Judge Ramona Manglona of the federal district court for the Northern Mariana Islands just threw out a blatantly unconstitutional provision of the territorial government that strictly limited registration and voting for a referendum to only those “persons of Northern Marianas descent.”
The Constitution of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) defines persons of Northern Marianas descent as those who are “at least one-quarter Northern Marianas Chamorro or Northern Marianas Carolinian blood or a combination thereof or an adopted child of a person of Northern Marianas descent if adopted while under the age of eighteen years.” One is considered a “full-blooded” Chamorro or Carolinian if “born or domiciled” in the territory by 1950.
There is no question that CNMI’s voting prohibitions are racially discriminatory. In fact, they are reminiscent of the odious “one-drop rule” of racial segregation codes or the First Regulation to the Reichs Citizenship Law of Nov. 14, 1935, which similarly defined Jews based on their ancestry.
Yet John Davis was forced to bring this suit at his own expense, with his own lawyer, because the Justice Department was nowhere to be found. It had no interest in filing a lawsuit under the Voting Rights Act against a blatantly discriminatory and repugnant law that prevented John Davis from voting because he doesn’t have the right “blood” quantum.
