Comments on: New National Group to Push Non-Partisan Redistricting

By: ETJB

ETJB — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 14:25:10 +0000

The Voting Rights Amendment does not address candidate or political organizational rights.

By: Richard Shepard

Richard Shepard — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 12:44:04 +0000

#8 The Elections Clause allows states to adopt procedures for fair and orderly elections. While procedures necessarily have at least some substantive content it would be absurd to abandon them. I think you are going to have a very hard time convincing any court that an election district is an unconstitutional qualification.

By: Jim R

Jim R — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 05:57:44 +0000

Re #8. A majority of representative to the 1st Congress in 1789 were elected from districts. Among those elected by district was James Madison, one of the major participants in the Constitutional Convention, and the primary author of the the Bill of Rights, who defeated James Monroe (53% to 47%).

#9 The district that was lampooned in the gerrymander cartoon was actually quite reasonable, L-shape. Part of the district boundary followed the NH-MA state line which was parallel to the crooked path of the Merrimack River. The mouth of the river formed the mouth of the beast. Wings were added where the district followed a relatively straight western boundary of Essex County, and some of the claws were natural coastal features such as those in Nahant and Marblehead.

By: Jim R

Jim R — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 05:44:56 +0000

The problem is that the group’s very first principle is compliance with the VRA, which leads to districts that disregard all the other principles such as compactness, following political subdivision boundaries, political neutrality, ignoring incumbents, etc.

By: From Don Lake

From Don Lake — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 22:59:03 +0000

When I gripe about the treatment of veterans [bout 25 hours a day] I am often told to ‘write my congress man’. The person in the street is so clue less to Governor Gerry and his on going gift to the nation!

By: Michael Seebeck

Michael Seebeck — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 22:57:08 +0000

Actually, Congressional districts are unconstitutional and have been for a while, since the Supreme Court ruling in U.S. Term Limits v. Thornton (93-1456), 514 U.S. 779 (1995). The push should be to have non-partisan state legislature districting and statewide at-large congressional elections.

To be clear, from Thornton’s holdings:

“(b) So too, the Constitution prohibits States from imposing congressional qualifications additional to those specifically enumerated in its text.”

Districts are qualifications imposed by states that are not enumerated in the Constitution.

Source: http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/93-1456.ZS.html

By: Derek

Derek — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 20:37:51 +0000

OK, well we could have multi-member districts. STV seems to be a good system. But I favor a mixed system. 2 rounds, candidates are elected at the Congressional District level first and then at the Constituency level. But if we want Proportional Representation to kick in, we need to guarantee that each state gets at least 2 Reps in order for this to happen.

By: Bill Lussenheide

Bill Lussenheide — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 19:34:47 +0000

Although Stine’s idea of “at large” is an interesting idea, it would tend to favor the urban areas of a state over the rural areas in terms of time, money, and resources put forth by office holders.

By: Krist Novoselic

Krist Novoselic — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 19:01:46 +0000

Independent redistricting is good. We have a bi-partisan / independent commission here in Washington State. However, independent redistricting can only do so much with making elections competitive. The criteria of compactness and grouping communities of interest weighs on drawing the boundaries. In Washington, we wind up with a handful of competitive districts. It creates a “Swing” dynamic, where the two dominant party organizations, and the special interests that support them, pump tons of resources in these battlegrounds – while the uncompetitive or uncontested districts are ignored. I agree with Stine, we need STV to move away from the single member district.

By: Richard

Richard — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 17:34:51 +0000

Post #3 is from Edward T. J. Brown, not Richard Winger, just in case anyone is wondering. There is already a constitutional amendment pending in Congress to establish the right to vote in the U.S. Constitution.