1. Baker V. Carr
(1962)
Elizabeth Cahan

2. Background Information
 A Tennessee law says all its towns are required to
provide population statistics to the state every 10 years.
Each town is required to do this so the state can
accurately determine jurisdictional boundaries.
 The Fourteenth Amendment has an Equal Protection
Clause. This clause says that “No state shall…deny to
any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of
the laws.” [1]

3. The Case
 Charles Baker, a resident of Shelby County, Tennessee, filed
suit against Joe Carr, Tennessee's Secretary of State.
 Baker’s alleged that Tennessee legislature had not redrawn its
legislative districts since 1901, (61 years earlier) which
violated the Tennessee State Constitution.
 Baker, who lived in an urban part of the state, said the state
demographics had changed because a greater proportion of
the population had moved to the cities. This demographic
change diluted his vote and was in violation of the Equal
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

4. Verdict
 The Supreme Court said that Tennessee’s refusal to follow the
expressed law of remapping the districts was in direct
violation of the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.
 The 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution
doesn’t allow the government to infringe on an individual
person’s rights to pursue a happy life.
 Article III of the United States Constitution states that the
Federal Government is allowed to rule over all laws in the
event that unfair advantages are present with the creation of
a law. This law was created to ensure an equal legal process
throughout the United States.

5. Legacy
 Baker v. Carr is the first of the cases developing the
Supreme Court’s “one person, one vote”
legislation. This line of cases helped equalize
representation between country and city dwellers
in an increasingly urbanized nation.

6. Legacy- Other Cases
 The Supreme Court’s ruling in Reynolds v. Sims
(1964) was built on the Baker v. Carr case.
Reynolds v. Sims required virtually every state
legislature to be reapportioned. This caused
political power in most states to shift from rural to
urban areas.