906
Thomas, J., concurring in judgment
strives for the ideal of a color-blind Constitution. "The principle of equality is at war with the notion that District A must be represented by a Negro, as it is with the notion that District B must be represented by a Caucasian, District C by a Jew, District D by a Catholic, and so on." Wright v. Rockefeller, 376 U. S. 52, 66 (1964) (Douglas, J., dissenting). Despite Justice Douglas' warning sounded 30 years ago, our voting rights decisions are rapidly progressing toward a system that is indistinguishable in principle from a scheme under which members of different racial groups are divided into separate electoral registers and allocated a proportion of political power on the basis of race. Cf. id., at 63-66. Under our jurisprudence, rather than requiring registration on racial rolls and dividing power purely on a population basis, we have simply resorted to the somewhat less precise expedient of drawing geographic district lines to capture minority populations and to ensure the existence of the "appropriate" number of "safe minority seats."
That distinction in the practical implementation of the concept, of course, is immaterial.14 The basic premises underlying our system of safe minority districts and those behind the racial register are the same: that members of the racial group must think alike and that their interests are so distinct that the group must be provided a separate body of representatives in the legislature to voice its unique point of view. Such a "system, by whatever name it is called, is a divisive force in a community, emphasizing differences between candidates and voters that are irrelevant." Id., at 66. Justice Douglas correctly predicted the results of state sponsorship of such a theory of representation: "When racial or religious
14 Cf. Lijphart, Proportionality by Non-PR Methods: Ethnic Representation in Belgium, Cyprus, Lebanon, New Zealand, West Germany, and Zimbabwe, in Electoral Laws and Their Political Consequences 113, 116 (B. Grofman & A. Lijphart eds. 1986) (describing methods other than separate electoral registers to allocate political power on the basis of ethnicity or race).
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