Tuesday, June 20, 2017

American Intelligence Test: Gerrymandering - Would You Trust A Political Party With Your Freedom?

The Supreme Court of the United States has decided to hear another case on Gerrymandering. The case has the potential to be important if for no other reason than it deals with a fundamental pillar of our democratic system: the equality of every vote. I am sure that it will come as no surprise that one of the most corruptive and unethical elements of our political process has attempted to use their office to abuse, deny and erode our freedoms: Yes, the political parties.
While it is neither unexpected nor unreasonable for political parties to seek to maintain their influence and power; it is nonetheless a vile, dishonorable, immoral, and ignoble means to place their interests above America’s principle of freedom and democracy. Power may corrupt the good, but imagine what power does to those who start out floating in the cess-pool.
On the issue of gerrymandering that will be before the Court, the question and decision may turn on how the Justices understand and view the fundamental rights of citizens when challenged by the interests of political parties. One dimension of this issue will surely focus on the “states’ rights” versus individual’s rights and an insistence of this being a federal government over-reach interfering with those “state’s rights”.

How would you judge? Well before you answer, you might want to see how you’d answer the following questions. [You may also want to consider the arguments that will be made by both sides on the case when argued before the Supreme Court.] Determining what principle(s) are paramount to other conflicting principles will depend upon how you understand and value the respective factors. How the Justices do, we will have to wait and see. Let’s hope that they have principles and values that illuminate our freedoms.
Question A:   What is the objective of gerrymandering?
(1). To group voting districts by income levels
(2). To insure a balanced distribution of population with geographic area within a state
(3). To protect incumbent politicians’ reelection chances
(4). To create voting districts that allow one political party to dominate votes
(5). To create voting districts that dilute one or more groups’ influence in election outcomes
(6). To create voting districts that aggregate areas with shared/common interests
Question B:   Who engages in gerrymandering?
(1). Politicians
(2). Voters
(3). Federal Election Commission
(4). The political party currently in the majority in a state after a census
(5). Congress
(6). State legislatures
(7). Federal and Supreme Courts
(8). Commissions that perform redistricting tasks for a given state
Question C:   Do you live in a state were districts are gerrymandered?
(1). Yes
(2). No
(3). I don’t know
Question D:   What factors do you believe are appropriate to use in creating voting districts?
(1). Income level
(2). Race / Ethnicity
(3). Political party
(4). Religious affiliation
(5). Educational level
(6). Economic interests
(7). Business interests
(8). Geography
(9). Population density
(10). None
Question E:    Is gerrymandering legal or illegal in the US?
(1). Legal
(2). Illegal
(3). I don’t know
Question F:    Should there be a penalty for states or their politicians where a court finds them guilty of political gerrymandering?
(1). Yes
(2). No
Question G:   Is it possible to create voting districts that are free from gerrymandering?
(1). Yes
(2). No
Question H:   What prevents political parties from engaging in gerrymandering?
(1). It’s illegal
(2). Nothing
(3). Federal and Supreme Courts
(4). Federal Election Commission
(5). Voting Rights Act
(6). Congress
(7). States’ judiciaries
(8). Access to Information (the ‘light of day’)

Answers:
Answer - A:  3, 4 and/or 5
Rationale - A:      Gerrymandering is the process of creating an electoral advantage for one political party over another/others. Items 3, 4 and 5 represent conditions or instances of what would constitute the purpose of gerrymandering.

2 is a requirement of establishing voting districts that are equally apportioned by the state’s population. This constrains or limits what can be done in creating voting districts whether gerrymandering is being attempted or not.

6 is a dimension/factor that is used to explain situations that appear to have no other rational justification for deviating from other rules/guidelines used in redistricting processes.

Whether 1 is used in redistricting is possible but may not be driven by a gerrymandering objective or may be, it would require additional information to make any assessment of its purpose.
Answer - B:  1, 4, 6
Rationale - B:      Given the objectives of gerrymandering in Question A, the state politicians and political entities are the agents of gerrymandering. The extent to which they engage varies by how overtly, covertly, or casually these individuals and groups feel they can get by with it and that they need it to achieve their objectives.

