Louisiana at a Glance State Profile - Gov. Blanco (D) - Sen. Landrieu (D) - David Vitter (R) Presidential Politics Congressional Districting - 01 - Jindal (R) - 02 - Jefferson (D) - 03 - Melancon (D) - 04 - McCrery (R) - 05 - Alexander (R) - 06 - Baker (R) - 07 - Boustany (R) Almanac 2006 Home - States & Districts - Elected Officials - Committees - Election Cycles - Guide To Usage Almanac 2004 Almanac 2002 Almanac 2000 Almanac 1998 For district profiles and additional information on the elected officials of Louisiana, please use the pull-down menu above.

[an error occurred while processing this directive]

109th Lineup: 5 R, 2 D
108th Lineup: 4 R, 3 D
District Map: Click here

Louisiana redistricted its congressional districts three times in the 1990s. The first two plans created two black-majority districts, one of them in each case highly irregular in shape; they were declared unconstitutional in federal court in December 1993 and July 1994. The first plan was used in the 1992 elections, the second in 1994. In January 1996 a federal court came up with a plan, adopted by the legislature, that cut through few parish boundaries and had much more regular lines, and had only one black-majority district, centered in New Orleans. It was upheld by the Supreme Court in June 1996.

In August 2001 six of the seven House incumbents (all except John Cooksey, who was running for the Senate) submitted to the legislature their own plan. Governor Mike Foster called a special session for redistricting in October, and the legislators made minor tweaks in the House incumbents' plan. It was opposed by the Black Legislative Caucus, which drew up a plan with a second black-majority district stretching from Lafayette and Baton Rouge along the Mississippi River to the Arkansas border. But that was rejected by solid margins. Foster signed the new plan in October; it certainly seemed likely to be upheld by the courts, since the Supreme Court had already approved an almost identical plan. It was submitted to the Justice Department in January 2002 and approved in April. Unexpectedly, the plan turned out to have an effect on the results. In the December 2002 runoff, Democrat Rodney Alexander won an upset victory for Cooksey's old seat. His margin of victory came from heavily black areas added to the district. But he switched to the Republican party in August 2004. In 2005 some Democrats urged the Democratic legislature to redistrict again, as Republicans in Texas had in 2003, to help their party gain a seat or two. But Democratic Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco seemed uninterested, and it was hard to see how Democrats could gain a seat without creating a grotesquely shaped district like the one the courts rejected in 1993 and 1994.