A federal court has delivered a sweeping rebuke to Mississippi’s system of electing state supreme court justices, ruling that the map in place for nearly four decades strips Black voters of fair representation.
U.S. District Judge Sharion Aycock struck down the map that has governed elections for the nine-member court since 1987, finding it violates the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The challenge came from Black Mississippians who argued that despite making up roughly 40% of the state’s population, their ability to elect candidates of choice to the state’s highest court has been systematically weakened.
The numbers tell the story. Only four Black justices have ever sat on the Mississippi Supreme Court—and never together. Each came from the same district covering Jackson and part of the Delta, and every one of them was first placed on the bench by a governor’s appointment rather than through election. Today, only one Black justice, Leslie King, serves on the court.
“The evidence illustrates that Black candidates who desire to run for the Mississippi Supreme Court face a grim likelihood of success,” Judge Aycock wrote, dismantling the state’s defense that one majority-Black district was sufficient. She noted the map fails to account for voter eligibility rules and felony disenfranchisement laws that disproportionately impact Black residents, compounding historic barriers to the ballot box.
Mississippi’s attorney general’s office, which defended the existing map, said it is reviewing the decision. The ruling halts further use of the current system and orders the legislature to design a new one. A hearing will determine how quickly that must happen.
Civil rights groups hailed the ruling as a long-overdue correction. “This win corrects a historic injustice,” said Ari Savitzky of the American Civil Liberties Union, which represented the plaintiffs.
The case, *White v. State Board of Election Commissioners*, is now set to reshape how Mississippi’s top judges are chosen—and may alter the face of justice in a state with one of the largest Black populations in the nation.
