DEMOCRACY

DEMO DEMO -CRACY -CRACY

Words by Seb Andrew

Democracy in the U.S is not in good shape. In fact, it’s not even in decent shape. Not that it ever has been. But things look exceptionally bleak right now; with opposition to free and fair elections no longer a fringe position, but a policy plank of a major U.S party. However, a looming Supreme Court case could be about to make things a whole lot worse.

Partisan gerrymandering is a major issue in the U.S. For those not familiar, ‘gerrymandering’ refers to the malicious manipulation of electoral boundaries to reduce competition and allow one party to maintain power. Gerrymandering silences voters and if done effectively, can lock a party out of control of government for years, even decades.

Gerrymandering isn’t something we’ve had to worry about in Australia for a long time; ever since the end of Queensland’s BjelkePetersen government in 1989, and not for us South Aussies since the reign of Premier Thomas Playford ended in the late 60s. Both of these governments survived due to gerrymandering, using unfair distribution to give conservative-leaning voters in the country far more voting power than Laborsupporting urban centres (one country vote

was worth ten city votes in SA). Nowadays, state and federal boundaries across the country are determined by independent commissions with usually little fuss.

Americans aren’t so lucky.

Some states use independent or bipartisan committees, but the majority of states have their state and federal districts drawn by state legislatures. Unsurprisingly, these districts aren’t drawn with fairness and competitiveness in mind, rather, maintaining power. Now, yes, gerrymandering is practised by both Democrats and Republicans – but the latter have wielded it far more effectively and brutally. Across the South and Midwest, Republicans have weakened or outright eliminated Democrats’ voting power. Urban Democrat voters are either split across multiple districts, where their votes are outweighed by suburban and rural Republican voters. Or they’re ‘packed’ into districts that vote 80-90% for Democrats, removing the ability for these voters to make other seats competitive, essentially making their votes useless.

(Left) Texas’s Congressional Districts (2013-2023). The city of Austin is split across four districts to dilute the voting power of its residents (Right) Texas’s Congressional Districts (2023-2033). Greater Austin is again split, but its CBD is ‘packed’ in an ultra-Democratic 37th district. Republicans created this ‘pack’ as growth in Austin was putting multiple Republican-leaning seats at risk of flipping. (Images sourced from Wikipedia)

Gerrymandering does not lead to a healthy democracy. It allows extremists to flourish and pass laws that deviate greatly from the electorate’s opinion because there is no fear of repercussions from the electorate. What are they going to do? Vote them out? It grossly flips the very concept of an elected democracy on its head. Instead of the voters picking their representatives, representatives pick whichever voters best suit their re-election.

Although this article concerns itself with gerrymandering at the federal level, it is important to understand just how much Republicans have gerrymandered state legislatures and entrenched themselves in power across the country (more on that later).

A few steps have been taken to make federal districts fairer in the US. Pennsylvania had its congressional districts struck down in 2018 after being ruled by a partisan gerrymander. An independent commission produced fair maps in Michigan. Although it never came to pass, for a brief moment, it looked as if Florida and Ohio (some of the worst offenders of racial and partisan gerrymandering) would produce fair maps.

To be decided in the court’s October 20222023 term is a case titled Moore v. Harper, which if agreed to, would be a devastating blow to the fight against partisan gerrymandering of federal congressional districts. Moore is being brought to the court by Republican legislative leaders in North Carolina after their congressional maps were struck down by a lower court for giving Republicans a distinct partisan advantage.

Now, here’s the scary part for fairness advocates. The defendants (the Republicans) are arguing their case based on Independent State Legislature Theory (ISL). It’s a lot to unpack, but essentially advocates of ISL believe that state legislatures should hold supreme authority over the regulation of federal elections in their state. State constitutions, state and federal courts, ballot initiatives, governors, all institutions that serve as checks and balances on redistricting currently… under ISL, none of it matters, and any disputes over election regulation will always be found in favour of the legislature. This all comes from a section in the U.S constitution that delegates this authority to state legislatures.

An endorsement of ISL by the nation’s highest court would be a disaster.

All present and future efforts to combat partisan gerrymandering through citizeninitiated referenda and lower court rulings would be rendered meaningless. Years of hard work, hard-earned safeguards, gone. It would not only just be a return to the status quo, but to something much worse.

The House of Representatives would become even more undemocratic, as Republican legislatures get even more brutal in their efforts to deprive Democrats of representation. It’s a little hard to tell the exact impacts since the next round of redistricting is ten years away. But states like Arizona, North Carolina, Texas, and Florida, which are likely to gain even more seats next year, are where Democrats could see themselves driven further into the minority federally by Republican state legislators. Republicans in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Ohio could also easily undo Democratic gains made as a result of court rulings and referendums.

On both sides, partisan legislatures will seek to create uncompetitive maps that skew in their favour; as Democrats in Maryland and New York attempted to do before being constrained by court rulings. Irrespective of one’s views on the need to keep quasi-fascist parties out of power, this once again puts the power of choice in the representatives, not the people.

Sadly, it is likely that Moore will be decided in favour of North Carolina. Four justices; Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch have expressed support for ISL. Amy Coney Barrett will likely join them, giving it a majority.

This decision will have a lot of impacts- by giving legislatures supreme reign over all aspects of running allow Republicans to make voting harder by limiting early or absentee voting, mail voting, and sameday registration. But for more and more Americans, who will finally jump through the increasing hurdles to vote, their vote won’t matter. Because gerrymandered legislatures will have essentially already decided who they’re voting for and there’s no way to stop it; only to vote out those who have ensured that they can never be voted out.

REFERENCES

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/ analysis-opinion/how-radical-independent-statelegislature-theory-could-disrupt-our