Politics


New Congressional Maps Brings Polarization


Of the 269 districts that have been redrawn this year, only 13 are rated as competitive.


E tion. About the only thing most politi-


cians and pundits agree upon is that the process contributes to the frac- tious and turbulent politics of mod- ern America. It’s not pretty — and it usually


leaves lasting scars politically and personally. Since the 1960s, the number of


competitive congressional districts has declined with each census and the subsequent redistricting. Critics charge this has led to more


“safe seats” in Congress, where vot- ers of one party dominate, and to fewer swing districts. Of the 269 districts that have been


redrawn this year, only 13 are rated toss-ups by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. In safe-seat districts, primaries


have often become more important than general elections; Once candi- dates secure their party’s nomina- tion, they cruise to victory in the fall. And with more members coming


from safe seats, there is less pressure for them to compromise when they get to Washington or to seek bipar- tisanship.


Competitive congressional dis-


tricts are on the endangered list, con- cluded Bloomberg Business Week, “setting up an even more polarized Congress next year.”


HOW IT ALL STARTED The redistricting process was rela-


40 NEWSMAX | MAY 2022


Original cartoon The Gerry-Mander. This is the political cartoon that led to the coining of the term ‘gerrymander.’ The district depicted in the cartoon was created by the Massachusetts legislature to favor the incumbent Democratic-Republican Party candidates of Gov. Elbridge Gerry over the Federalists in 1812.


BY JOHN GIZZI


very 10 years, states are required to redraw the lines of congressional districts to reflect changes in popula-


tively unregulated until the 1960s, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that districts should be as equal in population as practicable — or face a legal challenge. It became further complicated by


the Voting Rights Act of 1965, man- dating districts be drawn to allow minorities to choose a member of the House of their choice in areas where such seats can be feasibly drawn. But in the 28 states where new dis-


tricts have been finalized this year, Black majority districts decreased from 10 to five seats while Hispanic majority seats went from 27 to 31. One unanticipated legacy of the


Voting Rights Act and the creation of majority and minority districts has been the rise of the Republican Party in the South. For generations, Democrats dom-


inated the South because the Repub- lican Party was nonexistent. Even when most of the country


voted Republican in the midterm elections of 1938 after President Franklin D. Roosevelt raised taxes and the economy soured, Democrats still clung to control of Congress. This was because of the South, where there was no Republican Party. Updates to the federal Voting


Rights Act in the 1990s resulted in more majority Black districts, while other districts grew whiter and more conservative. Accordingly, more Republicans


were elected to Congress from the South as well as elsewhere in the coun- try.


Whatever the regulations for draw-


ing congressional districts, gerryman- dering — that is, drawing such lines to benefit one party over another — remains the nearest thing to eternal life on Earth. The term comes from a redistricting plan under the aegis of Massa- chusetts Gov. Elbridge Gerry in the 19th century. A political cartoon underscored that one of the districts in Gerry’s plan resembled a salamander and thus the term “gerrymander” was born. The term and process have


never gone out of fashion. Redrawings of the Cali-


fornia congressional lines in the 1970s and 1980s heavily favored Democrats. The architect of these plans


was the crude-but-brilliant San Francisco Rep. Phil Bur- ton, who drew boundaries on a tablecloth. Once enacted by the Dem- ocratic-controlled legislature and signed into law by Demo-


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