**CHILL.
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DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA - SATURDAY, JUNE 24, 2017
VOLUME 96 - NUMBER 24
TELEPHONE (919) 682-2913 PRICE: 50 CENTS
US Supreme Court won’t speed
up return of remap rulings
By Gary D. Robertson
RALEIGH (AP) - The U.S.
Supreme Court declined on June
15 to speed up returning to North
Carolina its rulings in the case
of nearly 30 legislative districts
that have been declared illegal
racial gerrymanders.
The one-sentence denials
could make it harder for a low
er federal court to assemble a
workable plan to hold otherwise
unscheduled elections this fall
under redrawn boundaries.
Now it won’t be until the end
of June for the justices’ judg
ments to be issued to the three-
judge court in Greensboro. Law
yers for more than two dozen
voters who successfully got
28 House and Senate districts
thrown out for needlessly pack
ing too many black voters in
them wanted the judgments is
sued immediately.
The timeline is important be
cause attorneys for voters who
sued want the lower court to
act quickly on directing legisla
tors to redraw maps and decid
ing whether a special election
should be held. Now it’ll be an
other two weeks before the three
judges formally receive them
and act accordingly.
Republican legislative lead
ers had asked that the case be re
turned after the routine 25 days.
The GOP lawmakers prefer
holding the first elections under
new boundaries during the next
regularly scheduled state elec
tion in 2018.
Their lawyer had written
Chief Justice John Roberts this
week in a brief against accelerat
ing the judgments. There wasn’t
enough time to hold 2017 elec
tions when considering require
ments in state law for drawing
boundaries, holding a candidate
filing period and issuing absen
tee ballots for both primary and
general elections, the lawyer
wrote.
Roberts considers appeals
from North Carolina. Thursday’s
(june 15) orders said Roberts
had referred the matter to the full
court. No reasons were given for
the denials.
Senate leader Phil Berger
wrote on Twitter he was pleased
with the denials of the “left’s
scheme” to force a special elec
tion and nullify the voters’ deci
sions in the 2016 election. Gen
eral Assembly members serve
two-year terms.
The state House “continues to
await guidance from the courts
on redistricting and will fully
comply with their direction as
soon as received,” House Speak
er Tim Moore tweeted.
An attorney for the voters
who sued over the maps didn’t
immediately comment late
Thursday on the maps. But in a
brief to Roberts filed June 14,
an appeals lawyer for the voters
wrote the opposition by legisla
tive leaders to speed up the judg
ment was a “transparent ploy”
to delay the process for creating
constitutional maps.
The “opposition to the appli
cation is simply another attempt
to run out the clock on the pos
sibility of a special election
remedy,” Washington attorney
Jessica Ring Amunson wrote.
The justices on June 5 upheld
the three-judge panel’s ruling
last August that struck down the
districts first approved in 2011.
Maps filed that year helped Re
publicans expand majorities
achieved during the 2010 elec
tions.
But the justices also rejected
a previous order by the panel
requiring a 2017 election. The
justices wrote the lower court
judges should have done a better
job evaluating legally whether
holding a special session was
warranted.
The Louis E. Austin History Grove was dedicated June 10 at Solite Park. Louis Austin was the
founding editor and publisher of The Carolina Times. Above are Austin’s living relatives. From
left to right are Mrs. Kimberly Austin Johnson, great niece; her daughter, Austin K. Johnson;,
great great niece; Milton Bernard Austin, nephew; Kenneth W. Edmonds, grandson; and Christian
M. Edwards, great grandson.lSee story and photos on pages 8 and 9.
Democracy with no choices:
Many candidates run unopposed
By David A. Lieb
When voters cast ballots for state representatives last fall, millions of Americans essentially had no choice: In 42 percent of all such elec
tions, candidates faced no major party opponents.
Political scientists say a major reason for the lack of choices is the way districts are drawn - gerrymandered, in some cases, to ensure as
many comfortable seats as possible for the majority party by creating other districts overwhelmingly packed with voters for the minority
party.
“With an increasing number of districts being drawn to deliberately favor one party over another - and with fewer voters indicating an
interest in crossover voting - lots of potential candidates will look at those previous results and come to a conclusion that it’s too difficult to
mount an election campaign in a district where their party is the minority,” said John McGlennon, a longtime professor of government and
public policy at the College of William & Mary in Virginia who has tracked partisan competition in elections.
While the rate of uncontested races dipped slightly from 2014 to 2016, the percentage of people living in legislative districts without elec
toral choices has been generally rising over the past several decades.
About 4,700 state House and Assembly seats were up for election last year. Of those, 998 Democrats and 963 Republicans won without
any opposition from the other major political party. In districts dominated by one party, election battles are fought mostly in the primaries;
the winner from the majority party becomes a virtual shoo-in to win the general election.
Some states had a particularly high rate of uncompetitive races:
-In Georgia, just 31 of the 180 state House districts featured both Republican and Democratic candidates, a nation-high uncontested rate
of 83 percent. Republicans hold almost two-thirds of the seats in the Georgia House of Representatives.
