gerrymandering – Page 17

Rural versus Urban

These days, “us versus them” seems to describe the whole world: Israel versus Gaza, ISIS versus non-Muslims, cops versus African-Americans, theocrats versus secular folks, Republicans versus Democrats… Choose your team–there are plenty of them.

When I wonder why Americans can’t “just get along,” as Rodney King memorably put it, I think back to a wonderful rant published by the editors of The Stranger, an alternative newspaper published in Seattle, in the wake of the 2004 elections. Looking at the red and blue of the election map, they noted that cities were bright blue dots in even the reddest states–that urban areas comprised an “urban archipelago” with political values and attitudes vastly different from those of rural America.

Researchers have confirmed their observation: virtually every major city (100,000 plus) in the United States of America has a political culture starkly different from that of the less populous areas surrounding it.

As New York Times columnist Gail Collins noted a couple of years ago, people living in densely populated urban areas understand the need for government–paved roads and public safety and garbage collection. That farmer out at the end of the gravel road who rarely gets a visitor (and isn’t worth the effort of the burglar), doesn’t see much reason to pay taxes.

Living with lots of people who are different from you shapes a certain worldview, an identifiably urban value structure. As the authors of the Urban Archipeligo wrote in that seminal essay,

Look around you, urbanite, at the multiplicity of cultures, ethnicities, and tribes that are smashed together in every urban center…: We’re for that. We’re for pluralism of thought, race, and identity. We’re for a freedom of religion that includes the freedom from religion–not as some crazy aberration, but as an equally valid approach to life. We are for the right to choose one’s own sexual and recreational behavior, to control one’s own body and what one puts inside it. We are for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness…..

Unlike the people who flee from cities in search of a life free from disagreement and dark skin, we are for contentiousness, discourse, and the heightened understanding of life that grows from having to accommodate opposing viewpoints. We’re for opposition…. Republicans have succeeded in making the word “liberal”–which literally means “free from bigotry… favoring proposals for reform, open to new ideas for progress, and tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others; broad-minded”–into an epithet….

Let’s see, what else are we for? How about education? Cities are beehives of intellectual energy; students and teachers are everywhere you look, studying, teaching, thinking…. It’s time to start celebrating that, because if the reds have their way, advanced degrees will one day be awarded based on the number of Bible verses a person can recite from memory. In the city, people ask you what you’re reading. Outside the city, they ask you why you’re reading. You do the math–and you’ll have to, because non-urbanists can hardly even count their own children at this point. For too long now, we’ve caved to the non-urban wisdom that decries universities as bastions of elitism and snobbery. Guess what: That’s why we should embrace them. Outside of the city, elitism and snobbery are code words for literacy and complexity. And when the oil dries up, we’re not going to be turning to priests for answers–we’ll be calling the scientists. And speaking of science: SCIENCE! That’s another thing we’re for. And reason. And history.

Is this stark “we versus they” picture fair? Of course not. There are plenty of thoughtful and measured inhabitants of rural precincts. That said, the inclusive culture created by the urban worldview is one of the reasons so many marginalized folks–LGBT people, Jews, atheists, artsy nonconformists– tend to migrate to cities.

The problem is, the people who live in densely populated cities have demonstrably less political voice than their country cousins; most states don’t really have “one person one vote” and the result is that rural values are vastly overrepresented. State taxes paid by city dwellers go disproportionately to rural areas, and the people who populate state legislatures have gerrymandered voting districts to keep things that way.

Representative government just isn’t very representative these days.

Until we address gerrymandering—and the efforts to suppress the votes of minority voters—the values of rural areas will continue to be over-represented, and the views of folks living in the urban archipelago will continue to be ignored by policymakers.

And that’s not good for democracy.

Comments

Suppress the Vote? Or Require It?

An interesting response to recent, transparent efforts in several states to suppress the votes of “those people” has been the suggestion that America make voting mandatory. Many other democratic countries–notably Australia–require people to vote and fine those who don’t. (Actually, as I understand it, what is mandatory is appearance at the polls. There is apparently something akin to a “none of the above” option that will fulfill the legal obligation.)

