Gerrymandering is a process of manipulating an electoral district’s boundaries to the advantage of a party or person. The act has often been criticized as unfair, dishonest, and an attempt to reg voter outcomes, yet both Democrats and Republicans utilize it in the US today.
Gerrymandering comes into play usually once in a decade when states update their voting districts due to population changes in the state. This is when political parties try to redraw electoral maps to gain the greatest number of seats or votes for their party.
Historical Context
Since the beginning of this country, Gerrymandering has been an issue. The term itself originated in 1812 after the Boston Gazette published a political cartoon highlighting the weird-looking shape of the redrawing of Massachusetts districts under Gov. Elbridge Gerry and calling it “gerrymander.”
Types of Gerrymandering
There are different types of Gerrymandering. ‘Cracking’ is a method used to dilute the voting power of the opposing party’s supporters by spreading them across multiple districts. This makes it harder for them to win a majority in any single district. In the 2011 redistricting process, democrats used cracking by spreading Republican voters in the western and rural parts of the state.
‘Packing’ is utilized by placing the opposing party’s voters into only a few districts to reduce their influence in other areas. This would make it so the opposing party wins fewer seats overall. In 2016, North Carolina’s congressional district map was challenged because the Republicans packed African American voters, who were presumed to vote for the Democratic party, into just a few districts.
‘Hijacking’ redraws two districts in a way that forces two incumbents to run against each other in one district, ensuring that one of them will be eliminated, and the act of ‘kidnapping’ means moving an incumbent’s home address into another district. The hijacking was seen in Pennsylvania’s 2011 map and later banned in 2018. The State Supreme Court banned the state’s 18-house district because it was clear the republican party had used hijacking methods to place Democratic incumbents in districts that leaned Republican or to place them against each other, which weakened the Democratic influence in the state.
The use of Gerrymandering has been in effect since the time of the founding fathers, and it continues to corrupt and increase political bias in the US today. So why is it still legal?
It is written in the constitution that states get significant control over how elections are run and how districts are shaped. This allows, constitutionally, for Gerrymandering. Yet, there is one type of Gerrymandering that is not allowed because of the Voting Rights Act: racial Gerrymandering.
Current Legal Landscape
In Rucho v. Common Cause (2019), the court determined that Gerrymandering is a political issue, not a judicial one, meaning there was nothing the federal courts could do to stop it. So, there is little that can be done to stop the corruption of Gerrymandering.
Only time will tell if the public and lawmakers will help stop this process in order to ensure that every American citizen’s vote counts.
