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Jillian Taylor

Mrs. Kristen Kline

English II

16 April 2017

Do We Have a Voice?

In 1810, Eldbridge Gerry redrew the electoral districts of Massachusetts in favor of the

Democratic-Republican party ("Gerrymandering - Proving All Politics Is Local."). His last name,

Gerry, combined with the shape of one of the Boston districts, similar to a salamander, forms the

word ‘gerrymandering’ ("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). This word because popular after being

used in a March edition of the Boston Gazette ("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). Gerrymandering

has actually been around before Governor Gerry, as Patrick Henry, a founding father, used

redistricting in Virginia to beat James Madison in an election ("Gerrymandering - Proving...").

Even back in the 1800’s, gerrymandering proved to be negative and unjust. Partisan

gerrymandering is an abominable act that disturbs the constitutional voting rights of all citizens,

but there are many feasible solutions that could be implemented with the combined efforts of the

American people.

So what really is gerrymandering? According to Merriam Webster’s Word Central, it is a

verb meaning “to divide [as a state] into election districts so as to give one political party an

advantage over its opponents. Partisan gerrymandering is the redistricting in favor of one

political party (FairVote.org) that typically leads to one-party domination ("Gerrymandering

(Executive Summary)."), which is very bad. Incumbent-protection gerrymandering is partisan

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gerrymandering that is intended to keep previous leaders in office before and after an election

(FairVote.org.). Politicians do this because incumbents are most vulnerable right after a

redistricting because they are not well-known (Bruce Cain, 14). A term often associated with

gerrymandering is the redistricting, which according to Gould is “to divide a new into districts;

specifically; to revise the legislative districts off.” Redistricting is possible because of a set of

Supreme Court cases in the 1960’s that made district reapportionment mandatory every decade

("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). This ruling, in theory, is actually very beneficial because

population are constantly changing ("7 Things to Know About Redistricting"). Statistics from "7

Things to Know About Redistricting…” show that the average number of people in each

congressional district increased 10% from 2000 to 2010. If district lines don’t move with the

people, cultural groups could begin to become extremely under-represented. For redistricting to

be fair and unbiased, the entire process must be open and transparent to the people ("7

Things…”).

Each congressional district automatically gets one representative, and the rest of the

representatives are divided up based on population size (Smith). Most states only qualify for one

representative, which isn’t conducive to diversity because cultural groups don’t get adequate

representation (Gould). Congress has tried to help this issue by creating majority-minority

districts (Gould) which means that the majority of the population is a minority group. The misuse

of redistricting, gerrymandering, is not shown to cause polarization within the House of

Representatives. (“Definition of Polarization.”) states that polarization in reference to politics

“occurs when public opinion goes to two extremes, and there is no real middle ground or

moderates.” This basically means that a person believes the ideals of a political party without

deeply questioning what they are believing. Gerrymandering doesn’t cause polarization because
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the US Senate has been just as polarized as the House in past years (Smith). While

gerrymandering isn’t a cause of polarization, it is still important because it a scapegoat for many

political problems (Smith).

The government has made small steps to help eliminate gerrymandering. A law called

“The Voting Rights Act of 1965” was passed that added racial consideration into the mix

("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). In 2010, Florida lawmakers passed a measure that outlawed

gerrymandering ("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). The complicated part was that it didn’t ban

redistricting, so gerrymandering is still happening ("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). The law

served as a “new legal tool for the state’s courts to deal with cases related to electoral politics

and redistricting.” ("Gerrymandering - Proving...") Iowa has made efforts to copy political

systems from the UK and Australia to eliminate gerrymandering ("Gerrymandering -

Proving..."). Iowa is the only US state to consistently utilize independent commissions

("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). They also created a nonpartisan legislature called the

‘Legislative Service Bureau’ that has full oversight on redistricting ("Gerrymandering -

Proving...").

There are many negative occurrences surrounding gerrymandering. Before the act was

passed, some politicians redistricted to concentrate certain minorities of their choice, thereby

altering the political landscape ("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). In 2003, Colorado had some

complication with their decade redistricting according to ("Gerrymandering - Proving...").

