Yawn
-- Tuesday saw two special elections to fill vacancies in the House of Delegates. To tell the truth, the contests barely qualified as elections and certainly not as special.
. . .
Campaign fatigue likely affected both contests. The nation's most compelling presidential election in decades was settled only two months before. In the most propitious of circumstances, stand-alone races do not draw SRO crowds. Precinct officials usually have to resist the urge to fall asleep while waiting for voters to dribble in. Still, the apathy on display this week does not cheer the soul. Despite bumper-stickers sporting slogans such as "Because Freedom Isn't Free," many Americans take their voting rights for granted. That the struggle to secure those rights has proved difficult amplifies the dismay.
Gerrymandering discourages competition. The politicians responsible for drawing electoral maps strive to create safe seats. Incumbents start by protecting themselves. The system allows officials to decide whom they will represent. The crucial test rests not with the citizens but with the partisans who create the districts. The practice dates almost to the nation's founding, and was originally perfected by a Massachusetts ally of Thomas Jefferson, the idealist of Monticello.
Although the percentage of Americans identifying themselves as "independents" continues to rise, most voters do not bounce between the parties like pingpong balls. Gerrymandering succeeds in part because voting behavior is easy to track. Gerrymandering exploits patterns, nevertheless; competitive districts could goad the parties to expand beyond their so-called bases, and that process could lead individuals more rigorously to examine not only the parties' platforms but their own perspectives.
We concede the impossibility of drawing maps with competition in all 40 Senate districts and all 100 House districts. It can't be done. But if lopsided districts must occur, may they please be created by non-partisan commissions rather than by sachems who make them lopsided by design?
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Reader Reactions
The ides of redistricting by commission sounds on the surface like a good idea. Have “ordinary people” draw the districts. The problem is, ordinary people won’t draw the districts.
The commission would have to be appointed by someone. A court? No, we’ve seen what happens when the courts get involved in elections. The state election commissioner? That person is elected themselves; who’s to say they won’t be partisan? The governor? Partisanship. A legislative committee? Same thing. Who could select a truly non-partisan group of ordinary citizens to go through the arduous, confusing, detailed task of drawing voting districts?
No one.
The system in place today isn’t a perfect system by any means, but it’s the best system there is. The best answer is to elect officials who can be trusted to draw these districts in a fair and responsible manner. At least then you have a chance—albeit not a great one, but a chance—at doing the right thing for the state. In no other scenario do you have that chance.
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