Political subdivision

“ The term communities of interest may, in certain circumstances, include political subdivisions such as counties, municipalities, tribal lands and reservations, or school districts, but shall not include common relationships with political parties or political candidates. ”

“ A State cannot of course manipulate its political subdivisions so as to defeat a federally protected right, as for example, by realigning political subdivisions so as to deny a person his vote because of race. ”

“ For the purpose of acquiring, constructing, improving, maintaining, or operating any work of public improvement, a political subdivision may levy special taxes when authorized by a majority of the electors in the political subdivision who vote thereon in an election held for that purpose. ”

“ If population is used as a basis for classification for the applicability of any Act to any political subdivision or subdivisions of this State on the above subject matters, the Act shall apply only to political subdivisions of less than a specified population or shall apply to political subdivisions of more than a specified population. The General Assembly shall not, in any manner, regulate, restrict or limit the power and authority of any county, municipality, or any combination thereof, to plan and zone as herein defined. ”

“ In establishing representative districts, which shall afford equality of representation, the General Assembly shall seek to maintain geographical compactness and contiguity and to adhere to boundaries of counties and other existing political subdivisions. ”

“ Each county commissioner district must be formed of contiguous and compact territory and must cross political subdivision lines the least number of times necessary to establish as nearly as practicable equally populated districts. Whenever the population of a municipality entitles it to more than one district, all whole districts must be drawn within the municipal boundaries. ”

“ Whenever such action as aforesaid creates a new political subdivision the Governor-General shall appoint such officers for the new subdivision with such powers and duties as may be required by the existing provisions of law applicable to the case and fix their salaries; such appointees shall hold office until their successors are elected or appointed and qualified. ”

“ Thus that opinion went on to indicate that variations from a pure population standard might be justified by such state policy considerations as the integrity of political subdivisions, the maintenance of compactness and contiguity in legislative districts or the recognition of natural or historical boundary lines. ”

“ Respondent is therefore an entity 'administered by individuals (the commissioners) who are responsible to public officials (an elected county judge) ' and this together with the other factors mentioned satisfies us that its relationship to the State is such that respondent is a 'political subdivision' within the meaning of § 2 (2) of the Act. Accordingly, the Court of Appeals' judgment denying enforcement of the Board's order is
Affirmed. ”

“ Duchin and Dr. Imai were adequate comparators, we could not adopt the map-comparison test that Alabama proposes. The test is flawed in its fundamentals. Districting involves myriad considerations—compactness, contiguity, political subdivisions, natural geographic boundaries, county lines, pairing of incumbents, communities of interest, and population equality. ”

“ Each state has the right to make political subdivisions of its territory for municipal purposes, and to regulate their local government. As respects the administration of justice, it may establish one system of courts for cities and another for rural districts, one system for one portion of its territory, and another system for another portion. ”

“ We have explained that the first precondition also takes into account other traditional districting criteria like attempting to avoid the splitting of political subdivisions and “communities of interest.” League of United Latin American Citizens v. Perry, 548 U. S. 399, 433–434 (2006) (LULAC) .
To its credit, the Court recognizes that compactness is not enough and that a district is not reasonably configured if it flouts other “traditional districting criteria.” Ante, at 10. ”

“ In fact, the principal reason for an isolated legislative body is that the sentiments of the different localities may be expressed in legislation. The practical result is that 95 per cent of our city governments are based upon ward representation, nor can an instance be cited in all American political theory which shows the creation of a successful political organization based upon an isolated legislative body in which there has not been an accompanying representation by territorial districts. ”

“ The matter in controversy is one peculiarly within the domain of state control. Kelly v. Pittsburg, 104 U.S. 708. It is for the state to determine its political subdivisions, the number and size of its municipal corporations, and their territorial extent. ”

“ The counties, with their chief cities, should be so many little independent communities, each with its legislative council, its law-courts, and its other institutions, employing and tasking the political energies and abilities of the citizens or inhabitants of the district. ”

“ The requirement that districts shall be of nearly equal population has often been disregarded altogether. Since the state legislature is controlled by the political party having a majority, the dominant party can arrange the district lines so as to secure a party majority in the greatest possible number of districts. ”

“ It is too late to question the right of the general assembly to establish particular districts for the attainment of special local public good, through works of a particular character, and to order itself, or authorize some political body to order, special assessments to be made, within the district, for the purpose of meeting the cost and expenses of such works. ”

“ The geographic — the socioeconomic — the desires of the people — the desires of the elected officeholders — the desires of political parties — all these can and do legitimately operate not only within the framework of the "relatively equal in population districts" factor, but also within the factors of contiguity and compactness. The county and Assembly line legal restrictions operate outside the framework of theoretically "equal in population districts." All the factors might conceivably have the same weight in one situation ”

“ Whether the subdivision of the representative power within any state, if there be a subdivision, be equal or unequal, or fairly or unfairly made, congress cannot know, and has no authority to inquire. ”

“ Ask not the population of our plains and forests, and secluded agricultural districts, to which political party they belong; if they are republicans, royalists, socialists or communists, reds or blues, whites or tricolor,—they know nothing of all this. ”