Republican attempted to redistrict in the middle of the decade, but it was shut down because the

districts had already been re-assigned that decade ("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). The

following year, in California, the gerrymandering was so extreme that none of the 53 House of

Representatives seats changed ("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). They won those 53 seats even
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though the Republicans were trailing the Democrats by 1.4 million votes based on

("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). In 2006, Republican dominated legislature in Texas tried the

same thing as Colorado by redistricting in the middle of the decade ("Gerrymandering -

Proving..."). Democrats took the case to court, and it was found legal because redistricting hadn’t

happened in the decade up to that point. Although legal, the redistricting was gerrymandering, as

it seemed to discriminate against minorities and increased the number of Republican House seats

("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). In 2011, some Republican lawmakers drew new district lines in

North Carolina and Pennsylvania (FairVote.org). The following year, Democrats only won 9 out

of the 31 House seats, even though they beat the Republicans in votes (FairVote.org).

Finding the solution to gerrymandering is complicated for many reasons. The main

factor, observed by SchoolYoungKim, is that many politicians are in favor of gerrymandering, so

it’s hard to convince the people in power to change what benefits them. There is also a counter

argument that “it’s not the state legislatures that result in sold Republican or Democratic

districts, but the fact that Democratic voters tend to cluster in cities where they are outnumbered

by a lot.” (Gould). While Australia, Canada, and most European countries have anti-

gerrymandering reforms, they haven’t worked in the US partly because of ingrained political

interests ("Gerrymandering - Proving..."). According to CGP Grey, it is also experimentally

proven that independent and bipartisan committees don’t work as a solution to gerrymandering.

Bipartisan committees create regions that they are comfortable with, meaning they have all their

supporters in one area (CGP Grey). Independent commissions have been attempted by many

state, including Ohio and Missouri, and they have proven to be unsuccessful ("Gerrymandering -

Proving..."). Another things that conflicts with the elimination of gerrymandering is that “the
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more districts are designed to be compact and maintain county voting lines, the more likely they

are to safe for one party.” (FairVote.org)

Gerrymandering is more severe in the US than any other major democracy

("Gerrymandering (Executive Summary)."), with recent polls showing the Congress approval

rating to only be 5-11% (Levinson). Many states have tried to help solve the problem of

gerrymandering, with California being a leader in new ideas. For example, if the government in

California doesn’t agree on the redistricting “a set of retired judges called Special Masters” draw

the new district lines (Smith). California also created a 14 member committee in 2014 called the

‘California Citizen Redistricting Commission’ (Gould). The group was comprised of many

different people like business owners, professors, and even a chiropractic doctor (Gould). The

committee helped to represent minorities like Latinos (Gould). Because of the CCRC, the House

of Representatives seats became more balanced between Republicans and Democrats (Gould).

Dan Shmur said that the committee “forces politician of both parties to be much more responsive

to voters”. (Gould, Jens Erik) California also had another instance of anti-gerrymandering in

2011 (Smith). The Citizen Redistricting Commission (CRC) was created to collect info that

would be used in the next redistricting (Smith). The group travelled California interviewing

people about what they wanted the new lines to be (Smith).

There are many possible solutions to gerrymandering, but “necessary reform must come

from outside the ordinary political process.” (Levinson) It is possible to eliminate

gerrymandering, as some countries like Germany and New Zealand have overcome the issue

(Levinson). The first possible solution is independent commissions, which are groups separate
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from a political party (CGP Grey). The main problem that has shown itself with independent

commissions is that they can easily become corrupted (CGP Grey). Another possible solution is

the shortest-line split method (CGP Grey) that "Gerrymandering - Proving All Politics is

Local..." states was created by the Center for Range Voting. It would be an unbiased redistricting

process, as it is based on mathematics instead of human intuition (CGP Grey). The major

problem with this is that it could accidentally create unfair regions (CGP Grey). Communities of

interest, which is redistricting based on general beliefs and backgrounds ("7 Things...”), could

work as a redistricting system. Other unbiased options include using weighted center, travel time,

perimeter/area, convex hull area, or natural geographic divisions could be used ("BDistricting.").

Proportional gerrymandering is gerrymandering that creates election regions fitting to the

population percentages (CGP Grey), which could work as a redistricting system. For example if

one region had a dense population of Republicans, it would be made a district so that other

Democrats could be better represented. Proportional gerrymandering could also help to represent

minority groups. For example California, with its’ 50+ House seats, could be split into 10

districts that can each have 5-6 representatives. Each rep would get 17% of the vote, thus

creating opportunities for minorities to have a voice (Levinson). Proportional representation,

which is based on a party’s popularity in a vote (Kennedy), is another possible solution to

gerrymandering. One of the benefits of this is that it would invite more political party's into the

mix (Kennedy). This strategy, according to (Kennedy), is actually used by Europe and is fairly

successful.

