In 2024, the League of Women Voters of South Carolina (LWVSC) filed a lawsuit in the South Carolina Supreme Court arguing that the congressional map passed by the state Legislature is an unlawful partisan gerrymander and violates the South Carolina Constitution. Legislators previously admitted that the map was drawn for partisan reasons.  LWVSC argues that the state map “cracks” and “packs” voters based on partisanship to ensure control over elections for the rest of the decade.  

CLC’s “Friend-of-the-Court" Brief

CLC submitted a “friend-of-the-court" brief that explains why partisan gerrymandering violates the state’s Free Elections Clause and why the South Carolina Supreme Court has the authority and the obligation to review this case and uphold South Carolinians’ constitutional rights.  

Among other provisions, the South Carolina Constitution contains a Free Elections Clause, which provides a standard to evaluate whether a map is an impermissible partisan gerrymander. The constitutional guarantee that “[a]ll elections shall be free and open” and all citizens of the state “shall have an equal right to elect officers” is undermined when politicians manipulate district lines, pre-determine election results, and insulate themselves from voters.  

The South Carolina Supreme Court has the ability to give power back to the voters, as the state constitution requires. The Court can and should step in to block these extreme partisan gerrymanders, so that South Carolinians can vote under fair maps and make their voices heard. 

Ernest Falls is a U.S. citizen and Tennessee resident who wishes to exercise his freedom to vote by registering and voting. In 1986, Mr. Falls was convicted of a single felony in Virginia state court, but he has long since served his sentence.  

Since moving to Tennessee six years ago, Mr. Falls has navigated a complex and shifting obstacle course in order to restore his freedom to vote. To date, Mr. Falls has been unable to restore that right despite years of effort, litigation and compliance with ever-changing requirements imposed by the Tennessee Division of Elections, led by the Coordinator of Elections, Mark Goins. Each time Mr. Falls complies with Coordinator Goins’ new and changing requirements, the goalposts move again, keeping Mr. Falls’ right to vote out of reach.  

Mr. Falls’ experience highlights the unfairness and absurdity of Tennessee’s felony disenfranchisement process. Nearly half a million Tennesseans with past felony convictions must follow Tennessee’s process for rights restoration to be able to vote again. Election officials can – and do – change the rules frequently and apply the rules differently to different people, and they seem to operate with no checks or oversight on their power. Mr. Falls’ experience shows that there is no justification for these arbitrary rule changes other than voter suppression.

Mr. Falls has met the requirements for voting rights restoration in Tennessee. He now simply seeks for Coordinator Goins to notify local election officials that his voting rights have been restored, as is required under state law. On December 23, 2024, Mr. Falls filed this lawsuit to compel Coordinator Goins to fulfill this requirement so that Mr. Falls can finally exercise his constitutional right to vote in Tennessee.

CLC filed this lawsuit in partnership with Free Hearts and Sherrard Roe Voigt & Harbison, PLC.

CLC has also challenged Tennessee's unequal, inaccessible, opaque and inaccurate voting rights restoration process in a federal lawsuit brought in 2020.