Hugo Black

“ The District Court held with respect to the three members of the Mississippi Board of Election Commissioners that the complaint failed to show that they had a sufficient interest in administering or enforcing the laws under attack to permit making them parties defendant. We do not agree. Under state law the Election Commissioners have power, authority, and responsibility to help administer the voter registration laws by formulating rules for the various tests applied to applicants for registration. ”

“ For example, the complaint states that at the time the suit was filed Amite County, Mississippi, the registrar of which was one of the defendants here, had a white voting age population of 4,449 with white registration of 3,295, while it had 2,560 colored persons of voting age, of whom only one was a registered voter. There is no need to multiply examples. The allegations of this complaint were too serious, the right to vote in this country is too precious, and the necessity of settling grievances peacefully in the courts is too important for this complaint to have been dismissed. ”

“ The District Court accepted the State's argument that this meant that a State can be made a defendant in such a case only when the office of registrar is vacant, so that there is no registrar against whom to file suit. This argument relies on the fact that in a case pending in this Court when the statutory language was changed, registrars had resigned their offices in order to keep from being sued under § 1971. ”

“ In 1954 the state constitution was amended to provide that thereafter an applicant for registration had to be able to read and copy in writing any section of the Mississippi Constitution, and give a reasonable interpretation of that section to the county registrar, and, in addition, demonstrate to the registrar 'a reasonable understanding of the duties and obligations of citizenship under a constitutional form of government. ”

“ In its brief in this Court the Government argues that this provision is invalid on its face as contrary to § 101 (a) of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 78 Stat. 241, amending § 131 of the Civil Rights Act of 1957, 71 Stat. ”