Cite as: 520 U. S. 471 (1997)
Opinion of the Court
93a (Stipulations ¶ 82) (under 1990 population statistics in the Board's existing districts, the three districts with highest black concentrations contain 46.63%, 43.79%, and 30.13% black residents, respectively); id., at 85a (Stipulations ¶ 59) (population statistics for the Jury plan, with none of the plan's 12 districts containing a black majority). Because the Board's adoption of the Jury plan would have maintained the status quo regarding the number of black-majority districts, the parties stipulated that the Jury plan was not "retrogressive." Id., at 141a (Stipulations ¶ 252) ("The . . . plan is not retrogressive to minority voting strength compared to the existing benchmark plan . . ."). Appellant George Price, president of the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), presented the Board with a second option—a plan that created two districts each containing not only a majority of black residents, but a majority of voting-age black residents. Id., at 98a (Stipulations ¶ 98). Over vocal opposition from local residents, black and white alike, the Board voted to adopt the Jury plan as its own, reasoning that the Jury plan would almost certainly be precleared again and that the NAACP plan would require the Board to split 46 electoral precincts.
But the Board's hopes for rapid preclearance were dashed when the Attorney General interposed a formal objection to the Board's plan on the basis of "new information" not available when the Justice Department had precleared the plan for the Police Jury—namely, the NAACP's plan, which demonstrated that "black residents are sufficiently numerous and geographically compact so as to constitute a majority in two single-member districts." Id., at 155a-156a (Attorney General's August 30, 1993, objection letter). The objection letter asserted that the Board's plan violated § 2 of the Act, 42 U. S. C. § 1973, because it "unnecessarily limit[ed] the opportunity for minority voters to elect their candidates of choice," App. to Juris. Statement, at 156a, as compared to the new alternative. Relying on 28 CFR § 51.55(b)(2) (1996), which
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