WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court dealt North Carolina a setback on Monday in a voting rights case for the third time in recent weeks, affirming a decision that struck down many state legislative districts for relying too heavily on race.

The court also ordered a lower court to reconsider whether racial gerrymandering in North Carolina required a special election this year. And in a third, separate ruling, the justices agreed to decide a major case on the privacy of cellphone records.

The court’s summary affirmance of the ruling to strike down the North Carolina voting districts gave no reasons, and there were no noted dissents. But the question in the case was similar to one the justices addressed last month, in which the court struck down two of the state’s congressional districts as racial gerrymanders.

The new case presented the same basic question in the context of the state’s General Assembly.

Last August, a three-judge Federal District Court unanimously struck down 28 State House and Senate districts drawn in 2011 by the Republican-led legislature, saying the districts violated equal protection principles by using race as the predominant factor without good reason. The trial court rejected the state’s argument that the districts, as drawn, were justified as an attempt to comply with the Voting Rights Act.