Harrison: Redistricting battle proves everything old is new again in Mississippi

Don’t throw the past away

You might need it some rainy day

Dreams can come true again

When everything old is new again

– Peter Allen

The recent Louisiana v. Callais redistricting decision that gutted the Voting Rights Act proves that “everything old is new again” – at least in Mississippi and many other states, mostly in the South.

But let’s focus on Mississippi.

For much of the history of Mississippi, the state’s leadership has sought to prevent the election of Black people to political office.

The 1890 Mississippi Constitution famously included schemes and ploys designed to prevent Black Mississippians from holding elective office or from even participating in the democratic process by voting.

The federal courts, buoyed by the Voting Rights Act passed in 1965 at the behest of President Lyndon B. Johnson, began in the late 1960s and ‘70s to curb those schemes and ploys that were designed to deny African-Americans’ civil rights. White Mississippi politicians kicked and screamed in opposition to Black people being allowed to participate in the state’s representative democracy. But federal judges depended on the Voting Rights Act to force their inclusion.

The recent Supreme Court decision gives politicians permission to ignore the Voting Rights Act and to again draw political districts that dilute or even ignore Black voter strength.

Based on the interpretation of many, political districts no longer will have to be drawn to give Black voters a majority even when the districts could be created that are relatively compact and do not split communities of interest, such as cities and counties.

Hardly was the ink dry from the pen of Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote the majority opinion, before Gov. Tate Reeves and other Mississippi politicians began to conspire to eliminate the majority-Black congressional district that has elected a Black Mississippian, Bennie Thompson, since 1993. Before Thompson, Mike Espy was elected from the 2nd District in 1986 to become the first Black Mississippian elected to Congress since the 1800s.

In addition to scheming to dilute Black voter strength in the 2nd Congressional District, Mississippi legislative leaders are studying the boundaries of the 52 state Senate seats and 122 state House seats with the presumed intent of eliminating many of those majority-Black districts. There are currently 17 such districts in the Senate and 43 in the House.

Because of Louisiana v. Callais, politicians are again looking to prevent majority-Black districts.

Indeed, everything old is new again.

It was not even olden times, though, when the federal courts found that Mississippi politicians were discriminating and diluting Black voting power and ordered three new majority-Black state legislative districts – one in the House and two in the Senate. Those new majority-Black districts were created in 2025 to prevent the dilution of minority voters.

At the very least, look for legislators to eliminate those three new court-ordered districts before the 2027 state elections and go back to the old maps that had fewer majority-Black districts.

After all, everything old is new again.

This column was produced by Mississippi Today, a nonprofit news organization that covers state government, public policy, politics and culture. Bobby Harrison is the editor of Mississippi Today Ideas.