Thread by @ashtonpittman

NEW: When a federal court redrew Mississippi's congressional maps to make it comply with the Voting Rights Act, plaintiffs say, it inadvertently helped kill direct democracy—and a medical marijuana law voters approved in 2020.

They're asking for a remedy.
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"Left to a state legislature unable to adopt a constitutionally compliant redistricting plan for the last thirty years …, the initiative petition rights of the people of Mississippi have been sideswiped and killed,” the motion says.
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On Nov. 3, 2020, about two-thirds of Mississippi voters approved Initiative 65. If their wishes had been fulfilled, patients would have been able to begin obtaining medical marijuana to treat various illnesses starting in August.
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In May, the Mississippi Supreme Court ruled that Section 273 of the Mississippi Constitution, which is the part that outlines the way ballot initiatives work, “cannot work in a world where Mississippi has fewer than five representatives in Congress.”
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When voters adopted ballot initiatives in 1992, the state had 5 congressional districts, but lost one due to slow population growth after the 2000 Census.

Without exactly five districts, the MS Supreme Court says, citizens can't put issues on the ballot.
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Section 273 of the Mississippi Constitution, Mississippians point out in today's court filing, says that the “Legislature … shall in no way restrict or impair" ballot initiative rights "or the powers herein reserved to the people.”
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If the Mississippi Legislature had done its duty & drawn a four-district congressional map that complied with the Voting Rights Act, the motion says, they would've been required to take steps to ensure it didn't "impair" the ballot initiative process.
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Courts have had to draw Mississippi's congressional maps for the past 30 years as lawmakers repeatedly failed to draw Voting Rights Act-compliant maps.

That relieved lawmakers of the duty to ensure redistricting didn't impair the ballot initiative law.
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"In effect, through its good-faith and federally mandated actions, this Court unknowingly and unintentionally accomplished what Mississippi’s Constitution expressly prohibited its own Legislature from doing,” today's motion says.
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Today's motion asks the federal court that drew Mississippi's most recent congressional map to amend its judgment to specify that the state should use the old five district plan for initiatives (but not voting) until the Legislature resolves the conflict.
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They ask for the "Court’s acknowledgement that its authority to ensure Mississippi’s compliance with the Voting Rights Act of 1965...cannot be used as an instrument to deprive the people of Mississippi of their constitutionally embedded initiative rights."
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This evening, an attorney in the case said federal courts “have only limited power to affect state law” and that does not include the power to redraw maps for purposes other than elections.

“They had to make it compliant with one-man, one-vote with the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965,” he said. “… The initiative process doesn’t involve one-man, one-vote and it doesn’t involve the Voting Rights Act."

Colom said the plaintiffs are not asking the federal court to reinstate Initiative 65. If the proponents of Initiative 65 choose to intervene in the case and seek the medical marijuana law’s reinstatement, however, they could do so, he said.
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