Districts and Redistricting
We all live in various representative districts. There is the city and/or county district, state representative district, state senate district, and US Congressional district. These are prescribed by our US and state Constitutions. Each state or commonwealth is represented by two Senators and the entire country is represented by the president and vice president. Then there is the Governor, Lt. Governor, Attorney General, and other statewide officeholders.
These districts are necessary to insure fair representation in our system of government. It took great fore-thought and planning by our founding fathers to construct this system. It took men with vision and a sense of fair play to see the necessity of setting up these several levels of representation. I suspect much of that came from living under systems that did not allow proper representation, along with studies of the Greek and Roman democracies. Many factors led to the great country.
The design of these districts, however, has strayed far from the original plan. The layout of our districts has been abused by both parties. It seems the one thing our US Representatives from each side of the aisle can agree on is to protect their own seat in congress once they are in office. So they gerrymander a congressional district to provide themselves the best chance of staying in office. The majority party at the time then attempts to lay out the various districts to best favor their own party. Many of our districts would take a Philadelphia Lawyer to halfway explain their reasons for lying the way they do, unless you just want to hear the simple truth. In fact, many times the redistricting plans end up in court to validate their design. This isn't always an impartial verdict anymore either, though it is usually better than the partisan legislatures.
I believe our districts should be constructed in a way that takes into account the populations required for the level of representation. Then it should be focused on putting towns and counties into a district that have a similar need and/or geographic connection. There is a requirement to have a certain amount of districts with a majority racial or ethnic makeup. This can be accomplished without skewing all the districts.
Many would call me naive to think this way, but I believe that districts that make sense will also work out for both parties in the long run. To believe otherwise is to demonstrate doubt in the power of your message and to show a distrust of the voters. Even the most gerrymandered of districts has fallen into the hands of the opposing party when the representative has not been faithful in their duties, the challenger presents a truly desirable alternative, or their party has shown a dereliction of their ability to govern fairly.
There is no good reason to have a small town that joins the North Carolina border in the same district as the second largest metropolitan area in the state, which is almost 200 miles away. Our legislators should learn to work together to form districts that make sense, or turn the process over to a non partisan board who can.
These districts are necessary to insure fair representation in our system of government. It took great fore-thought and planning by our founding fathers to construct this system. It took men with vision and a sense of fair play to see the necessity of setting up these several levels of representation. I suspect much of that came from living under systems that did not allow proper representation, along with studies of the Greek and Roman democracies. Many factors led to the great country.
The design of these districts, however, has strayed far from the original plan. The layout of our districts has been abused by both parties. It seems the one thing our US Representatives from each side of the aisle can agree on is to protect their own seat in congress once they are in office. So they gerrymander a congressional district to provide themselves the best chance of staying in office. The majority party at the time then attempts to lay out the various districts to best favor their own party. Many of our districts would take a Philadelphia Lawyer to halfway explain their reasons for lying the way they do, unless you just want to hear the simple truth. In fact, many times the redistricting plans end up in court to validate their design. This isn't always an impartial verdict anymore either, though it is usually better than the partisan legislatures.
I believe our districts should be constructed in a way that takes into account the populations required for the level of representation. Then it should be focused on putting towns and counties into a district that have a similar need and/or geographic connection. There is a requirement to have a certain amount of districts with a majority racial or ethnic makeup. This can be accomplished without skewing all the districts.
Many would call me naive to think this way, but I believe that districts that make sense will also work out for both parties in the long run. To believe otherwise is to demonstrate doubt in the power of your message and to show a distrust of the voters. Even the most gerrymandered of districts has fallen into the hands of the opposing party when the representative has not been faithful in their duties, the challenger presents a truly desirable alternative, or their party has shown a dereliction of their ability to govern fairly.
There is no good reason to have a small town that joins the North Carolina border in the same district as the second largest metropolitan area in the state, which is almost 200 miles away. Our legislators should learn to work together to form districts that make sense, or turn the process over to a non partisan board who can.
posted by NHThomas | 9:25 PM
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