Congress: Filibuster, Redistricting

10/10/07

Electing Representatives

• Reapportionment

• Redistricting

Reapportionment

• The process of re-dividing the 435 seats of the United States House of Representatives, based upon each state's proportion of the national population.

• The preceding census is the baseline for determining how many House seats are allotted to each state.

Redistricting

• The process by which the boundaries of state legislative districts and United States House districts are drawn to reflect population shifts.

• Each state has a different method for redistricting.

Issues in Redistricting

• Gerrymandering

• Geopolitical concerns

• Minority voting strength

• Equal Representation

Gerrymandering

• The manipulation of electoral districts is known as gerrymandering.

Geopolitical Concerns

• In 1842, the Reapportionment Act required that congressional districts be contiguous and compact.

Compactness

Contiguity

Good Irregular

Minority Voting Strength

• Minority dilution– Weakening of the minority vote in an existing

district by splitting the minority vote among multiple new districts.

– Outlawed by the 1965 Voting Rights Act

• Minority packing– Taking existing minorities from multiple districts

and packing them into one new district. – Court cases have ruled against these districts.– But racial gerrymandering still occurs.

Equal Representation

• In 1962, the Supreme Court ruled that districts must follow the principle of "one man, one vote”

• Each district should have 646,952 residents

• Difficult to achieve in states with one representative (Ex: Montana)

But “One Man, One Vote” Does Not Hold in the Senate

• Residents in low population states receive more representation:– Sen. Feinstein (CA) represents 35 million people– Sen. Enzo (WY) represents 500,000 people

• Minorities under-represented:– 26 smallest states (in terms of population) have 11%

of the nation’s African-American and Latino residents– The 9 largest (population) states have a majority of

ALL people in the nation and 30% of the African-American and Latino population.

• Is there a principle that justifies entitlement to extra representation for some groups?

In Washington State• Until 1985, redistricting happened through

legislative action

• Legislature refused to redistrict through the 1970s

• Court-imposed redistricting in 1972

• Since 1990s, independent, bipartisan commission does redistricting