Fain v. Caddo Parish Police Jury

312 F. Supp. 54, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13693
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Louisiana
DecidedDecember 4, 1969
DocketCiv. A. No. 14665
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 312 F. Supp. 54 (Fain v. Caddo Parish Police Jury) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Fain v. Caddo Parish Police Jury, 312 F. Supp. 54, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13693 (W.D. La. 1969).

Opinion

OPINION

BEN C. DAWKINS, Jr., Chief Judge.

William A. Fain, Jr., a registered voter of Caddo Parish, Louisiana, brought this class action to procure reapportionment of the Caddo Parish Police Jury.1 The suit is predicated on the theory that there is a wide disparity between the population of Ward 4 (consisting mostly of the City of Shreveport) and the populations of the other Wards which comprise Caddo Parish. Consequently, plaintiff urges that this situation causes the efficacy of his representation (and that of all members of his class similarly situated) on the Police Jury to be diluted in violation of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, and seeks a declaratory judgment to that effect.

The relevant facts are not in dispute. As a political subdivision of the State of Louisiana, Caddo Parish is governed by a Police Jury composed of twenty-two members who represent nine Wards. As reflected by the 1960 United States Census, the populations of the various Wards were as follows:

Ward 1 .................. 3,817
Ward 2.................. 8,009
Ward 3.................. 13,706
Ward 4..................172,716
Ward 5.................. 6,720
Ward 6.................. 2,385
Ward 7.................. 9,189
Ward 8 .................. 3,664
Ward 9 ................. 3,653
Total 223,859

[55]*55Each Ward is represented on the Police Jury by one elected juror, except Ward 4, which has fourteen representatives.

Citing the landmark cases of Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 82 S.Ct. 691, 7 L.Ed.2d 663 (1962); Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 84 S.Ct. 1362, 12 L.Ed.2d 506 (1964); Avery v. Midland County, 390 U.S. 474, 88 S.Ct. 1114, 20 L.Ed.2d 45 (1968), and Simon v. Landry, 286 F.Supp. 60 (W.D.La.1968) (which held that apportionment of Louisiana Police Juries is governed by the rationale of Reynolds), plaintiff urges that the noted population figures clearly demonstrate that the Caddo Parish Police Jury is malapportioned. Fain points out that under any of the three tests espoused in Bannister v. Davis, 263 F.Supp. 202 (E.D.La.1966) the Police Jury is wrongly apportioned:

1. Population variance: 2
5.75 to 1 in Caddo Parish
5.17 to 1 — Ward 4 to the most underrepresented Ward in Caddo Parish
2. Maximum detrimental deviation from average percentage: 3
76.56
3. Minimum controlling factor :4
Eight jurors outside of Ward 4 are elected to represent 51,143 persons while each of the Ward 4 jurors represents only 10,175 persons. Consequently, if three of the Ward 4 jurors voted with the eight non-ward 4 jurors, eleven jurors representing only 81,668 persons would control 50% of the votes on the Police Jury and the other eleven jurors, representing the remaining 142,191 persons would have only 50% of the vote.

Defendants reply that though the figures do show a wide disparity of population among the Wards, the cited cases do not pertain to multi-member districts wherein a majority of the population is represented by a majority of the members of the governing body. They point out that Avery’s precise holding was only that “units with general governmental powers over an entire geographic area [must] not be apportioned among single-member districts of substantially unequal population.” (Emphasis added.) 390 U.S. pp. 485-486, 88 S.Ct. p. 1121. Defendants have gone to great lengths to justify the Police Jury’s present apportionment on the premise that Caddo Parish is assured a representative government under its governmental structure, since a majority of the residents are represented by a majority of the jurors on the Police Jury.

Additionally, defendants note that Reynolds does not require a “mathematical exactness or precision” in populations comprising the various geographic subdivisions from which jurors are chosen. Finally, defendants have presented to this Court many thought-provoking, practical, and equitable considerations which, they assert, justify allowing the Jury, as presently elected and constituted, to continue functioning without reapportionment. Among such considerations is the fact that the Police Jury is on record that it will reapportion after the 1970 census, that the 1960 census is an unreliable basis for the requested reapportionment, that the majority of the people in Caddo Parish elect a majority of the Jurors on the Police Jury, and that to reapportion at this time would complicate the inner-workings of the Police Jury which operates by the Committee system.

While we are completely sympathetic with defendants’ position, and note that we are not dealing with sin[56]*56gle-member districts as were Reynolds and Avery, we are constrained by the concepts and language of those cases to hold that the Caddo Parish Police Jury is malapportioned insofar as that apportionment relates to the election of members of the Police Jury.

Such concepts are embodied in the following language:

From Reynolds—
“* * * To the extent that a citizen’s right to vote is debased, he is that much less a citizen. The fact that an individual lives here or there is not a legitimate reason for over-weighting or diluting the. efficacy of his vote.” 377 U.S. page 567, 84 S.Ct. page 1384.
From Avery—
“* * * Government — National, State, and local — must grant to each citizen the equal protection of its laws, which includes an equal opportunity to influence the election of lawmakers, no matter how large the majority wishing to deprive other citizens of equal treatment, or how small the minority who object to their mistreatment.” 390 U.S. page 482, 88 S. Ct. page 1119.
“* * * [Petitioner] has a right to a vote for the Commissioners Court of substantially equal weight to the vote of every other resident.” Page 476, 88 S.Ct. page 1116.
“* * * the votes of some residents have greater weight than those of others; in both cases the equal protection of the laws has been denied.” Pages 480-481, 88 S.Ct. page 1118.
* * We hold today only that the Constitution permits no substantial variation in equal population in drawing districts for units of local government having general governmental powers over the entire geographic area served by the body.”
Pages 484-485, 88 S.Ct. page 1120. From Simon—

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Related

Wallace v. House
377 F. Supp. 1192 (W.D. Louisiana, 1974)
Dollinger v. Jefferson County Commissioners Court
335 F. Supp. 340 (E.D. Texas, 1971)

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Bluebook (online)
312 F. Supp. 54, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13693, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/fain-v-caddo-parish-police-jury-lawd-1969.