-In Massachusetts, just 34 of the 160 state House districts had candidates from both major parties, an uncontested rate of 79 percent. There,
Democrats hold four-fifths of the House seats.
-About 75 percent of the state House races in Arkansas and South Carolina lacked either a Democratic or Republican candidate. Under an
Arkansas law passed this year, the names of unopposed candidates won’t even have to be listed on future ballots. Unchallenged candidates
will automatically be declared the winners.
Voting for unopposed candidates “just seems like an extra step in the process that we could eliminate,” said the sponsor of the Arkansas
law, Rep. Charlotte Douglas, who hasn’t faced any opposition the past two elections.
She added: “You hate to say that it doesn’t count, because any vote counts, but it’s unnecessary.”
There are far fewer uncontested U.S. House races. Less than 15 percent of the 435 districts lacked a Republican or Democratic candidate
last year.
But some of the same states were atop that noncompetitive list: Five of Massachusetts’ nine U.S. House districts lacked Republican can
didates. Three of Arkansas’ four districts lacked Democratic opponents. And in Georgia, which has 14 U.S. House districts, four Republicans
and one Democrat ran unopposed by the other major party.
There are reasons for unopposed elections aside from gerrymandering. Some states, particularly in the South, have political cultures that
place less importance on partisan competition. Incumbency also poses a deterrent to potential challengers.
University of Georgia political science professor Charles Bullock said the large number of uncompetitive districts in his home state may
be due less to gerrymandering than to naturally segregated demographics, with Democratic-inclined black residents living in different areas
than Republican-leaning white voters.
Yet Georgia’s Republican-led Legislature has continued to tinker with the district lines they drew after the 2010 Census in what some
Democrats contend is an attempt to lessen competition.
A 2015 law, which was recently challenged in court, altered the boundaries of 17 Georgia House districts, including two narrowly won
by Republicans the previous year.
This year, Georgia Republicans again sought to change the boundaries of several state House districts, including a couple won by Repub
licans by single-digit margins last November. Some of the proposed shifts sought to move heavily black precincts - where voters overwhelm
ingly support Democrats - from Republican-held districts into ones occupied by Democrats. Although the bill passed the House, it died in
the Senate.
NCC
NcU
Legislators to Host Town Hall
A Town hall meeting that Rep. MaryAnn Black and Rep.
Marcia Morey will be having next Saturday, June 24 from 9am-
10:30am (with sign-in starting at 8:30am) at the chambers of the
Durham County Commissioners.
They plan on updating Durham residents on this year’s legis
lative session and to hear directly from the community what is
sues are of importance in determining future legislative priorities.
The public invited to attend.
Rep. Black Rep.Morey
Barber banned from
Legislative Building
after protest arrest
RALEIGH (AP) - One of North Carolina’s most prominent civil
rights leaders, the Rev. William Barber, is banned from entering the
state Legislative Building after he was arrested at a protest there
last month.
A magistrate ordered Barber and 31 others arrested during a sit-
in over health care on May 30 to stay away from the building as part
of their bond on second-degree trespassing charges.
General Assembly Police Chief Martin Brock said he didn’t ask
for the ban, but will likely request it for future protesters who are
arrested. ——:“-- -—■— •
“If someone has been arrested two or three times, would it be
reasonable to expect that they would be arrested again? That would
be my observation,” Brock told the News & Observer of Raleigh.
But Barber’s attorney said the bans are illegal and she plans to
ask a judge to overturn them at the next court hearing for the ar
rested protesters on June 26.
Geeta Kapur cites the North Carolina Constitution, which says:
“the people have a right to assemble together ... to instruct their
representatives, and to apply to the General Assembly for redress
of grievances.”
The state NAACP president and the other protesters weren’t
interfering with legislative business, which makes the ban even
worse, she said.
“The only way you can petition a legislator is by going to the
legislature,” Kapur said. “We take this to be an intimidation tactic.”
Whether the ban sticks is questionable. A similar 2013 decision
to order protesters to stay away from the building was thrown out.
NAA CP Condemns
Weakening Of DOJ Civil
Rights Enforcement Powers
BALTIMORE -The NAACP released the fol
lowing statement after the Justice Department
issued guidance to the Civil Rights division to
settle cases without using consent decrees: no-
fault agreements that have helped de-segregate
schools, reform police departments, defend re
ligious freedom and ensure access for the dis
abled.
“Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ order to
Civil Rights division staff that they avoid us
ing consent decrees - a historic tool to ensure
business and local governments simply follow
the rules - is another clear attempt to hurt the
Black community by weakening the govern
ment’s ability to defend our civil liberties,” said
Leon Russell, Board Chairman of the NAACP.
“Not only does this break away from decades
of tradition, it’s just plain sneaky since the in
structions were given verbally rather than writ
ten in a memo or email. The NAACP is calling
on the Trump Administration to be more open
and transparent about changes within the Jus
tice Department’s Civil Rights division and to
put protecting Americans first.”
For Background: ProPublica - a nonprofit,
investigative news outlet - reports that top of
ficials in the Justice Department’s civil rights
division have issued verbal guidance to its staff
to seek settlements in cases without consent de
crees.