Wednesday, April 10 - In class we discussed Project 3 - since no one completed correctly we're allowed to redo Project 3 and turn it in next class.  We also discussed the reading/questions for Baker vs Carr. 

A group of appellants - anyone qualified to vote in the state of Tennessee - brought a suit against the State of Tennessee alleging that the State failed to properly classify/represent the voters in each county because the state never reapportioned the counties - even though the populations of each county drastically changed since the original apportionment. A lot of the city counties experienced substantial growth and were not represented adquately in the General Assembly.

The original case was dismissed by a middle District court, but after being reviewed by the Federal court it was decided that the case was dismissed in error.  The Federal Court stated that it was in the State's jurisdiction and therefore they couldn't make a final ruling, but they did say, basically, that the appelants had a justifiable case and that they should be entitled to a trial and decision. Justice Brennan also stated in his opinion that District court should vote consistently with the Federal Courts findings, which were that the State should reapportion the counties based on a new census count of the counties. He listed several examples of where there was blatant disregard for the law and constitution.   Brennan also listed out several requirements on what the new apportionment should qualify each county for - including the number of representatives, number of senators, etc.

We also discussed Justice Franfurter's disagreement with Brennan.  He basically states that as long as basic legal requirements are met, that the Federal Court should leave it up to the District Courts to decide.  He states that the Federal Court is always pulled into political disputes and that it is not in their jurisdiction to weigh in on such terms, at least until there is a law broken.