For most people, the word Gerrymandering doesn’t ring a bell, but for our politicians, it is essential to their electoral strategy. The process is simple: every ten years states have to redraw their district maps, and depending on political representation, one party will be able to redraw the maps to artificially increase their representation in the state legislature.
This might seem nefarious, but the reality is that this is a very normal part of our political process and has been practiced by both parties since the early days of our country. Fortunately, there has been progress on reforming this issue, but it doesn’t go nearly far enough. In 2015 the Supreme Court of the United States affirmed the constitutionality of Arizona’s Independent Redistricting Commission and ruled in Rucho v. Common Cause and Lamone v. Benisek that the Elections Clause of the Constitution solely assigns disputes about partisan gerrymandering to the state legislatures, according to the Congressional Research Service. As of now, 15 states use these commissions for state legislative redistricting, in part because of the conservative court’s reluctance to tackle “political questions” which is a bizarre justification considering that the Supreme Court has become overtly partisan.
Regardless of their hypocrisy, the Supreme Court has given Congress and the state legislature the power to oversee redistricting, ostensibly giving more power to the people. But whether or not that is enough to stop gerrymandering depends on how you do it.
Take New York and Virginia’s commissions which are composed evenly of Democrats and Republicans. This bipartisan framework seems nice, but according to David Imamura who served on the New York’s IRC, the result was “total paralysis” because of the political nature of gerrymandering. Immara, in his article “The Rise and Fall of Redistricting Commission,” states that redistricting reforms should be implemented on a national level and suggests bringing in independent commissioners. For example, California and Michigan “did not fall victim to partisan gridlock” because their independent commissioners were not affiliated with any party. While I agree with Imanura that redistricting commissions are meager reforms, they are nevertheless a step in the right direction toward national policy.
In 2019 the House introduced the For the People Act, requiring states to use national requirements for redistricting commissions, however, Senate Republicans blocked its passage. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who led the charge in blocking the bill comically called it a “power grab,” but the Supreme Court seems to disagree.
This brings us to our beloved Governor Chris Sununu, who vetoed an independent redistricting bill in 2020 that had strong bipartisan support. The commission would have included five representatives from both parties and five independent citizens who have not claimed party affiliation. According to The Well News’s Dan McCue, the bill also “prohibited individuals from serving if they’d been an elected official or lobbyist in the past 10 years,” which would have made the redistricting process more fair. But alas, he vetoed the bill anyway, and released a statement on his website saying that “Legislators should not abrogate their responsibility to the voters and delegate authority to an unelected and unaccountable commission selected by the political party bosses.” Sununu did not clarify what he meant by this, leaving it up to our own interpretations. A likely inference is that he was talking about the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, which is ironic considering Republicans have the same organization.
Putting hypocrisy aside once again, we must recognize this moment as emblematic of a larger national agenda to subvert democratic institutions. Sununu did not act on his own, he was thinking like a partisan, working with the senate minority leader to maintain his party’s influence and to further the conservative project; a project that has worked tirelessly to undermine the rights of women and people in the LGBTQ+ community. The Supreme Court’s social conservatism can be felt in their decision on Roe v. Wade and their constant undermining of trans healthcare. To these disciples of the Federalist Society, everything settled is on the table, and the structural integrity of our democracy is on its way to destruction.
The Democrats running in the New Hampshire Gubernatorial Primary should be pressing this very point. Unfortunately, our last resort for protecting women’s and LGBTQ+ rights rests on a political party which has shifted more to the right than the left. On cultural issues, Democrats have virtually won the debate, but until they recognize the failure of liberalism to adequately address working-class needs, the conservatives will always have the upper hand.
JT Dowd can be contacted at
john.dowd@keene.edu
