President George W. Bush’s administration in late 2001 sued Alamosa County in the San Luis Valley in south central Colorado, demanding the county racially gerrymander commissioner districts to guarantee the election of a Hispanic commissioner. The Bush Department of Justice sued because, as a complaining witness testified, “To me, representative government means having somebody that looks like you, that understands what you do, and we didn’t have that.”
Specifically, federal lawyers alleged Alamosa County’s use of a state-mandated system of electing commissioners at large from residential districts, a law since Colorado statehood in 1876, violated the Voting Rights Act by preventing Hispanic people from electing their “candidates of choice.” Argued Bush’s lawyers, Alamosa County Hispanics’ “candidate of choice” was a Hispanic Democrat!
Although Alamosa…
