Cite as: 512 U. S. 874 (1994)
Opinion of O'Connor, J.
This is not so with § 2 dilution challenges to size, however. In a dilution challenge to the size of a governing authority, choosing the alternative for comparison—a hypothetical larger (or smaller) governing authority—is extremely problematic. See ante, at 881-882 (opinion of Kennedy, J.). The wide range of possibilities makes the choice inherently standardless. Here, for example, respondents argued that the single-member commission structure was dilutive in comparison to a five-member structure, in which African-Americans would probably have been able to elect one representative of their choice. Some groups, however, will not be able to constitute a majority in one of five districts. Once a court accepts respondents' reasoning, it will have to allow a plaintiff group insufficiently large or geographically compact to form a majority in one of five districts to argue that the jurisdiction's failure to establish a 10-, 15-, or 25-commissioner structure is dilutive. See, e. g., Romero v. Pomona, 883 F. 2d 1418, 1425, n. 10 (CA9 1989); Heath, Managing the Political Thicket: Developing Objective Standards in Voting Rights Litigation, 21 Stetson L. Rev. 819, 827 (1992) ("[O]nce one departs from the current number of districts or other objective standard, the test loses its validity as a threshold standard").
Respondents argue that this concern with arbitrary and standardless intrusions into the size of local governing authority is overstated. Respondents' principal support for this conclusion is that a five-member commission is the most common size for Georgia. But a five-member commission is not the only common size in Georgia: 22 Georgia counties have three-member commissions (and one county has an 11-member commission). Moreover, there is no good reason why the search for benchmarks should be limited to Georgia. Expanding the search nationwide produces many 20-person county commissions in Tennessee, and 40-member commissions in Wisconsin. DeSantis, County Government: A Century of Change, in The Municipal Yearbook 1989, pp. 80, 83.
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