• Welcome to OGBoards 10.0, keep in mind that we will be making LOTS of changes to smooth out the experience here and make it as close as possible functionally to the old software, but feel free to drop suggestions or requests in the Tech Support subforum!

LA Times: Courts urged to strike down election maps that lock in the winners

bym051d

bym051d

I AM VERY IMPORTANT
Joined
Mar 16, 2011
Messages
39,327
Reaction score
5,090
Stole the thread title from Reddit.

Should it be legal to have a congressional district only one party can win?

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-gerrymander-court-20160815-snap-story.html

North Carolina may be a swing state in presidential politics, with polls showing Hillary Clinton now leading Donald Trump.

But there’s no question who will win most of the state’s 13 House congressional districts in November.

“It’s virtually certain that Republicans will hold their 10-to-3 advantage, regardless of what happens in the presidential race,” said David Wasserman, an analyst with Cook Political Report. “The districts are simply far too polarized.”

That electoral lock may prompt the Supreme Court to take a new look at the old question of whether extreme partisan gerrymandering is unconstitutional, denying voters an equal chance to have their voices heard.

Lawyers for North Carolina and Wisconsin are challenging GOP-drawn electoral maps that ensure Republicans win a majority of seats in Congress or the state house, even when a majority of voters statewide lean in favor of Democrats.

Gerrymandering has always been a problem, but the severity of the problem these days is way overboard. It's time for us to move to unbiased commissions or fair, computer generated maps.

Using your elected advantage to give yourself an district advantage is one thing, being 10-3 in a fairly even state is another.
 
If an entire county or adjacent counties are typically aligned with one party, that's fine. But convoluted districts constructed with party allegiances in mind are ridiculous.
 
PhDeac said:
If an entire county or adjacent counties are typically aligned with one party, that's fine. But convoluted districts constructed with party allegiances in mind are ridiculous.
Click to expand...

There has been some redistricting reform going on in VA where they have to redraw something like 3 districts. One of the guys leading the redistricting effort in VA spoke at our bar lunch a year or so ago. Funniest story he had was 1 of our former state Sens (a Dem) tried to redraw his opponent's house out of his district. He was successful in said redrawing, however he neglected to notice it was his opponent's father by the same name who he redrew out of his district. And he lost that race. It was in the Fredericksburg area.
 
That's hilarious. It would take grad students at State U. a few days to draw districts using existing boundaries. Instead, we let politicians select their own voters.
 
It's always been an issue, but the GOP saw the writing on the wall with the electoral college, figured out that the primary way for them to stay relevant was to hijack the state maps after the 2010 census, and take gerrymandering to its extreme.

And yet, they're the party screaming about non-existent voter fraud and rigged elections.
 
TX is another example of fixing the vote by gerrymandering. They chopped up one of the few left-leaning cities, Austin, so much that they have no Dem representatives in the House.
 
There should be a non-partisan group that uses a universal computer program to draw the districts in all states. Simple, easy solution that ends it forever.
 
CantStandYa said:
It's always been an issue, but the GOP saw the writing on the wall with the electoral college, figured out that the primary way for them to stay relevant was to hijack the state maps after the 2010 census, and take gerrymandering to its extreme.

And yet, they're the party screaming about non-existent voter fraud and rigged elections.
Click to expand...

This is such horseshit. Not only has it been going on since before the days of Gerry, who it is named after, but it has been plenty extreme since well before 2010. I remember NC's 12th was under fire 25 years ago because it was gerrymandered to favor Democrats.

The truth is Dems and Pubs only complain about gerrymandering abuse when they're getting screwed.
 
Come on, now. You can't take away gerrymandering, the one advantage republicans have.

Dems have the education, the media, and the entertainment industry. It's possible to live your whole life and never interact with a republican thought.

The one area that it seems the GOP planned ahead in was gerrymandering. They need that to even pretend to be a legitimate party.

It will take decades for the GOP to compete in these other areas, assuming they realize how badly they are beaten and how relevant it is.
 
EatLeadCommie said:
This is such horseshit. Not only has it been going on since before the days of Gerry, who it is named after, but it has been plenty extreme since well before 2010. I remember NC's 12th was under fire 25 years ago because it was gerrymandered to favor Democrats.

The truth is Dems and Pubs only complain about gerrymandering abuse when they're getting screwed.
Click to expand...

You're talking the difference in the 12th district and a 10-3 Republican advantage in a state that voted 51% Democrat in 2014. How is that separation fair for voters?

The truth is, everyone should use an impartial system, at all times. I'm fine with Maryland having to do it too.
 
bym051d said:
You're talking the difference in the 12th district and a 10-3 Republican advantage in a state that voted 51% Democrat in 2014. How is that separation fair for voters?

The truth is, everyone should use an impartial system, at all times. I'm fine with Maryland having to do it too.
Click to expand...

I agree gerrymandering is bad. But what if Charlotte has 1/2 the states population and all vote Democrat. Everywhere else votes Republican. Would you have 1/2 representatives be Democrat and 1/2 Republicans? What if you couldn't divide Charlotte up with any rationality to get to 50% representatives?

I guess my question is, how do you divide up the area so everyone has fair representation? How do you balance that by local issues? Do you go by statewide vote and then go according to proportion, but what a Democrat in Asheville could be different than a Democrat in Wilmington. It is easy to say gerrymandering = bad, but there is no easy solution.
 
If Charlotte has half the state's population then half the districts should be in Charlotte divide by census track.

There are plenty of easy solutions if you aren't concerned about who votes for who.
 
PhDeac said:
If Charlotte has half the state's population then half the districts should be in Charlotte divide by census track.

There are plenty of easy solutions if you aren't concerned about who votes for who.
Click to expand...

Charlotte has far fewer people than that, but understand what you are saying.
 
I was referring to bern's hypothetical two posts above mine.
 
This has been going for for centuries.

It is exacerbated by the Voting Rights Act. These encourage "max black" districts where legislatures put 60, 70, 80 plus black voters in a district, instead of 30 percent in three or four. Republicans and black Democrats put these together and keep doing it. It helps R's get an edge in other districts and makes sure there are more black (hurting liberal white challengers in primaries), but less Democratic representatives (winning by one vote is the same as by 90 percent), in the House.

The biggest expert on this in the South is Dr. Charles Bullock. Guess who was his TA.

Certain states believe in Judge/Commission maps. It would be better than the nonsense of post Shaw v. Reno, unless you honestly believe that it is more important to have blacks represent blacks, hispanics (who frequently hate each other) represent other hispanics, and such. This is half the reason R's have a 2.7 percent national edge in the vote to hold the House (i.e. can lose by 2.7 percent and still hold). The other half is due to the 2010 state legislative elections.
 
Last edited:
If you had a third party who had 1/3 support spread evenly throughout the state, but had neither a majority nor plurality anywhere, should they get 1/3 representatives, or 0 representatives?
 
How many districts? Is my party 1/3 of an on the ballot state wide Senate, Governor seat?
 
bernbp5 said:
If you had a third party who had 1/3 support spread evenly throughout the state, but had neither a majority nor plurality anywhere, should they get 1/3 representatives, or 0 representatives?
Click to expand...

They should get the representatives that people in the geographically cohesive districts vote for.
 
bernbp5 said:
If you had a third party who had 1/3 support spread evenly throughout the state, but had neither a majority nor plurality anywhere, should they get 1/3 representatives, or 0 representatives?
Click to expand...

i'd much prefer the former but the latter is what we're stuck with.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top