Many people, including myself, believe that the best solution to gerrymandering is using

a fully automated system. There are tons of fully automatic redistricting systems that use

mathematics to create a completely unbiased district assignment ("BDistricting."). An example

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of an automated redistricting is autoredistricting.org, which is a program that actually

incorporates fairness into its calculations (Kennedy) so that the districts are never extremely

unfair. This is a great addition to the program, as some people believe that automatic redistricting

softwares must incorporates fairness/communities of interest so that politicians will accept them

(Kennedy). This solution can be implemented by a petition for a constitutional convention if 34

of the US states agree on it (Levinson).

Gerrymandering is a real problem in the US because it distorts the representation. The

Gettysburg Address states “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not

perish from the earth.” Is gerrymandering, which can leave minorities with no representation,

really government by and for the people? John P. Roche once said “Power corrupts, and the

prospect of losing power corrupts completely.” (Levinson) This means that some politicians will

do whatever is just to stay in their position of power.“ Dan Shmur said that if you’re a politician,

those lines are a matter of life and death” while talking about gerrymandering (Gould). There are

tons of anti-gerrymandering solutions like non-partisan commissions, proportional

gerrymandering, and automated redistricting systems. The everyday person can help by calling

state legislature with their concerns, paying attention to political situations, and speaking out

against unjust representation ("7 Things…”). As John F. Kennedy once said, “ask not what your

country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.” ("Definition of Polarization.")
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Works Cited

“Student Dictionary .” Merriam-Webster's Word Central, Merriam Webster,

www.wordcentral.com/. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

CGPGrey. “Gerrymandering Explained.” YouTube, YouTube, 12 July 2011,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mky11UJb9AY. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

“Gerrymandering and a Cure for It – the Shortest Splitline Algorithm (Executive

Summary).”RangeVoting.org - Gerrymandering (Executive Summary),

rangevoting.org/GerryExec.html. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

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“Examples of Our Unbiased District-Drawing Algorithm in Action / Comparisons with

Gerrymandered Districts Drawn by Politicians.” RangeVoting.org - Gerrymandering and

a Cure - Shortest Splitline Algorithm, RangeVoting.org,

rangevoting.org/GerryExamples.html. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

Mccarty, Nolan, et al. “Does Gerrymandering Cause Polarization?” American Journal of

Political Science, vol. 53, no. 3, 2009, pp. 666–680., doi:10.1111/j.1540-

5907.2009.00393.x. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

FairVote.org. “Gerrymandering.” FairVote, FairVote, www.fairvote.org/gerrymandering.

Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

“Gerrymandering - Proving All Politics Is Local.” Gerrymandering - Proving All Politics Is

Local | Politics & Policy, Politics and Policy,

politicsandpolicy.org/article/gerrymandering-proving-all-politics-local. Accessed 26 Apr.

2017.

“7 Things to Know About Redistricting.” 7 Things to Know About Redistricting | Brennan

Center for Justice, New York University for Law, 28 Oct. 2013,

www.brennancenter.org/analysis/7-things-know-about-redistricting. Accessed 26 Apr.

2017.

Smith, Keith. “On Gerrymandering and Its Effects.” Political Science at University of the

Pacific, Pacific's Department of Political Science, 3 Nov. 2011,

pacificpoliticalscience.wordpress.com/2011/11/02/on-gerrymandering-and-its-effects/.

Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

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Levinson, Sanford. “To End Government Shutdowns, End Partisan

Gerrymandering.”America.aljazeera.com, Al Jazeera America, 13 Oct. 2013,

america.aljazeera.com/articles/2013/10/13/government-

shutdowngerrymanderingdistricts.html. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

“BDistricting.” BDistricting - About, bdistricting.com/about.html. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

Crashcourse. “Gerrymandering: Crash Course Government and Politics #37.” YouTube,

YouTube, 31 Oct. 2015, www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnhFm5QVVTo. Accessed 26

Apr. 2017.

SchoolYoungKim. “⚠ DANGERS of Gerrymandering ⚠.” YouTube, YouTube, 4 Nov. 2015,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTTg2gAe1J0. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

Gould, Jens Erik. “California vs. the Gerrymander: Why Republicans Are Quaking.” Time, Time

Inc., 19 July 2011, content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2083189,00.html.

Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

Kennedy, Noah. “How Do We Get Rid of Gerrymandering?” Handsoffredistricting.net, Fair and

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rid-of-gerrymandering/. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

“Definition of Polarization.” DaveManuel.com, 26 Apr. 2017, www.davemanuel.com/investor-

dictionary/polarization/. Accessed 26 Apr. 2017.

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Apr. 2017.
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