Voting Rights Act Claim Against State Not Barred by Sovereign Immunity

A district court has held that Congress validly abrogated states’ sovereign immunity in the Voting Rights Act. Reaves v. U.S. Dep’t of Justice, ---F.Supp.2d---, 2005 WL 237770 (D.D.C. Feb. 1, 2005).

In a short discussion, the court relied on Supreme Court VRA decisions from the 1960s and 1970s as well as the Court’s more recent sovereign immunity cases in other contexts. The case involved a challenge to the decision of the South Carolina Democratic party to void a June 8, 2004 primary election and to hold a subsequent special election—for which the Justice Department granted pre-clearance—and the state’s decision to change some of the polling places without seeking pre-clearance.

The court also dismissed the federal defendants on the grounds that under settled law pre-clearance decisions are unreviewable, and there was no Article III case and controversy regarding the polling places because only the state, not the federal government, could remedy the injury.