TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2023
How many should be black? When is a gerrymander really a gerrymander? When is a gerrymander racist?
When is something resembling a gerrymander actually required by federal law? Also, how many of Alabama's seven House members should be black?
These questions are raised by the ongoing battle over Alabama's proposed redistricting of its seven House seats. In this new report for Mother Jones, Ari Berman describes the mathematical background to this ongoing dispute:
BERMAN (9/5/23): In early 2022, a three-judge panel that included two appointees of Donald Trump found that Alabama violated the Voting Rights Act by failing to draw a second majority-Black congressional district in the state. Alabama has a Black population of 27 percent, but just one of the state’s seven congressional districts was likely to elect a candidate favored by Black voters under the maps drawn by Alabama Republicans. In June, the Supreme Court, in a surprise victory for voting rights, affirmed the lower court’s ruling in Allen v. Milligan, paving the way for Alabama to draw a second majority-Black district.
But over the summer, Alabama Republicans flagrantly defied the orders of the federal district court and the US Supreme Court. Instead of drawing a new majority-Black district, the state legislature in July drew a seat that was only 40 percent Black and would have been easily carried by Trump, while lowering the Black population in the state’s lone majority-minority district...
There you see the mathematical background to this continuing dispute. In short:
Alabama has a black population of 27 percent. But under the state's original redistricting map, it's likely that the state would have elected only one black House member.
One House member out of seven is only 14.3 percent. The courts ordered the state to create a map which would likely have resulted in the election of two black House members (28.6 percent), and the state failed to comply.
That's the mathematical background to this matter. Here's a bit of the logical background:
As a general matter, there's nothing that says that some group is entitled to proportional representation in a state's House delegation. For example:
Suppose that some state is 27% Republican. Also, suppose that this imaginary state has seven House seats.
There is no guarantee that the state's delegation should include two Republicans! Indeed, if the Republican population is evenly distributed throughout the state, and if the state legislature creates seven compact and contiguous congressional districts, the odds are good that the state delegation will have no Republicans at all.
(We live in state of that general type. In presidential elections, Maryland is roughly one-third Republican—but Republicans hold only one of Maryland's eight House seats. In Massachusetts, Republicans hold none of the state's nine House seats, even though the state is roughly one-third Republican.)
Why then are the federal courts ordering Alabama to create a legislative map with two majority black congressional districts? This takes us into provisions of the Voting Rights Act—and into the kinds of political warfare which helps define the state of our dysfunctional present-day politics.
For the record, we all have a general idea of what a gerrymandered congressional district looks like. As a general matter, we tend to picture a district with an extremely weird-looking, non-compact and non-contiguous shape—a weird shape which has been engineered to produce a desired political outcome.
That said, consider this:
Over the course of recent history, some of the weirdest looking congressional districts have been drawn to ensure the likelihood of black representation. In effect, such districts have been gerrymandered to produce a court-ordered end.
We close with a welter of questions:
Alabama is 27 percent black. In your view, does that mean that the state should have two black members of Congress, instead of perhaps only one?
In this new post, Kevin Drum describes Alabama's original proposal as an example of "racist gerrymandering." Our blue tribe is strongly inclined to throw bombs of this type, but is it politically wise?
Also this:
How well do you understand the legal requirements which lie behind the court orders in this ongoing matter? How well does anyone you know understand these matters?
Those legal requirements are designed to increase black representation in Congress. Do you think that's a good idea? Also, and very important:
Are you able to imagine the possibility that someone might not agree?
It's racist.
ReplyDeleteAll those questions were addressed by the court, who said it was racial gerrymandering.
ReplyDeleteCreating districts with big black majorities has two unintended effects:
ReplyDelete1. These districts tend to elect more extreme candidates. A black elected from a more balanced district would generally have to be more moderate.
2. Creating these districts sometimes increases Republicans elected, because so many of the state's Democrats are concentrated in them.
I am sure that your fastidious and comprehensive review of the data has brought you to conclusion number one. On second thought, no, I am sure that your thoughts on this matter are completely without substance or merit, and are derived from no study whatsoever.
