Cite as: 539 U. S. 461 (2003)
Souter, J., dissenting
left with little hope of determining practically whether a districting shift to one party's overall political advantage can be expected to offset a loss of majority-minority voting power in particular districts; there will simply be greater opportunity to reduce minority voting strength in the guise of obtaining party advantage.
One is left to ask who will suffer most from the Court's new and unquantifiable standard. If it should turn out that an actual, serious burden of persuasion remains on the States, States that rely on the new theory of influence should be guaranteed losers: nonretrogression cannot be demonstrated by districts with minority influence too amorphous for objective comparison. But that outcome is unlikely, and if in subsequent cases the Court allows the State's burden to be satisfied on the pretense that unquantifiable influence can be equated with majority-minority power, § 5 will simply drop out as a safeguard against the "unremitting and ingenious defiance of the Constitution" that required the procedure of preclearance in the first place. South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U. S. 301, 309 (1966).
III
The District Court never reached the question the Court addresses, of what kind of influence districts (coalition or not) might demonstrate that a decrease in majority-minority districts was not retrogressive. It did not reach this question because it found that the State had not satisfied its burden of persuasion on an issue that should be crucial on any administrable theory: 1 the State had not shown the possibility
1 The District Court correctly recognized that the State bears the burden of proof in establishing that its proposed redistricting plan satisfied the standards of § 5. See, e. g., 195 F. Supp. 2d 25, 86 (DC 2002) ("We look to the State to explain why retrogression is not present"); see also Reno v. Bossier Parish School Bd., 520 U. S. 471, 478 (1997) (covered jurisdiction "bears the burden of proving that the change does not have the purpose and will not have the effect of denying or abridging the right to vote on
497
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