MISSOURI COMMENTARY: RACIAL GERRYMANDERING IN COURT

Last week the Supreme Court accepted for argument and ultimate decision a voting rights case out of Louisiana that once again brings the issue of "racial gerrymandering" before the court. This, coupled with the results of the 1994 election, especially in the South, raises questions about the drawing of congressional boundaries in such a way as to put all blacks in a given state in one or two districts while keeping the other districts "white as white can be."

After the 1990 census, the congressional map makers went on a binge of drawing crazily-shaped boundaries to insure that as many blacks as possible would be thrown into one or two districts, thereby insuring the election of a black Democratic congressman or two.

The Republicans thought this was a grand and noble idea. Why shouldn't they? With the blacks removed, they could win the all-white seats. Democrats, as the party of affirmative action, were silenced into painful acquiescence. Yes, they sheepishly acknowledged, we too agree that there should be two all-black Democratic districts and eight all-white Republican districts.

That is precisely what happened in the South in the recent election. Legions of Democratic candidates were wiped out in the all-white districts and a couple of black Democrats were reelected without meaningful opposition. In 1960, the makeup of the House of Representatives in the South was Democrats 99, Republicans 9. In 1994, the makeup of the House in the South became Democrats 61, Republicans 64.

On the positive side, there will be more black members of Congress in the next session -- a record 41 members. End of the positive.

On the negative, a whole bunch of erstwhile Democratic seats are now Republican. The black vote in those districts made the districts Democratic. With the black vote gone, they are now safely Republican. Remember that 62 percent of white males voted Republican in the last election.

The blacks in Congress have lost three committee chairmanships and 17 subcommittee chairs.

Most importantly, the white member of Congress from an all-white district has no political motivation to take into account the views and concerns of black Americans. When the district was mostly white but with a significant black minority, then the representative had to be concerned, at least in part, with the views of that significant black minority. No longer. White congressmen from all white districts can talk white, think white and vote white.

By being concentrated into a limited number of districts, blacks have strengthened their numerical position, but nevertheless are a weaker minority. Black members of Congress can discuss their programs within the black caucus, but will have a terribly difficult time persuading the overwhelmingly white caucus to buy them.

The Louisiana case before the Supreme Court brings a fresh focus on "racial gerrymandering." The court's opinion in a 1993 North Carolina case, Shaw v. Reno, was vague and unclear. The new Louisiana case will presumably decide definitively whether racial gerrymandering is unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment's guarantee of equal protection.

Is a bizarre shape of the district conclusive proof that the mapmakers were trying to separate blacks from whites? Is a compulsory separation of races, deemed unconstitutional in all other circumstances, somehow made constitutional in the context of the Federal Voting Rights Act? Is the shape of a congressional district irrelevant with the only thing that matters being the intent of the mapmakers to segregate black voters from white voters?

Similar cases in Georgia, Texas and Florida are working their way through the federal judicial system.

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote in 1993 the "racial gerrymandering reinforces the belief that individuals should be judged by the color of their skin." Newt Gingrich and the congressional black caucus say that in drawing up congressional districts, it's a perfectly sound political thing to do.

~Tom Eagleton is a former U.S. senator from Missouri and a columnist for the Pulitzer Publishing Co.