Alabama’s method of electing appellate judges does not dilute the voting power of blacks, a Montgomery federal judge ruled Wednesday in a case brought against the state by the Alabama NAACP.
The group contended that Alabama’s at-large elections of appellate judges – instead of electing the judges by districts – disenfranchises black voters and is the reason why there have been no black state appellate civil and criminal judges and only three African-American judges on the Alabama Supreme Court in the last 36 years.