Why Alabama Fights to Limit Black Voting Power
By Darius Spearman (africanelements)
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In June 2026, the Supreme Court of the United States issued an emergency stay in the long-running redistricting case Milligan v. Allen (courthousenews.com). The decision allowed the state of Alabama to use a Republican-backed congressional map for the upcoming midterm elections. A three-judge federal panel had blocked this same map just days prior, ruling that it was drawn with intentional race-based discrimination (courthousenews.com). This sudden legal whiplash effectively eliminated a newly won congressional seat where Black voters had a fair opportunity to elect their preferred candidate.
This event is not an isolated political squabble. Instead, it is the latest chapter in a century-long struggle over race, geography, and political power in the Deep South. To understand the headlines of today, one must examine the deep historical currents, landmark legal battles, and shifting demographics that have shaped representation in Alabama.
Redistricting Crisis Timeline
The Ghost of Reconstruction and the 1901 Constitution
The struggle for fair representation in Alabama has deep roots in the post-Civil War era. During the historic Reconstruction period, which lasted from roughly 1865 to 1877, Black Americans made incredible strides toward political equality (wikipedia.org). Under federal military protection, Black citizens registered to vote in massive numbers. They successfully elected Black representatives to local, state, and federal offices, including the United States Congress (wikipedia.org). However, this era of progress faced a swift and violent backlash from white supremacists (wikipedia.org).
Following the withdrawal of federal troops, Southern states sought ways to systematically dismantle these achievements. In 1901, Alabama drafted a new state constitution with the explicit goal of establishing white supremacy (wikipedia.org). This document successfully stripped Black citizens of their constitutional right to vote (wikipedia.org). The state effectively erased Black political power for over sixty years. Many Black families faced severe economic and social subjugation. This period demonstrated that lasting freedom was denied to millions of newly freed individuals when federal protections disappeared.
Legal Barriers to the Ballot: Literacy Tests and Grandfather Clauses
To enforce disenfranchisement, Alabama utilized discriminatory legal mechanisms. Two of the most infamous tools were literacy tests and grandfather clauses (lumenlearning.com). Literacy tests required prospective voters to prove their reading and comprehension skills. However, white registrars administered these tests in an intentionally subjective and unfair manner (lumenlearning.com). They made sure that Black applicants failed, regardless of their actual reading ability. Even highly educated Black citizens were routinely denied the right to vote under these subjective rules (wikipedia.org).
To protect white voters who were also illiterate, Southern states created grandfather clauses (lumenlearning.com). These clauses exempted individuals from literacy tests if their ancestors could vote before Black Americans gained suffrage (lumenlearning.com). Since enslaved people could not vote, these clauses protected illiterate white voters while completely shutting out Black voters. The combination of these tools successfully decimated Black voter registration. Consequently, the white political establishment maintained complete control over the state government. This era of Jim Crow laws set a precedent of systemic exclusion that modern civil rights activists are still fighting to dismantle today.
The Birth of the Voting Rights Act and the Loss of Preclearance
The systemic exclusion of Black voters finally met a formidable opponent in the mid-twentieth century. Birthed out of the civil rights protests in Selma, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 revolutionized Southern politics (aclu.org). Section 5 of this landmark law was particularly powerful. It required states with a history of voter discrimination to obtain federal approval, known as preclearance, before changing any voting laws (justice.gov). This measure ensured that Alabama could not quietly pass laws that diluted Black voting power.
However, the legal landscape shifted dramatically in 2013. In the case of Shelby County v. Holder, which originated in Alabama, the Supreme Court struck down the formula used to determine which states required preclearance (aclu.org). This decision made Section 5 completely inoperable. As a result, Alabama and other Southern states gained the freedom to redraw congressional maps without prior federal oversight. This change has triggered a national debate over how federalism affects political rights of marginalized communities. Without federal preclearance, voting rights advocates must rely solely on Section 2 lawsuits to challenge discriminatory maps after they are already enacted.
