What role did the Supreme Court rulings (e.g., Shelby County v. Holder 2013) play in redistricting during 2009-2016?
Executive summary
The Supreme Court’s 2013 ruling in Shelby County v. Holder removed the Section 4(b) coverage formula that triggered federal “preclearance,” which meant jurisdictions previously required to get federal approval before changing voting rules—including redistricting—no longer had to seek that prior sign‑off [1]. Civil‑rights groups, legal scholars and advocacy organizations say that loss of preclearance opened the door to faster, less‑checked redistricting and other voting changes in many Southern and previously covered jurisdictions [2] [3].
1. Shelby’s immediate legal effect: preclearance ended, administrative check evaporated
Shelby County v. Holder held the VRA’s Section 4(b) coverage formula unconstitutional, a ruling whose practical effect was to eliminate the long‑standing requirement that covered jurisdictions obtain federal preclearance before adopting new voting changes, including redistricting plans; the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division explains that those jurisdictions “no longer need to seek preclearance” absent separate court orders [1] [4]. The decision did not strike down Section 5 itself, but without a coverage formula Section 5’s preclearance mechanism could not be enforced in the same way [4].
2. How that translated into redistricting practice 2013–2016: faster, local control, more risk of discriminatory maps
Multiple civil‑rights organizations and legal commentators document that, after Shelby, states previously subject to preclearance moved quickly to enact voting changes and redistricting maps that would previously have faced federal scrutiny; the Justice Department notes states implemented changes the same day the opinion issued, and advocacy groups say those moves included partisan and racial gerrymanders and voter‑ID laws [5] [6] [2]. Because much preclearance activity had operated at the local level, analysts warn significant impacts likely played out city‑by‑city and county‑by‑county, complicating efforts to quantify effects immediately after Shelby [7].
3. The role of courts after Shelby: more litigation, different legal tools
With preclearance largely neutralized, challengers increasingly relied on other legal avenues—primarily Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and constitutional claims in federal and state courts—to contest discriminatory redistricting [1] [8]. Courts continued to police racial gerrymandering and race‑based classifications, and litigation produced mixed results; the Brennan Center and others note courts remained a critical backstop but that Shelby removed a preventive administrative barrier that had often blocked discriminatory changes before they took effect [2] [9].
4. Competing perspectives: civil‑rights groups versus some state actors and the Court majority
Civil‑rights groups and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund argue Shelby “devastated” protections and “opened the floodgates” for racially discriminatory redistricting and other suppressive tactics, citing immediate post‑Shelby state actions and a wave of lawsuits challenging maps [3] [6]. By contrast, the Supreme Court majority in Shelby framed the coverage formula as outdated and suggested Congress—not courts—should update the formula; Reed Smith and other observers note some states and reform proponents advocated independent redistricting commissions as alternative safeguards in a post‑preclearance world [10] [11].
5. Limits of attribution for 2009–2016 redistricting outcomes
Analysts caution that isolating Shelby’s specific impact on redistricting from other forces—demographic shifts, state partisan control of legislatures, and contemporaneous Supreme Court rulings on partisan gerrymandering—is difficult. The NAACP LDF and Brennan Center both emphasize that the full effects became more visible only over subsequent cycles and that local‑level changes can be hard to quantify immediately after 2013 [7] [2]. Available sources do not provide a definitive, measured tally of how many specific 2010–2016 redistricting plans were altered because of Shelby versus other causes; sources stress ongoing litigation and delayed assessment [7].
6. What changed politically and legally by 2016: litigation intensifies, partisan‑gerrymandering doctrine evolves
Between 2013 and 2016, states moved with renewed latitude on redistricting and voting rules, and challengers turned to Section 2 and equal‑protection claims; at the same time the Supreme Court continued to refine redistricting doctrine in other cases—leaving racial gerrymandering claims cognizable while later curbing federal review of partisan gerrymanders—which altered the strategic landscape for redistricting litigation [9] [12]. The net effect: Shelby removed an early, preventive federal check, and ensuing court decisions and state actions reshaped how and where redistricting fights were fought.
7. Bottom line for 2009–2016: Shelby shifted the battlefield from prevention to litigation
In the 2009–2016 window, Shelby did not retroactively change 2010 maps but it removed a routine federal approval step for covered jurisdictions beginning in 2013, accelerating a shift toward state and local control and forcing civil‑rights groups to pursue corrective litigation after the fact; legal observers and advocacy groups view that shift as a major reason discriminatory or more aggressive partisan redistricting became harder to block before implementation and therefore more common in practice [1] [3] [2]. Limitations: available reporting underscores continuing debates over causation and quantification, and many concrete impacts played out at local levels that scholars say remain incompletely documented [7].