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... U.S. District Judge Sharion Aycock in Greenville sided with a group of Black citizens of the state in finding on Tuesday that the map in place since 1987 for Mississippi Supreme Court elections violated the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

The court's nine justices are elected in nonpartisan races from three districts to serve eight-year, staggered terms. The map's lines are drawn by the state legislature and have changed little in over a century, according to the plaintiffs.

Black people make up about 40% of the state's population, but Aycock noted that the Mississippi Supreme Court has had only four Black justices, none of whom have served at the same time. Each held the same seat in District 1, which includes the city of Jackson and part of the Mississippi Delta, and all four were first appointed by a governor.

The only Black justice currently is Presiding Justice Leslie King.
"In short, the evidence illustrates that Black candidates who desire to run for the Mississippi Supreme Court face a grim likelihood of success," Aycock wrote. ...

But Aycock, who presided over a non-jury trial in the case, said that data did not reflect voter eligibility or account for the state's lifetime ban on voting for people convicted of certain felonies, which disproportionately affects Black people.

Aycock pointed to a history of the southern state suppressing Black voters over nearly a century leading up to the Voting Rights Act's passage, after they gained the right to vote in the state in 1868 following the end of the Civil War. ...