When the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 on Thursday that federal judges had no power to stop partisan gerrymandering, it brought to a crushing end decades-old questions about the court’s willingness or ability to rein in voting maps drawn to blatantly benefit one party.

The ruling, after years of escalating battles over voter identification laws, gerrymanders and voter purges, left Democrats and voting rights advocates bitterly disappointed. Former Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., who has helped lead the fight against Republican-drawn district maps, said in a statement that the court’s decision “tears at the fabric of our democracy and puts the interests of the established few above the many.”

He added, “History will not be kind in its assessment of the ways in which this court has undermined voting rights and core democratic principles in America.”

But rather than bringing any kind of finality, the ruling will almost certainly increase the importance of voting issues for the Democratic presidential candidates, many of whom have already issued detailed proposals on voting laws, district lines, gerrymandering and other issues surrounding American democracy. In effect, the questions will move to state governments and courts, and to Congress.