Understanding the Black Belt and the Cracking of Mobile
To understand the geography of this conflict, one must look at the central region of Alabama. This area is known as the Black Belt (alabamablackbeltadventures.org). The term originally referred to the rich, dark, fertile soil of the region (britannica.com). In the nineteenth century, this highly productive soil became the epicenter of cotton plantation agriculture, which relied heavily on enslaved labor (alabamablackbeltadventures.org). Today, the region retains a demographic legacy, as its counties remain majority-Black (britannica.com). This historic area represents a vital base for Black political and economic power. It is also an area where Black workers have struggled for economic justice against severe systemic barriers.
For decades, mapmakers used gerrymandering techniques to dilute this concentrated voting power. Specifically, they utilized packing and cracking strategies. Packing involves squeezing a high percentage of Black voters into a single congressional district. Cracking involves splitting the remaining Black populations across multiple districts. This practice was heavily applied to the coastal city of Mobile, Alabama (aclu.org). Some summaries confusingly refer to mobile urban centers when discussing this issue. However, the legal dispute specifically centered on the geographic boundaries of Mobile, where Black residents were split to prevent them from electing a representative of their choice. By cracking the Black population of Mobile and the surrounding Black Belt, the state ensured that white conservative majorities consistently drowned out Black voters.
Alabama Demographics vs. Congressional Representation
The reinstating of the 2023 map drops Black voting power back down to a single safe seat, leaving a huge representation gap.
The Legal Battleground: Milligan v. Allen Demystified
The modern battle over these maps began after the 2020 Census. Civil rights advocates filed a lawsuit challenging the state’s new congressional map, arguing that it diluted Black voting power (aclualabama.org). This legal battle is known as Milligan v. Allen or Allen v. Milligan (supremecourt.gov). The two names refer to the exact same case. In federal litigation, the name of a lawsuit can invert as it moves through different stages of appeal depending on which party is petitioning the court. Evan Milligan, a Black voter, was the lead plaintiff who sued the state of Alabama (aclualabama.org). Wes Allen is the Alabama Secretary of State (aldailynews.com).
When the state appealed the lower court’s rulings to the U.S. Supreme Court, the state official became the petitioner. This change inverted the name of the case on the docket to Allen v. Milligan (supremecourt.gov). In June 2023, the Supreme Court issued a surprising 5-4 ruling in this case (aclualabama.org). The court upheld Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and affirmed a lower court order to draw a second congressional district where Black voters had a fair opportunity to elect their preferred candidate. This decision was a historic victory, but the state legislature quickly refused to comply, prompting further court intervention.
The Role of the Special Master in Redrawing the Lines
When a state legislature refuses to draw a fair map, the responsibility falls to the federal courts. In 2023, the Alabama Legislature openly defied the Supreme Court mandate by passing a revised map that still maintained only one majority-Black district (aclualabama.org). In response, the federal court intervened and appointed an independent expert known as a Special Master (aclualabama.org). A Special Master is a neutral, court-appointed demographer or election law scholar (lls.edu). Their job is to draw fair, legally compliant maps that are free from political or racial gerrymandering.
By utilizing a Special Master, the court aimed to remove partisan self-interest from the redistricting process. The expert drafted several alternative plans using objective, non-partisan criteria. These plans were subjected to public comment, legislative review, and court evaluation (lls.edu). Ultimately, the court selected a map that featured a redrawn second congressional district (aclualabama.org). This intervention demonstrated that federal courts have the power to protect voting rights when state lawmakers refuse to do so.
Demographics of Power: Black Voting Age Population and Crossover Voting
To understand how these maps are evaluated, one must understand the metric known as Black Voting Age Population, or BVAP. While congressional districts are apportioned based on total population, demographers rely on BVAP when assessing Voting Rights Act compliance (lls.edu). This metric measures the percentage of a district’s population that is Black and eighteen years or older. Measuring BVAP is crucial because overall demographic data can be misleading if a community has a high percentage of children or non-citizens who cannot vote.