If America ever did go to a “vote or pay a fine” system–something that we might do at about the same time pigs fly over a frozen hell–I’d lobby for a vote-by-mail system like the one in Washington State.

Be that as it may, what are the pros and cons–real and theoretical– of a mandatory voting law?

Arguments for such a system generally include the following: increased participation would ensure that election results mirror the preferences of the entire population, not just those sufficiently motivated to express those preferences at the polls. At least some percentage of the currently disengaged would take more interest in government and politics–knowing that they would have to cast a ballot, at least some Americans would make an effort to know something about the people on that ballot.

Arguably, universal turnout would require candidates to craft more inclusive messages, since targeting an ideological sliver would no longer be the path to victory. (That targeting is one reason for our currently polarized politics.) Candidates and parties would also save a lot of money and effort currently spent on GOTV (get out the vote) efforts. The role of money in politics would thus abate somewhat.

So what are the cons, the arguments against mandatory voting?

Requiring people to vote would assure the participation of low-interest, arguably uninformed people, “alphabet voters” who would simply pull a lever in order to avoid a fine. (You can lead a voter to the polls, but you can’t force him to think.) A fine would fall most heavily on the poor and disadvantaged–the very people who have difficulty getting to the polls in our current system.

The most compelling argument against mandating voting is a First Amendment one: the Supreme Court has recognized that, just as government cannot censor what Americans say, the government cannot compel Americans to speak. If voting is compelled speech, if it is tantamount to an endorsement our electoral system, then requiring people to cast a ballot would be unconstitutional. (Proponents respond to this argument by pointing out that jury duty is mandatory, and that participation on a jury can be seen as an endorsement of the justice system.)

At least one scholar has suggested that–rather than making voting mandatory (which we are highly unlikely to do)–we should work to make elections more competitive, because turnout increases when voters have meaningful choices.

Gerrymandering/redistricting reform anyone?

Comments

California–Yes, California!– Shows Us That Government Can Function

Something very strange is wafting in from the Left Coast. I think it is called sanity.

Long derided as the “land of fruits and nuts” and the poster child for official disfunction, California has turned itself into a model for diminished partisanship and adult legislative behavior.

The state has turned a gigantic deficit into a surplus and renounced the toxic partisanship that had regularly led to budgetary gridlock–not to mention the recall of a governor not so many years ago. As the New York Times recently noted,

But in the past month, California has been the stage for a series of celebrations of unlikely legislative success — a parade of bill signings that offered a contrast between the shutdown in Washington and an acrimony-free California Legislature that enacted laws dealing with subjects including school financing, immigration, gun control and abortion.

The turnaround from just 10 years ago — striking in tone, productivity and, at least on fiscal issues, moderation — is certainly a lesson in the power of one-party rule. Democrats hold an overwhelming majority in the Assembly and Senate and the governor, Jerry Brown, is a Democrat. The Republican Party, which just three years ago held the governor’s seat and a feisty minority in both houses, has diminished to the point of near irrelevance.

Political scientists in the state credit several recent reforms for the turnaround–especially the abandonment of gerrymandering in favor of nonpartisan redistricting. As a result, Representatives are no longer beholden to rabid base voters in deep red or deep blue districts, and thus fearful of “getting primaried.”

Unlike candidates in carefully drawn partisan districts, Republicans running for office in California are no longer insulated from demographic shifts. That’s particularly important in states like California, where growing Latino and Asian populations tend to vote for progressives. One Republican quoted in the Times article acknowledged that the redistricting–along with changes to a nonpartisan primary system– were “freeing lawmakers from obedience to their party bases.”

Majority rule should reflect the will of real majorities. Gerrymandering has given minority factions a veto over majority preferences–it has enabled a sort of legislative “ju jitsu,” the results of which we have recently seen all too clearly.

Here in Indiana, we can choose to be Texas or we can choose to be California.

We should emulate California, but the signs aren’t auspicious.

Comments

Winners and Losers and the Democratic Process

There’s a common saying among political geeks (of whom I am admittedly one): elections have consequences.

