plaintiffs. Byrd v. Brice, W.D.La., 104 F.Supp. 442, aff'd 5 Cir., 201 F.2d 664. The defendants have not proved that the United States and its agents failed to observe the Louisiana statutory requirements as to identification of applicants.

We find that the United States and its agents correctly applied the Louisiana law relating to age requirements, but incorrectly applied the Louisiana law relating to residence requirements. LSA-R.S. 18:36. The agents approved the residential requirements of applicants who would be eligible to vote on the date of the next election rather than on the date of the application. In other respects, the United States and its agents properly administered the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the uncontested provisions of Louisiana law not in conflict with the Voting Rights Act.

In granting the relief prayed for we have ordered election commissioners to give assistance to voters who are unable to read and write. Louisiana now allows and has always allowed illiterates to vote. Until 1960 Louisiana law provided that a voter "unable to read and write, shall receive the assistance of a commissioner of his own selection in the marking of his ballot". LSA-R.S. 18:350. In 1960, as one of a bundle of segregation statutes, the Louisiana legislature enacted Act 499 amending Section 350. This amendment provides, in part, "The inability to read or write shall not entitle a voter to assistance in the casting of his vote". This stultifying provision conflicts with the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The Act provides for the suspension of literacy tests in states which have used such tests as a discriminatory device to prevent Negroes from...