Cite as: 521 U. S. 74 (1997)
Breyer, J., dissenting
ity district; (c) maintaining political subdivisions; (d) protecting incumbents; and (e) maintaining traditional district cores. 922 F. Supp., at 1564-1565.
All three plans are identical in respect to the first two considerations. Each maintains districts in three of the four state corners; each creates at least one urban minority district. Plan B—the District Court's plan—is marginally superior in respect to the third criterion (maintaining political subdivisions). Plan B splits six counties within the Atlanta area but none outside the Atlanta area. Id., at 1564. Plan C splits two counties (Bibb and Muscogee) outside the Atlanta area. (Appellants, however, advance nonracial justifications for the latter splits.)
Plan C is superior to Plan B in respect to the remaining two considerations. Plan C displaces no incumbents. Plan B displaces three incumbents (including two African-Americans). Plan C maintains all district cores. Plan B moves many more Georgians into new districts.
Plan C has certain other advantages: It maintains, as provided in the legislature's 1991 plan, 138 of Georgia's 159 counties. Plan B maintains 123. Plan C has greater population uniformity among its districts. And, of course, Plan C provides for two majority-minority districts—the number the legislature provided in two of its three redistricting plans.
I add one point. This is not a suit in which there are claims of interference with the right to cast a ballot or "dilution" of the majority's vote. Cf. White v. Regester, 412 U. S. 755 (1973); Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U. S. 533 (1964); and Go-million v. Lightfoot, 364 U. S. 339 (1960); see also Karlan & Levinson, 84 Calif. L. Rev., at 1212-1216. Rather, the legislature's plans, insofar as they were race conscious, sought only to prevent what the legislature could reasonably have believed to be unlawful vote dilution—i. e., to prevent a violation of VRA § 2, or perhaps § 5. See Tr. 103 (Oct. 30, 1995) (testimony of Rep. Sanford Bishop). Given this fact and given the three sets of considerations just mentioned, I do
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