Chavis v. Whitcomb

305 F. Supp. 1364, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10138
District Court, S.D. Indiana·Decided July 28, 1969·No. IP 69-C-23·Published·Cited by 35 cases

Opinion

OPINION

By Judges KERNER, STECKLER, and NOLAND:

This suit was tried before a three-judge court of the Southern District of Indiana, constituted under 28 U.S.C. § 2281 in that the complaint prays that certain statutes of the State of Indiana, having state-wide effect, 1 be declared violative of the Constitution of the United States. Jurisdiction is predicated upon 28 U.S.C. § 1343. The complaint seeks declaratory relief pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2201 and injunctive relief would necessarily accompany a judgment adverse to defendants.

The action was commenced against the Indiana General Assembly and its individual members. By order of March 18, 1969, the Court granted the plaintiffs’ motion to join Edgar D. Whitcomb, as Governor of the State of Indiana. By further order of May 12, 1969, the Court granted defendants’ motion to dismiss as to the Indiana General Assembly and its individual members.

The complaint purports to state a class action; each plaintiff sues in his own behalf and in behalf of the class or classes he is alleged to represent. By order of June 18, 1969, the Court determined that this was not properly a class action but that the plaintiffs could maintain the action individually. 2 Also by order of June 18, 1969, the Court granted the petition of certain intervening defendants for leave to intervene nunc pro tunc June 12, 1969, pursuant to Rule 24(b) (2), Fed.R.Civ.P.

The parties agree that the bicameral Indiana General Assembly consists of a House of Representatives of one hundred members, and a Senate of fifty members, 3 elected from districts, and that under the Indiana Acts of 1965 (2d Spec.Sess.), ch. 5, sec. 3, p. 18 and ch. 4, sec. 3, p. 15, 4 Marion County Indiana, which includes the City of Indianapolis, comprises the Twenty-sixth District of the House and the Nineteenth District of the Senate. Under these statutes fifteen representatives and eight senators are apportioned to and elected at large from Marion County. The plain *1367 tiffs assert that these statutes operate to violate their rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution of the United States.

THE COMPLAINT

Each of the plaintiffs is described by the complaint; allegations of fact relating specifically to the individual plaintiffs are then made. Each plaintiff sues in his own behalf and in behalf of persons similarly situated.

Plaintiff- Patrick Chavis is described as a resident and voter of Indiana. Though a Negro, he lives outside the 1960 and 1967 Ghetto Areas described in the complaint, residing in an area where Negroes are unlikely ever to gather in sufficient number to be able to exercise a voting bloc influence over the election of any candidate to any public office. Therefore, he alleges that he has an active interest in protecting the voting rights of the inhabitants of the described Ghetto Area whose interests and voting propensities approximate his own.

Plaintiffs Andrew Ramsey and Mason Bryant are described as Negro-Americans who are residents and voters of Marion County, Indiana, residing in the 1967 Ghetto Area described in the complaint. They are alleged to be part of a cognizable interest group which regularly engages in bloc voting but whose bloc voting is cancelled out by the voting of contrary interest groups in Marion County-wide elections. These plaintiffs allege that their vote is invidiously diluted in Indiana General Assembly elections by multi-member districting at large of General Assembly seats in Marion County.

Plaintiff Marilyn Hotz is described as a White-American, a resident of Marion County outside the City of Indianapolis, and a Republican by party preference. She alleges that persons living in Marion County outside the city include less than one-third of the population of Marion County but almost one-half of the regular Republican voters of the county. She further alleges that such residents are deprived of a proportionate voice as to who their Republican state legislators shall be, in years of Republican victory in Marion County.

Plaintiff Rowland Allen is described as an American citizen and a resident and voter of Marion County who is an independent voter. He alleges that he seeks to vote for the individual candidate rather than the political party, but that he is frustrated in this effort because of the large number of candidates presented by each party.

Plaintiff William Walker is described as a Negro resident and voter of Lake County, Indiana. He alleges that Lake County contains about the same number of Negroes as does Marion County but that Lake County Negroes have the opportunity to influence the election of only five-eighths as many senators and eleven-fifteenths as many representatives as do Marion County, Negroes in General Assembly elections. He alleges that his vote is mathematically diluted because of the multi-member districting of Marion County.

In a separate paragraph of the complaint, the plaintiffs Chavis, Ramsey, and Bryant allege that the present legislative apportionment and districting statutes of Indiana are unconscionably detrimental to the force and effect of the vote of Negroes and poor persons living in Marion County. They further allege the existence of a geographical 1967 Ghetto Area having demographic characteristics which cause it to contain a cognizable minority interest group, and the existence of a Ghetto Voting Area whose boundaries closely coincide with those of the Ghetto Area. Because of its cognizable minority characteristics, the Ghetto Area is alleged to have an unusual interest in specific areas of substantive law.

The Ghetto Area is alleged to exist involuntarily because of the segregation of racial minority groups and persons of low income.

These plaintiffs claim that under single-member districting the two described Ghetto Areas would control the *1368 nomination and election of three repre^ sentatives and of one senator, but that these areas have almost no political force or control over legislators under the present districting scheme because the effect of their vote is cancelled out by other contrary interest groups in Marion County.

It is further alleged that the Democratic Party organization, particularly the County Chairman, has substantial control over the nomination of prospective state legislators in Marion County primary elections, through sponsorship of a slate of candidates. This slate is seldom defeated. Plaintiffs allege that this control exists because multi-member districting causes the number of candidates to be so large that they cannot become individually known to even the most conscientious and discerning voter.

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Chavis v. Whitcomb, 305 F. Supp. 1364, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10138 (S.D. Ind. 1969).

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