Richie & Steven Hill
Redistricting is
back. Every 10 years it revisits us like a recurring plague. After the release
of new census numbers, all legislative districts in the nation must be redrawn
to make sure that they are closely equal in population. In a large state, that
means about 640,000 residents for each U.S. House district.
Whichever
political party controls the line-drawing process guarantees themselves majority
control and make or break individual political careers. They rely on “packing”
and “cracking”: packing as many opponents into as few districts as possible;
“cracking” an opponent’s natural base into different districts. Powerful
computers and software have made this process of unnatural selection more
sophisticated and precise.
Does it make a
difference? You bet it does. In Virginia, the Democrats in 2001 won their first
statewide race for governor since 1989. But Republicans went from barely
controlling the statehouse to a two-thirds majority. How? Republicans drew the
district lines.
One of the best
examples of partisan gerrymandering was California’s congressional plan in the
1980s. The late Congressperson Phil Burton, its chief architect, called it his
“contribution to modern art.” One district was a ghastly looking, insect-like
polygon with 385 sides. The result? In the 1984 elections the Democrats
increased their share of California’s house seats to 60 percent even as Ronald
Reagan’s landslide win helped Republican congressional candidates win more votes
than Democrats in the state.
This year in
various states one party indeed has stuck it to the other—just ask a Republican
who was mugged in Georgia or Maryland or a Democrat roughed up in Michigan or
Pennsylvania. In all those states and more, one party or the other used their
redistricting advantage to wipe out seats of the opposition.
But this year the
real story is that both parties have often colluded to take on their real enemy:
the voters. This year will go down in political history for the crass way it has
raised “incumbent protection” to a whole new level. With half the states
finished with redistricting, the current round may be the most anti-democratic
ever.
Take California:
the California Democratic Party controlled redistricting and its leaders decided
to cement their advantage rather then expand it. Incumbents took no chances.
Congressperson Loretta Sanchez acknowledged to the Orange County Register
that she and most of her Democratic U.S. House colleagues each forked over
$20,000 to Michael Berman, the powerful Democratic Party consultant in charge of
redistricting.
The money was
classic “protection money.” Sanchez stated “$20,000 is nothing to keep your
seat. I spend $2 million (campaigning) every election. If my colleagues are
smart, they’ll pay their $20,000 and Michael will draw the district they can win
in.”
California’s
Republican Party, which has vociferously opposed past Democratic redistricting
plans, was largely mute. That’s because their pliant incumbents also were bought
off with the promise of safe seats. The one incumbent facing a tough re-election
battle promptly announced his retirement; the rest are likely free from serious
competition for the next ten years.
The story has
been the same in state after state. The Wall Street Journal in a November
editorial on “The Gerrymander Scandal” estimated that as few as 30 of the 435
U.S. House seats will be competitive next year. Already fewer than one in ten
House seats were won by competitive margins in 1998 and 2000.
The ones hurt by
these back-room deals are the voters. For most voters, their only real choice in
the next decade will be to ratify the candidate of the party that was handed
that district in redistricting. One-party fiefdoms will be the rule no matter
what changes are made in campaign financing and term limits until we reform the
redistricting process or turn to more innovative voting methods like
proportional representation.
There once was a
time when voters went to the polls on the first Tuesday in November and picked
their representatives. But that’s changed. Now, the representatives pick us
first. Following on the heels of Florida’s election debacle, this only further
undermines confidence in our already shaky political system. Z
Rob Richie
and Steven Hill are, respectively, the executive director and the western
regional director of the Center for Voting and Democracy (www. fairvote.org) and
co-authors of Whose Vote Counts? (2001, Beacon Press).