Page:United States Reports 502 OCT. TERM 1991.pdf/657

 502us2$30I 09-08-95 14:43:51 PAGES OPINPGT

Cite as: 502 U. S. 491 (1992)

499

Opinion of the Court

may have sufficed for the necessary delegation of authority to the county engineer, compare Ala. Code § 23–1–80 (1975) with Ala. Code § 11–6–3 (1975), the commission also requested the state legislature to pass implementing legislation. The Alabama Legislature did so on July 30, 1979, when it enacted Act No. 79–652, 1979 Ala. Acts 1132. It provides in pertinent part: “Section 1. All functions, duties and responsibilities for the construction, maintenance and repair of public roads, highways, bridges and ferries in Russell County are hereby vested in the county engineer, who shall, insofar as possible, construct and maintain such roads, highways, bridges and ferries on the basis of the county as a whole or as a unit, without regard to district or beat lines.” The parties refer to abolition of the individual road districts and transfer of responsibility for all road operations to the county engineer as the adoption of a “Unit System.” Neither the resolution nor the statute which authorized the Unit System was submitted for preclearance under § 5. Litigation involving the Russell County Commission led to a 1985 consent decree, see Sumbry v. Russell County, No. 84–T–1386–E (MD Ala., Mar. 17, 1985), that enlarged the commission to seven members and replaced the at-large election system with elections on a district-by-district basis. Without any mention of the Unit System changes, the consent decree was precleared by the Department of Justice under § 5. Following its implementation, appellants Mack and Gosha were elected in 1986. They are Russell County’s first black county commissioners in modern times. C In May 1989, appellants in both cases now before us filed a single complaint in the District Court for the Middle District of Alabama, alleging racial discrimination in the