Arkansas AG Tim Griffin Seeks to End Majority-Black Judicial Districts

Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin asked a federal judge Thursday to end a 35-year-old order that established multiple majority-Black judicial districts in the state. The Republican attorney general made the request in a filing, citing a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling that weakened a key part of the Voting Rights Act.

Griffin asked a judge to terminate the 1991 consent decree that created 10 judicial seats in predominantly Black subdistricts. The order was originally issued in a lawsuit filed by Black residents who alleged that Arkansas’s system of electing judges violated the Voting Rights Act. In his filing, Griffin stated the decree should be terminated because of significant changes to the law and the Supreme Court’s Louisiana v. Callais ruling in April, which held that the Voting Rights Act does not require states to create majority-minority districts.

Griffin’s Legal Argument

“The consent decree should independently be terminated because defendants have fully complied with the consent decree in good faith since it was entered and any vestiges of past discrimination have been eliminated to the extent practicable,” the filing said. In a news release, Griffin characterized the consent decree as premised on racial stereotypes and contrary to equal protection mandates, adding that it unconstitutionally divides voters by race.

Criticism from Civil Rights Advocates

Griffin’s filing was met with criticism from civil rights advocates. Barry Jefferson, president of the NAACP Arkansas State Conference, said I think it’s an attack on the Black judges that are doing an outstanding job right now across Arkansas and urged resistance to the move. The NAACP Legal Defense Fund also announced it would oppose Griffin’s motion, noting that Black judges had not been elected in Arkansas before the 1991 consent decree.

Defense of the Decree

Kathryn Sadasivan, senior counsel for the Legal Defense Fund, emphasized the decree’s importance for representation. So we’re talking about a justice system that was being doled out by people who didn’t look like the people who were receiving that justice, and that’s pretty fundamentally unfair…It’s an important decree that’s led to a more representative bench, and I think that should be important to everybody in Arkansas, she said.