DeleteAu contraire mon ami. His impeccable source is Professor Otto Hisass.
DeleteI ain’t your ami.
DeleteAmie?
DeleteVery rich that a Fox viewing Trump supporting conservative has the temerity to worry about extremists in the democratic party, incidentally.
Delete“Are you able to imagine the possibility that someone might not agree?”
ReplyDeleteJesus, what a stupid question. Of course some don’t agree.
Many didn’t “agree” with the Civil Rights act of 1964.
Many didn’t “agree” with the 13th amendment.
So?
Are we supposed to tolerate the opinions of those who opposed these?
Do contrary opinions negate the value of these acts/amendments/court rulings?
Somerby acts as if the existence of a contrary opinion demands that we reject the liberal, ie correct, view.
I think Bob meant, "Are you able to imagine the possibility that someone might not agree and that this person might be morally right?"
DeleteAnyhow, I will ask that question: "Although we all think we're right (that's a tautology) are you able to imagine the possibility that you might be wrong?"
Somerby is showing sympathy for people who may be against these federally mandated legal requirements designed to increase black representation in Congress.
DeleteIt is not morally right to attempt to disenfranchise people based on their skin color.
DeletePerry, it's about coming of age
DeleteA fundamental, long and well recognized difference between Left and Right, is that the Left engages in a manner of “relativism” where they update their views when presented with new compelling knowledge or evidence, whereas the Right tends to be “reactionary” and “conservative” and stick to their guns regardless of the circumstances: for example, gun violence has increased to where it is now the leading cause of death for kids (age 1-18), yet right wingers say “from my cold, dead hands” (actually that guy is dead now, so um yeah).
DeleteToday Somerby asks “y’all don’t mind my racism, ok?”.
And then he tries to channel Dr Banner: Don’t call me a racist, you wouldn’t like me when you call me a racist.
Bob, most of the gerrymandering has been done by Republicans. Look at Florida, Wisconsin, Ohio, etc.
ReplyDelete"yan Walters, Oklahoma’s superintendent of public instruction, is apparently eager to make a name for himself as the most far-right education official of them all. On Tuesday, he announced that the Oklahoma State Department of Education was entering into a partnership with PragerU Kids. These right-wing indoctrination materials were approved in August for use in Florida classrooms.
ReplyDeleteWhere Florida said the PragerU Kids content could be used as supplemental material, Oklahoma is actively promoting it, describing it as “engaging, educationally sound, and classroom-friendly while being grounded in traditional American values that inspire self-reliance, patriotism, and resiliency while teaching core knowledge in subjects ranging from civics to financial literacy.” (Raise your hand if you don’t think anyone who wrote, edited, or approved that sentence should be involved in educating children.)"
The problem with this is that a parent who tries to correct the misinformation from school lessons will be undermining their child's trust in the reliability of what their teacher says in class.
From Daily Kos:
ReplyDelete"Back in 2020, three middle school students from Eastern New York solved the issue of gerrymandering, and their team leader won a $10,000 STEM prize for it. Kai Vernooy, James Lian, and Arin Khare devised a method for determining the level of gerrymandering in a state, and then applied a mathematical algorithm to draw fair and balanced districts. Coincidentally, in this 2020 article from Forbes about their project, Alabama was used as an example.
Kai explained that, “Alabama is a good example of a state that has experienced partisan gerrymandering over the last decade. In the 2010 redistricting cycle, Republicans drew district lines to pack together several major Democratic communities into a single district, ensuring that Democrats were only elected to one seat. Alabama's District 7, shown here in yellow, reaches into several other districts' regions to pick out Democratic voters.”
The Forbes article at the link above describes the three students’ methodology to solve the problem of gerrymandering. Personally, I would like the court to apply it to Alabama when they redraw the state’s districts. Heck, I would like to see gerrymandering undone in every state in the country, but I’d be happy to start with Alabama."
This isn't rocket science. When you wind up with a solution that disenfranchises black voters, it was created on purpose. Yes, that is immoral. Even Somerby should know that.