“ For what plausible reason are these principalities suffered to exist? When a government is rendered complex, (which in itself is no desirable thing,) it ought to be for some political end which cannot be answered otherwise. Subdivisions in government are only admissible in favor of the dignity of inferior princes and high nobility, or for the support of an aristocratic confederacy under some head, or for the conservation of the franchises of the people in some privileged province. ”

“ The principle is the same as that which justifies the subdivision of a state into municipalities for the localization [Pg 62] of taxes required for local purposes, and it becomes more and more important, as the size of municipal units is increased, for dealing with affairs that affect large groups of contiguous communities having many conflicting interests. ”

“ It is proposed, on the one hand, to very greatly diminish the number of elective officers, and, in order to do away with the predetermination of elections, to restrict the political action of the people in their own persons to districts so small that they can meet together and act as one body, and that in all other affairs than those of these small districts the people should act by delegates. ”

“ A minority rule is established that only a political convulsion can overthrow. I have recently been advised that in one county of a certain State three districts for the election of members of the legislature are constituted as follows: One has 65,000 population, one 15,000, and one 10,000, while in another county detached, noncontiguous sections have been united to make a legislative district. ”

“ In very large cities, as the details of a general Establishment for the Poor would be very numerous and extensive, it would probably facilitate the management of the affairs of the Establishment, if, beside the smallest subdivisions or districts, there could be formed other larger divisions, composed of a certain number of districts, and put under the direction of particular committees. ”

“ Every town must be divided, according to its extent, into a greater or less number of districts, or subdivisions; and each of these must have a committee of inspection, or rather a commissary, with assistants, who must be entrusted with the superintendance and management of all affairs relative to the relief and support of the Poor within its limits. ”

“ Our decision today is only that the Constitution imposes one ground rule for the development of arrangements of local government: a requirement that units with general governmental powers over an entire geographic area not be apportioned among single-member districts of substantially unequal population. ”

“ But of course the subdivision does not imply that one man should not take the whole if he is competent to do so. And if separate contributors supply articles on these several subdivisions, somebody must see that they work in harmony. ”

“ Such districts shall be composed of contiguous territory, and assembly districts shall be as nearly equal in population as may be. Each senatorial district shall choose one senator and each assembly district shall choose one member of assembly. ”

“ But to accept population variances, large or small, in order to create districts with specific interest orientations is antithetical to the basic premise of the constitutional command to provide equal representation for equal numbers of people. ”

“ The constituency is so evenly divided between the urban and rural populations, that its representative must fairly consult the interests of both. He can be neither an ultra-Tory nor a violent Radical. ”

“ Why deprive the Republic of the services of a useful man because his particular district has more good congressional timber than can be used and another district has none? Or again, why relegate to private life a man of National importance merely because his residence happens to be in a district not entirely in harmony with his views? ”

“ And when one goes up the scale from the urban district and rural district boundaries, one finds equally crazy county arrangements, the same tangle of obstacle in the way of quick, effective co-ordinations, the same needless multiplicity of clerks, the same rich possibilities of litigation, misunderstanding, and deadlocks of opinion between areas whose only difference is that a mischievous boundary has been left in existence between them. ”

“ And even in these subdivisions, they can act only through the forms of their own separate governments. These are necessarily slow and deliberate, affording time for excitement to subside, and for passion to cool. ”

“ If equality between great and small states be inadmissible, because in that case unequal numbers of constituents would be represented by equal numbers of votes, was it not equally inadmissible, that a larger and more populous district of America should hereafter have less representation than a smaller and less populous district? ”

“ No set of standards can guide a court which has to decide how many legislative districts a State shall have, or what the shape of the districts shall be, or where to draw a particular district line. No judicially manageable standard can determine whether a State should have single member districts or multi-member districts or some combination of both. No such standard can control the balance between keeping up with population shifts and having stable districts. ”

“ The Territory should be divided into at least two districts, and an additional judge, district attorney, marshal, and other appropriate officers be provided.
There is practically no organized form of government in the Territory. There is no authority, except in Congress, to pass any law, no matter how local or trivial, and the difficulty of conveying to the Congress an adequate conception and understanding of the various needs of the people in the different communities is easily understood. I see no reason why a more complete form of Territorial organization should not be provided. ”

“ At home, they will follow the legislation of the district, instead of guiding it by their precept and example. They will choose to be the engines of tyranny and oppression in the district, that they may become enslaved within their own territorial sovereignty. ”

“ It was naturally some months before the new division was effected, and still longer before the further division of each department into districts, and each district into cantons was finished. No wiser step for converting France from a congeries of provinces into a nation could have been devised. On the basis of the new divisions a new local government was established. Each department and district was to be administered by elected authorities, elaborately chosen by a system of double election. ”

“ The successive stages of integration are the township or ward, which is the unit of organization; the county or province, which is an aggregation of townships or wards; and the national domain or territory, which is an aggregation of counties or provinces; the people of each of which are organized into a body politic. It taxed the Greeks and Romans to the extent of their capacities, after they had gained civilization, to invent the deme or township and the city ward; and thus inaugurate the second great plan of government, which remains among civilized nations to the present hour. ”