This is shorthand for the essential bargain of democratic systems. We The People agree not to wage war and/or insurrection, and instead to conduct contests at regular intervals, during which we try to convince a majority of those who will cast a vote to see things our way. Those contests–called elections–are supposed to be fair (we aren’t supposed to use trickery or intimidation to keep eligible citizens from the polls, for example), and when they are over and the votes are counted, the contenders are supposed to abide by the results.

Now, the losers don’t have to like the results. They don’t have to agree with the wisdom of the electorate. They can console each other by agreeing that the voters were stupid or venal or misled. But in our system–in any legitimate system–the losers’ recourse isn’t sabotage; it’s the next election.

Yesterday’s headlines made it glaringly clear that a substantial portion of the GOP, locally and nationally, is no longer willing to play by those rules.

In Indiana, voters elected Glenda Ritz by a very substantial margin–a margin exceeding that of Mike Pence, who was elected Governor. The Republicans (who hold all the other offices) aren’t happy that they lost this one. Fair enough. But they have proceeded to cheat, to use the offices to which they were elected to undermine the authority of the new Superintendent, and to strip the office of the powers it had when their guy occupied it. They weren’t–and aren’t–willing to work with her until the next election, when they can try to convince voters to elect their candidate. Instead, they are doing everything they can to thwart the will of a majority of Indiana voters and undermine the democratic process.

Meanwhile, in the House of Representatives, we have a group of Representatives–a minority even within their own party–who don’t like a law that was duly passed in a prior legislative session. A majority of Representatives and Senators voted for that law, after many months of debate. It was signed by the President, and its constitutionality was upheld by the Supreme Court. The wisdom of that law was a central issue in the ensuing Presidential campaign–an election Obama won by more than five million votes, and an election in which a million more people voted for Congressional Democrats than for Congressional Republicans.

Poll after poll confirms that a majority of Americans either favors keeping the Affordable Care Act or wishes it had gone farther. But even if that weren’t the case–even if their hatred of this particular legislation wasn’t so irrational and disproportionate–that’s not the issue. In a constitutional republic, the Tea Party goons responsible for shutting down the government cannot justify circumventing democratic processes and holding the nation hostage.

I’m not a particular fan of Thomas Friedman, but his recent column was exactly right. This is a coup. It isn’t an attack on the Affordable Care Act. It is a frontal assault on the democratic process, on government legitimacy, and on the Constitution.

It’s a refusal to play by the rules, an effort to insure that–if they don’t like the outcome–elections won’t have consequences.

Comments

Depressing Thoughts for the 4th

Today, as we celebrate the birthday of our country, we might take a few moments to consider our polarized and paralyzed legislative process.

To take just one example, the odds are high that the GOP-controlled House will block immigration reform. Wonder why?

Blame gerrymandering.

Jared Bernstein laid it out recently in the Washington Post:

First, “only 38 of the House’s 234 Republicans, or 16%, represent districts in which Latinos account for 20% or more of the population.” Second, “only 28 Republican-held districts are considered even remotely at risk of being contested by a Democratic challenger, according to the nonpartisan Cook Political Report.”

So for about 200 of the House’s Republicans, a primary challenge by conservatives angry over “amnesty” is probably a more realistic threat than defeat at the hands of angry Hispanic voters, or even angry Democrats.

This state of affairs is pernicious, but it is also difficult to change. Thanks to partisan redistricting and the precision of modern computer programs, voters no longer choose their representatives. Representatives choose their voters. And as I have previously noted–and Bernstein’s article amply documents-gerrymandering exacerbates political polarization and gridlock.

In competitive districts, nominees know they have to run to the middle to win in the fall. When the primary is, in effect, the general election, the battle takes place among the party faithful, who tend to be much more ideological. Republican incumbents will be challenged from the Right and Democratic incumbents from the Left. Even where those challenges fail, they are a powerful incentive for the incumbent to protect his flank. So we elect nominees beholden to the political extremes, who are unwilling or unable to compromise.

Since both parties gerrymander when they are in power, it has been virtually impossible to replace the current corrupt system with nonpartisan redistricting. We are stuck with the crazies for the foreseeable future.

Of course, so is the GOP.

Happy 4th.

Comments