“Pro” gerrymanders

During Davis vs Bandemer, a redistricing case where the majority party had gerrymandered its way to 57 percent of state house seats with only 48% of the vote, Justice O’ Connor reported that any politician who does not exploit the redistricting process for partisan purposes “ought to be impeached”. This case and statement occured in 1986, but it makes one thing clear: partisan gerrymandering has been utilized, even encouraged, in American history for years.

The way that the supreme court, having the power to addresses gerrymandering in state legislatures, has responded to cases also raises questions about how the majority of the government views gerrymandering. In 2019, NPR reported that in a 5-4 decision along traditional conservative-liberal ideological lines, the Supreme Court ruled that partisan redistricting is a political question — not reviewable by federal courts — and that those courts can’t judge if extreme gerrymandering violates the Constitution. However, NPR reported in 2024, that the U.S. Supreme Court on made it far more difficult to challenge state redistricting plans as unconstitutional racial gerrymanders. By a vote of 6-to-3, along ideological lines, the court upheld a redistricting map drawn by the South Carolina legislature, a map that a lower court found had resulted in “the bleaching of African American voters” from a district.

From this, we can see that when some gerrymandered maps were being challenged, the Supreme Court used the excuse of “not having the jurisdiction” to determine the validity of the maps. But in other cases, where maps were challenged in favor of the republican party, the 6- majority republican Supreme Court found the map valid.

The Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy brings this same practice into question, raising another one: to what degree is gerrymandering bad, versus simply a political tool.

The common population frowns on gerrymandering today, because it targets minorities, but if it were the other way around-how would the majrotiy of america feel then? Happy, retributed? Would gerrymandering still be such a crime?

The cornell journal of law answers this question by explaining that partisanship in redistricting, and therefore redistricting itself, is inevitable. If limited in one direction, it must go somewhere else. Rather than pushing redistricting
toward an exclusive focus on defensive gerrymandering.

Defensive gerrymandering refers to a redistricting strategy
aimed at making re-election safer for one’s own party.It is “defensive” in the sense that it defends what the redistricters already have.

The morality of it’s practice is also argued through the terms defensive versus offensive redistrcing.

Offensive gerrymandering refers to a redistricting strategy
aimed at making re-election more difficult for the opposition party. The gerrymandering is “offensive” in the sense that it attacks the opposition.

However, neither category, or definition can justify the impacts of gerrymandering on the common population.

During a redistricting cycle, Democrats alleged that Republicans went too far in
exploiting their control of redistricting in a number of key states, includ-
ing Pennsylvania, Michigan, Colorado, and Texas. Sam Hirsch argues
that partisan gerrymandering “may well conspire to keep Republicans in
the majority and Democrats in the minority for the next five Con-
gresses-even if, nationally, Democrats repeatedly capture more con-
gressional votes. They saw this as completely unconstituional.

However, all of the democratic backlash on gerrymandering raises the question on whether the practice is disagreed with, or it’s impacts. How far would either party go to further their political agendas?

Legislation +Orginizations

Pieces of legislation like the independent redistricting commission have been proposed to try to combate this growing partisan issue. Simply put, this bill would act to amend the NC constitution to establish an independent redistricting commission, away from political bias. However, legislation like this does more to mark the extreme, civil divide between the parties. Overturning a state constitution for the abuse and pursuit of extremist values does much to show how divergent even our states have become under the two party system.

Goals of this legislation: revive senate districts and appointment of senators among districts so that districts meet following :

  1. Compactness to avoid elongated districts
  2. 1 person to ensure 1 vote to each voters vote
  3. Minimise number of split counties, municipalities, and other communities of interest
  4. When established, senate district and appointed senators remain unaltered until another census of the population is taken in 10 yrs. 

If assembly does not enact a plan within 120 days redistricting commission will adopt one of the plans, and do it themselves in place of assembly

Redistricting commission will be 9 people, 2 of them will be appointed by the chief justices of supreme court, from diff political parties

3 are gonna be appointed by government, 2 can be from same party but all three cant

1 by the speaker of house of rep, 1 by the leader in house of rep with the next highest or = number of members as the party of the speaker 

The bill was literally meticulously created to suit North Carolina, and finally promote equality in its state governments. The failure to enact a considerably fair bill serves as a testament to the wider issue of partisan politics today. Politicians don’t even look for neutrality or fairness anymore; with their party interests being their number one priority. It’s important to think about the road we go down with state politics being so one sidedly motivated.

This effort was in light of the other events occurring surrounding North Carolina at the time. With more and more maps being challenged and attempting to be overturned, it became increasingly important to neutralize the issue through compromise.
However, this proposed compromise, along with other attempts, would not do much to solve the problem despite the visible support of massive democratic organizations and congressmen themselves.

“Since 2018, Democracy Green has led a vocal effort fighting against unfair and often racist gerrymanders that have served to disenfranchise already marginalized communities, namely environmental justice and climate disaster-impacted communities,” said Sanja Whittington, Executive Director, Democracy Green. “We support the Fair Maps Act and the leadership of Rep. Wiley Nickel in leading the charge for an independent redistricting commission and leading an example from the top that will ensure all voters have equal access to the ballot box and the candidates of their choosing who will tackle their most critical environmental issues and the concerns of their communities.”

“Fair maps are critical to our democracy, and the League is proud to endorse the FAIR MAPS Act, which will ensure equity and transparency in the map-drawing process,” said Jessica Jones Capparell, Director of Government Affairs at the League of Women Voters of the United States. “Equal representation is a right for all, regardless of where you live, the color of your skin, or how you identify, which is why the League remains committed to ensuring that maps are drawn fairly and reflect the communities they serve, with all voices considered and equitably represented.”

https://nickel.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=812#:~:text=Wiley%20Nickel%20in%20leading%20the,the%20concerns%20of%20their%20communities.”