Commissions (8) may or may not engage in gerrymandering. Just because a commission was established doesn’t mean that it isn’t in service to the dominate political group in the state.

Voters (2) are the objects of gerrymandering and not directly involved in it. Of course some voters may be pleased with the results of gerrymandering to the extent that it unequally serves their interests at the expense of other voters.

The FEC (3) is basically a political entity that serves the interests of the political parties, so they don’t interfere with what the parties do.

Congress is a primary beneficiary of gerrymandering, so they don’t get in the way.

The courts (federal level) hold gerrymandering as illegal; however, the identification of when a redistricting plan is gerrymandered versus when it is not, is not a determination that comes without difficulty.
Answer - C:  43 states have more than one congressional district and thus provide the opportunity for gerrymandering. Since politicians are involved directly or indirectly in these states’ redistricting efforts, the probability for gerrymandering abuse increases with every state that has more than 2 districts (that is, 38).
Rationale - C:      Thirty-seven states establish voting districts through their legislatures.

There are seven (7) states only have one voting district and thus cannot engage in gerrymandering. That doesn’t mean they wouldn’t just that they can’t, and must use other means to influence the voting process.

Five (5) states use commissions to perform redistricting. This doesn’t mean that politics and politicians are unable to accomplish gerrymandering via those commissions but they have to do it more indirectly.

One (1) states uses non-partisan staff to perform the task which the legislature votes on. Does this mean they do or don’t gerrymander? No, an evaluation of the process would be necessary to determine if it is just accomplished via a different mechanism than most states.
Answer - D:  8 is the best answer. 6 and 7 have some validity. 9 may play some role.
Rationale - D:      By their very nature districts have to be geographically (8) defined. It stands to reason that there are aspects of geography that may provide a reasonable and logical basis for justifying their alignment with one regional district over another. Of course, this requires that an opposite adjustment/alignment is required to off-set that division.

Tied to geography may be economic or business considerations that would be the basis for an alignment decisions above (8) with its corresponding offset/trade in population representation.

Race and ethnicity are factors that present problems since one of the goals of gerrymandering may be focused on negating or diluting the voting influence of groups based on race or ethnicity, which means that these factors are relevant but how to accommodate them is one of the dimensions of the redistricting process that has to be understood and justified.

1, 4 and 5 are not appropriate factors to drive districting decisions.
Answer - E:  2
Rationale - E:      Gerrymandering is illegal. This is contingent upon a redistricting effort as having been conducted with the intention of providing a political advantage to one party over others. The politicians of course in states where they work to gerrymander the districts will insist that they had such intentions. Given the level of trust we all have in politicians, we would thus expect few to no cases of gerrymandering in the US.

If you don’t know, perhaps you might want to consider if you are an informed voter and whether you should thus vote.
Answer - F:  Yes
Rationale - F:      The reason for a penalty for the politicians is that a basic principle in our form of government is that if you break the law, you should pay a price for doing so. If there is no real penalty for engaging in gerrymandering then there is no reason not to do it.
Answer - G:  Yes
Rationale - G:     With today’s knowledge, technology, and information there is no reason that the states’ districting processes cannot be open, well-defined, democratic, verifiable, and following the principles and values of our nation and its people. The fact that our political leaders cannot find it in their personal honor, integrity and fealty of office is simply emblematic of the corruptive nature of our political parties.
Answer - H:  2

Rationale - H:      The ongoing, recurring and persistent implementation of gerrymandered districts, of defeats in court cases, and in the self-evident topography of their plans is empirical evidence that our parties and politicians are addicted to gerrymandering.

Despite being illegal, the courts (3) are the only entities that will intervene when cases are brought forward; but this requires a responsive approach as opposed to a preventative one. Gerrymandering is permitted unless an after the fact charge is made that voters rights were violated. The concept of preventing the violation at the beginning is absent from our current environment.

It’s not hard to fix the process or to prevent the illegality; but there must be a reason to make engaging in gerrymandering more unpalatable than abiding by our democratic principles and values.

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