A district does not need a BVAP of over fifty percent to function as an opportunity district. The court-ordered map in Alabama created a second congressional district with a BVAP of 48.7 percent (aclualabama.org). This percentage is highly effective due to the concept of crossover voting (lls.edu). In this district, Black voters vote as a highly cohesive political bloc, overwhelmingly supporting the same candidate. A small but reliable portion of white voters also crosses over to vote for that same candidate. This combined coalition is large enough to consistently outvote conservative candidates. Furthermore, Black voters make up a dominant majority in Democratic primaries, giving them complete control over the nomination process.
Black Voting Age Population (BVAP) in District 2
A Historic Breakthrough: Shomari Figures and the 2024 Election
The court-ordered map was utilized in the November 2024 elections, leading to a historic milestone. In the newly redrawn second congressional district, voters elected Shomari Figures, a Democratic newcomer (newsfromthestates.com). Figures is an attorney with deep roots in the civil rights movement. His father was a pioneering civil rights attorney and state senator, and his mother currently serves in the Alabama Senate (newsfromthestates.com). His victory was a major political shift, transforming a traditional Republican stronghold into a Democratic seat.
His election was also deeply historic on a broader scale. For the first time since the Reconstruction Era, Alabama sent two Black representatives to the U.S. House of Representatives simultaneously, as Figures joined veteran representative Terri Sewell (newsfromthestates.com). This breakthrough demonstrated how fair maps can directly alter the composition of government. It showed that when voting barriers are removed, Black communities can successfully shape political dynamics to ensure their voices are heard at the national level.
The 2026 Legal Whiplash: Louisiana v. Callais and Compelling Interest
However, this political progress was short-lived. In April 2026, the Supreme Court issued a major ruling in the case of Louisiana v. Callais (courthousenews.com). In a 6-3 decision, the conservative majority heavily curtailed the scope of the Voting Rights Act. The court ruled that a newly drawn second Black-majority district in Louisiana was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander (courthousenews.com). The court held that complying with the Voting Rights Act is not always a compelling interest that justifies prioritizing race when drawing lines.
In constitutional law, a compelling interest is a supreme, necessary government objective that justifies treating citizens differently based on race (cornell.edu). Historically, states assumed that complying with federal voting laws met this high bar. The Callais decision changed this standard, creating a massive loophole for states seeking to dismantle minority districts. Following this precedent, the Supreme Court issued an emergency stay in June 2026, allowing Alabama to reinstate its rejected 2023 map for the upcoming midterm elections (courthousenews.com). This action occurred despite a lower court finding that the 2023 map was drawn with intentional race-based discrimination. This decision reflects a broader trend where the Supreme Court has limited race-conscious policies, mirroring decisions on affirmative action and other racial equity initiatives.
The Broader Fallout: What Reverting to the 2023 Map Means
Reverting to the 2023 congressional map has severe consequences for both local communities and national politics. By replacing the court-ordered map, the state has reduced the Black Voting Age Population in the second district from 48.7 percent to just 39.9 percent (aclualabama.org). At this level, crossover voting is insufficient, meaning Black-preferred candidates will almost certainly lose. This change directly favors the Republican Party by restoring a safe conservative seat and weakening the Democratic presence in the U.S. House of Representatives.
The social and economic consequences for the Black Belt are equally profound. Reverting to this map splits these historically impoverished counties across multiple districts, diluting their collective voice. This division makes it much harder for residents to secure federal funding, resources, and legislative advocacy. The ongoing legal battle in Alabama proves that the struggle for equal representation is not a settled historical event. Instead, the fight continues to unfold in the federal courts, where the definition of a fair vote remains deeply contested.
About the Author
Darius Spearman is a professor of Black Studies at San Diego City College, where he has been teaching for over 20 years. He is the founder of African Elements, a media platform dedicated to providing educational resources on the history and culture of the African diaspora. Through his work, Spearman aims to empower and educate by bringing historical context to contemporary issues affecting the Black community.
