While many or all of the factors listed in the Senate Report may be relevant to a claim of vote dilution through submergence in multimember districts, unless there is a conjunction of the following circumstances, the use of multimember districts generally will not impede the ability of minority voters to elect representatives of their choice. Stated succinctly, a bloc voting majority must usually be able to defeat candidates supported by a politically cohesive, geographically insular minority group.... These circumstances are necessary preconditions for multimember districts to operate to impair minority voters' ability to elect representatives of their choice for the following reasons. First, the minority group must be able to demonstrate *1328 that it is sufficiently large and geographically compact to constitute a majority in a single-member district. If it is not, as would be the case in a substantially integrated district, the multi-member form of the district cannot be responsible for minority voters' inability to elect its candidates.... Second, the minority group must be able to show that it is politically cohesive. If the minority group is not politically cohesive, it cannot be said that the selection of a multimember electoral structure thwarts distinctive minority group interests.... Third, the minority must be able to demonstrate that the white majority votes sufficiently as a bloc to enable it—in the absence of special circumstances, such as the minority candidate running unopposed, see, infra, at 57, and n. 26 [106 S.Ct. at 2775 and n. 26]—usually to defeat the minority's preferred candidate.... In establishing this last circumstance, the minority group demonstrates that submergence in a white multimember district impedes its ability to elect its chosen representatives.
... given the lack of clarity with respect to the requirements for a section 2 violation, as well as the broad latitude often granted to courts having to consider the totality of the circumstances, Gingles is a reasonable exercise of the Court's authority in statutory interpretation. The Court's approach, by focusing up front on whether there is an effective remedy for the claimed injury, promotes ease of application without distorting the statute or the intent underlying it. It reins in the almost unbridled discretion that section 2 gives the courts, focusing the inquiry so that plaintiffs with promising claims can develop a full record. The creation of preconditions—a choice of clear rules over muddy efforts to discern equity—shields the courts from meritless claims and ensures that clearly meritorious claims will survive summary judgment. That might not always have been true had courts been allowed to consider all of the White/Zimmer factors at the early stages of the proceedings. Thus, although in this case the Gingles criteria might conceivably foreclose a meritorious claim, in general they will ensure that violations for which an effective remedy exists will be considered while appropriately closing the courthouse to marginal cases. In making that trade-off, the Gingles majority justifiably sacrificed some claims to protect stronger claims and promote judicial economy. The Voting Rights Act is a crucially important piece of national legislation, see Derrickson v. City of Danville, 845 F.2d 715, 723–24 (7th Cir.1988) (Cudahy, J., concurring), but it is subject to the same considerations of effective administration as other similar statutes.
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