However, within the subgroups that gerrymandering created through the divide, formed a new sense of community

Marginalized communities across the country have long been the targets of partisan gerrymandering, and Asian Americans are no exception,” said Chavi Koneru, Executive Director of North Carolina Asian Americans Together. “NCAAT strongly supports the FAIR MAPS Act because it is a critical step in eliminating gerrymandering in our state and ensuring that every single voice is heard.”

This is one of many nonprofits that have brought hundreds of asian Americans together under political challenges like gerrymandering, combatting the problem through voter registration and most importantly, education. In my next post, we will explore with them what it means for Asian Americans have political targets on their back like gerrymandering.

Importance of nonpartisan congress, considering extremist election

While gerrymandering works for both parties, in recent years it’s worked unequivocally more for the republican party.

The house and the senate are supposed to be the bi-partisan powers that can balance the executive branch. We were supposed to have checks and balances instituted by the constitution.

However, today, per AP News, Nov 14 2024, Republicans have won 218 house seats giving Donald Trump and his body legislative control. To the bare eye, this might seemed like a consequences of bad odds for the democrats, however, let’s examine how gerrymandering was utilized to orchestrate this outcome.

Republicans spent much of 2021 and 2022 enacting new maps to give themselves an electoral advantage, and 2023’s midterms were the first elections held under these new district lines. It’s completely possible that Republicans only won the House thanks to gerrymandered maps in the following states -and a few helpful boosts from the courts.

ALABAMA

In 2021, Alabama Republicans, who controlled all the levers of redistricting power in the state, passed a new map featuring just one majority-Black district despite Black Alabamians being almost 27% of the population. Given the racially polarized voting in the state, the new map meant that Democrats would likely win only that one congressional district.

Voters sued the new map, arguing that the Voting Rights Act (VRA) required the state to draw another majority-Black district, one that would also likely elect a Democrat to Congress. A federal three-judge panel agreed, finding that the VRA requires Alabama to draw a second majority-Black district. The court then blocked Alabama from using the map in this year’s elections and ordered the state to draw a new map with a second Black-majority district. However, the US Supreme Court ultimately BLOCKED this decision, at the request of Alabamas republican politicians.

The outcome? One less democratic seat in the state.

FLORIDA

In the end of 2021 when politicians began considering new map proposals, republicans all agreed to maintain the 5th district which was designed for the voice of black Floridians. However, a republican senator unraveled this plan when he introduced his own map which fragmented the 5th district, lessening the Black American voice with this racial gerrymander.

This plan led to a lawsuit in state court challenging the map for violating the Florida Constitution’s Fair Districts Amendment. In May, a trial court judge temporarily blocked the new configuration of the 5th Congressional District, finding that the map violated the Fair Districts Amendment. The judge then ordered the map to be replaced with a different map that preserved a Black-performing version 5th Congressional District.

Unfortunately, a Florida appellate court ended up pausing that decision. As a result, the plan was used in the midterm elections, losing the re-election of Democratic Representative Lawson due to the dismantling of the 5th Congressional District.

This led to one less Democrat representing Florida in the next Congress.

UTAH

Introduction

11/05/24

Every member of the US House of Representatives, state legislators, and local legislators are elected from districts. However, today, this process, has diverted from representing the people and instead has been manipulated for political strategy

This happens through a process called Gerrymandering

Gerrymandering ” is the political manipulation of electoral district boundaries to advantage a party, group, or socioeconomic class within the constituency. ” Legislators can use different methods to manipulate the votes

Cracking: spreading voters of a certain demographic among various districts in order to reduce that demographic’s influence in an election

Packing: concentrating many voters of one demographic into a single electoral district to reduce their influence in other districts.

Biased redistricting allows politicians to choose voters.

Gerrymandering has long been an issue–Nationally, extreme partisan bias in congressional maps gave Republicans a net 16 to 17 seat advantage for most of last decade. Michigan, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania alone — the three states with the worst gerrymanders in the last redistricting cycle — accounted for 7 to 10 extra Republican seats in the House.

But this isn’t strictly a republican issue either; gerrymandering has the ability to empower or tear apart any party. In Maryland, for instance, Democrats used control over map-drawing to eliminate one of the state’s Republican congressional districts.

Regardless of which party is responsible for gerrymandering, it is ultimately the public who loses out. 

In the past, gerrymandered maps could be taken to the Supreme Court to be ruled on there, however, back in 2019, the Supreme Court shut the courthouse door to challenges to partisan gerrymandering under the U.S. Constitution in Rucho v. Common Cause. The Court ruled that the U.S. Constitution doesn’t provide clear legal standards for courts to apply in gerrymandering cases, but state courts could fill the legal void. “Provisions in state statutes and state constitutions,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote, “can provide standards and guidance for state courts to apply.”

However, last November, republicans won two seats on the NC Supreme Court, giving it a conservative majority. In February, the court relied on a rarely used procedural rule to rehear the 2022 partisan gerrymandering case Harper v. Hall, and reversed its prior ruling on April 28.

Reversing Harper with a new court majority only around a year after it was settled raises questions about the rule of the law, as courts are becoming more polarized.

Rule of the law: The rule of law is a durable system of laws, institutions, norms, and community commitment that delivers four universal principles-accountability, just law, open government, and accessible and impartial justice. https://worldjusticeproject.org/about-us/overview/what-rule-law

This is an example of the instability gerrymandering produces, and the House capture that results in reversing past rulings. This back and forth only increases overturning.