Supreme Court Justice Thomas Says Courts Lack Authority in Redistricting Cases

The court has never explained where its power to overrule state legislatures comes from, Justice Thomas writes.

Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas poses for an official portrait at the East Conference Room of the Supreme Court building in Washington on Oct. 7, 2022. Alex Wong/Getty Images

Justice Clarence Thomas criticized the landmark Brown v. Board of Education ruling this week, days after its 70th anniversary, suggesting in a redistricting case that the Supreme Court used faulty reasoning when it declared that it was unconstitutional to separate schoolchildren by race.

This is a problem because the same defective thinking appears in the court’s redistricting decisions, according to the court’s longest-serving justice.