502
Souter, J., dissenting
that Epstein did not attempt to rely on the table's calculations to demonstrate voting patterns in the districts, and calculated crossover in the existing, and not the proposed, Senate districts"). Indeed, in relying on this evidence the majority attributes a significance to it that Georgia's own expert disclaimed, as the District Court pointed out. See id., at 85 ("[I]t is impossible to extrapolate these voting patterns from Epstein's database. As Epstein admitted on cross-examination: the whole point of my analysis is not to look at polarization per se. The question is not whether or not blacks and whites in general vote for different candidates" (internal quotation marks omitted)).
2
In another effort to revise the record, the Court faults the District Court, alleging that it "focused too narrowly on proposed Senate Districts 2, 12, and 26." Ante, at 485. In fact, however, it is Georgia that asked the District Court to consider only the contested districts, and the District Court explicitly refused to limit its review in any such fashion: "we reject the State's argument that this court's review is limited only to those districts challenged by the United States, and should not encompass the redistricting plans in their entirety. . . . [T]he court's review necessarily extends to the entire proposed plan." 195 F. Supp. 2d, at 73. The District Court explained that it "is vested with the final authority to approve or disapprove the proposed change as a whole." Ibid. "The question before us is whether the proposed Senate plan as a whole, has the 'purpose or effect of denying or abridging the right to vote on account of race or color.' " Id., at 103 (Oberdorfer, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part) (quoting 42 U. S. C. § 1973c). Though the majority asserts that "[t]he District Court ignored the evidence of numerous other districts showing an increase in black voting age population," ante, at 486, the District Court, in fact, specifically considered the parties' dispute over the statewide
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