Cite as: 515 U. S. 900 (1995)
Opinion of the Court
appellees failed to make that showing here. Appellants' conception of the constitutional violation misapprehends our holding in Shaw and the equal protection precedent upon which Shaw relied.
Shaw recognized a claim "analytically distinct" from a vote dilution claim. 509 U. S., at 652; see id., at 649-650. Whereas a vote dilution claim alleges that the State has enacted a particular voting scheme as a purposeful device "to minimize or cancel out the voting potential of racial or ethnic minorities," Mobile v. Bolden, 446 U. S. 55, 66 (1980) (citing cases), an action disadvantaging voters of a particular race, the essence of the equal protection claim recognized in Shaw is that the State has used race as a basis for separating voters into districts. Just as the State may not, absent extraordinary justification, segregate citizens on the basis of race in its public parks, New Orleans City Park Improvement Assn. v. Detiege, 358 U. S. 54 (1958) (per curiam), buses, Gayle v. Browder, 352 U. S. 903 (1956) (per curiam), golf courses, Holmes v. Atlanta, 350 U. S. 879 (1955) (per curiam), beaches, Mayor of Baltimore v. Dawson, 350 U. S. 877 (1955) (per curiam), and schools, Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483 (1954), so did we recognize in Shaw that it may not separate its citizens into different voting districts on the basis of race. The idea is a simple one: "At the heart of the Constitution's guarantee of equal protection lies the simple command that the Government must treat citizens 'as individuals, not "as simply components of a racial, religious, sexual or national class." ' " Metro Broadcasting, Inc. v. FCC, 497 U. S. 547, 602 (1990) (O'Connor, J., dissenting) (quoting Arizona Governing Comm. for Tax Deferred Annuity and Deferred Compensation Plans v. Norris, 463 U. S. 1073, 1083 (1983)); cf. Northeastern Fla. Chapter, Associated Gen. Contractors of America v. Jacksonville, 508 U. S. 656, 666 (1993) (" 'injury in fact' " was "denial of equal treatment . . . , not the ultimate inability to obtain the benefit"). When the State assigns voters on the basis of race, it engages in
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