482
Opinion of the Court
Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment"); see also Arlington Heights v. Metropolitan Housing Development Corp., 429 U. S. 252, 265 (1977) ("Proof of racially discriminatory intent or purpose is required to show a violation of the Equal Protection Clause"). When Congress amended § 2 in 1982, it clearly expressed its desire that § 2 not have an intent component, see S. Rep. No. 97-417, at 2 ("Th[e 1982] amendment is designed to make clear that proof of discriminatory intent is not required to establish a violation of Section 2"). Because now the Constitution requires a showing of intent that § 2 does not, a violation of § 2 is no longer a fortiori a violation of the Constitution. Congress itself has acknowledged this fact. See id., at 39 ("The Voting Rights Act is the best example of Congress' power to enact implementing legislation that goes beyond the direct prohibitions of the Constitution itself").
Justice Stevens argues that the subsequent divergence of constitutional and statutory standards is of no moment because, in his view, we "did not [in Beer] purport to distinguish between challenges brought under the Constitution and those brought under the [Voting Rights] statute." Post, at 504 (opinion dissenting in part and concurring in part). Our citation to White, he posits, incorporated White's standard into our exception for nonretrogressive apportionments that violate § 5, whether or not that standard continued to coincide with the constitutional standard. In essence, Justice Stevens reads Beer as creating an exception for nonretrogressive apportionments that so discriminate on the basis of race or color as to violate any federal law that happens to coincide with what would have amounted to a constitutional violation in 1976. But this reading flatly contradicts the plain language of the exception we recognized, which applies solely to apportionments that "so discriminat[e] on the basis of race or color as to violate the Constitution." Beer, supra, at 141 (emphasis added). We cited White, not for itself, but because it embodied the current
Page: Index Previous 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007