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New House Districting Idea

IamThunderbolt

IamThunderbolt

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Don't think I've seen this discussed but this seems to make a lot of sense. What do y'all see as the pros and cons of doing House elections in this manner?

We need a fairer system for choosing House members

and the FairVote Plan (includes interactive maps comparing current plan to FairVote plan)

2naisfn.png
 
That's not a good plan. Sure it comes up with about the same number of folks per seat, but that shouldn't be the sole standard. Electing 5 people at a time? Even worse.

Just use county lines and get to 600-800K per seat. Add outlining areas of Wake and Mecklenburg counties to a neighboring county. If either grows to $1.2 in the future, give it 2 seats.
 
JamesSokolove said:
yeah those two things are the same
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Getting the House to vote themselves out is as likely as getting Obama to impeach himself. Sorry I wasn't more clear. Thought my comment was pretty self explanatory.
 
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PhDeac said:
That's not a good plan. Sure it comes up with about the same number of folks per seat, but that shouldn't be the sole standard. Electing 5 people at a time? Even worse.

Just use county lines and get to 600-800K per seat. Add outlining areas of Wake and Mecklenburg counties to a neighboring county. If either grows to $1.2 in the future, give it 2 seats.
Click to expand...

I'm having difficulty following your post. If I am reading correctly, you think proportional representation is worse than sticking with single member districts that you would draw according to county lines? That seems a much worse system than we already have. The theory behind putting redistricting in the hands of the state legislature makes sense in theory because they are supposed to be drawing lines according to communities of interest. County lines on the other hand are completely arbitrary. If we are going to stick with single member districts then I would rather every state turn over the job of drawing the lines to independent commission (as in California), but proportional representation strikes me as far more representative.
 
How are county lines arbitrary? Those are the lines used for elected officials, school districts, taxation, etc.
 
PhDeac said:
How are county lines arbitrary? Those are the lines used for elected officials, school districts, taxation, etc.
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Perhaps arbitrary was the wrong word to use. The difference I see is that while division of a state into counties serves an important administrative purpose, and in most states political boundaries ARE taken into account in drawing lines, there can be a wide diversity of interests within a county. Using county lines would be easy but erode the quality of the representation you are getting. The idea of a community of interest is that there is a group of people similar in character who would be benefited by legislation. Theoretically, redistricting is supposed to be responsive to the population. Not to mention cities and towns regularly spill over county lines, and I don't see the point in cutting off these areas and assigning them to another district simply for ease of drawing. There are better ways to solve this.
 
Sounds like you're for gerrymandering. It puts together people similar in character.
 
PhDeac said:
Sounds like you're for gerrymandering. It puts together people similar in character.
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Drawing district lines with an eye towards the population being represented is not gerrymandering. While there is a lot of variety, most state constitutions require that redistricting be done according to explicit criteria that will often include the obvious things like contiguity, compactness, and an eye for political boundaries, but also the aforementioned concept of communities of interest-- ex. "social, cultural, racial, ethnic, and economic interests". This is not a new concept nor a particular contentious one.
 
They also often state that districts should be drawn with respect to existing lines.

Keeping with similar social, cultural, etc interests together is simply a step toward gerrymandering.
 
PhDeac said:
They also often state that districts should be drawn with respect to existing lines.

Keeping with similar social, cultural, etc interests together is simply a step toward gerrymandering.
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No it's not. I don't understand your resistance to common sense. Ex-- you wouldn't split city just because it grew over county lines.

To be fair, I had forgotten how many/how small NC's counties are (100! Really? Overkill). So in a state like this you could get away with more following political boundaries while taking into account other factors to keep like areas together for representation purposes. In much bigger states with significantly less counties (I think CA only has like fifty something) this is obviously not going to fly.
 
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PhDeac said:
That's not a good plan. Sure it comes up with about the same number of folks per seat, but that shouldn't be the sole standard. Electing 5 people at a time? Even worse.

Just use county lines and get to 600-800K per seat. Add outlining areas of Wake and Mecklenburg counties to a neighboring county. If either grows to $1.2 in the future, give it 2 seats.
Click to expand...

I was talking about NC.
 
LOL at the Dems complaining now. Before losing in 2010, they gerrymandered NC for 100 years in their own favor.
 
Gerrymandering is a bipartisan sport, but the 2011 North Carolina legislature outdid itself and, with the help of the Republican National Committee's redistricting director, created one of the most partisan redistricting plans in the nation. The bizarrely drawn congressional, state senate, and legislative districts divided heavily Democratic areas into two or three new districts, allowing the GOP to elect two-thirds of the state legislature and nine of the state's thirteen congressmen and women in 2012 even though the voters split their ballots evenly between Republican and Democratic candidates
Click to expand...

I would like to see the historical breakdown of votes vs seats.
 
UNCG Deac said:
LOL at the Dems complaining now. Before losing in 2010, they gerrymandered NC for 100 years in their own favor.
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WFFaithful said:
The Democratic map was actually quite fair with only a slight bias in some elections. The Republican map shows major bias.

In the 2002 US House election, Republicans in North Carolina won 7 seats with 53.9% of the vote while Democrats won 6 seats with 46.2% of the vote. Based on the popular vote, Republicans should have held 7 seats with Democrats holding 6 seats. This is a difference of zero seats.

In the 2004 US House election, Republicans in North Carolina won 7 seats with 53.9% of the vote while Democrats won 6 seats with 46.2% of the vote. Based on the popular vote, Republicans should have held 7 seats with Democrats holding 6 seats. This is a difference of zero seats.


In the 2006 US House election, Republicans in North Carolina won 6 seats with 46.2% of the vote while Democrats won 7 seats with 53.9% of the vote. Based on the popular vote, Republicans should have held 6 seats with Democrats holding 7 seats. This is a difference of zero seats.

In the 2008 US House election, Republicans in North Carolina won 5 seats with 45.11% of the vote while Democrats won 8 seats with 54.4% of the vote. Based on the popular vote, Republicans should have held 6 seats with Democrats holding 7 seats. This is a difference of one seat.

In the 2010 Republican takeover of the US House, Republicans in North Carolina won 6 seats with 54.1% of the vote while Democrats won 7 seats with 45.2% of the vote. Based on the popular vote, Republicans should have held 7 seats with the Democrats holding 6 seats. This is a difference on one seat.

In the 2012 US House election after redistricting, Republicans in North Carolina won 9 seats with only 48.75% of the vote while the Democrats won 4 seats with 50.6% of the votes. Based on popular vote, Republicans should have won 6 seats and Democrats should have won 7 seats. This is a difference of 3 seats.
Click to expand...

...
 
In NC Senate races, the GOP won 52.89% of the vote, yet controls 66% of the state Senate.
 
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