Evenwel v. Abbott: What Does One Person, One Vote Really Mean?

This fall, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in Evenwel v. Abbott, which could turn out to be the most significant redistricting case the Court has heard in decades. In Evenwel, two Texas voters claim that state legislative districts violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because the Texas legislature included large numbers of noncitizens, who are ineligible to vote, in the population it used to draw the districts. The plaintiffs reside in districts whose voting populations deviate anywhere from 31 to 49 percent from the “ideal” population of a Texas Senate District. As a result, their votes have only about half the value of voters in other districts. The Supreme Court has never decided what population states should use to meet the one person, one vote standard it established almost sixty years ago under the Equal Protection Clause. Should this issue be left up to the states to decide? Or does one person, one vote require that only eligible voters be considered?