One way of achieving a kind of immortality is to have a process named for you. Louis Pasteur discovered that microorganisms caused disease and fermentation and that this could be prevented by a heating process that became known as Pasteurization. Charles Cunningham Boycott, a 19th Century estate manager, refused to lower tenant farmers’ rents during one of Ireland’s many famines. The tenants’ response, a complete withdrawal of all commercial and social relations, has been used by political activists ever since and boycott is now both a noun and a verb.
And then there is Eldridge Gerry who lent his name to the nefarious political tactic of Gerrymandering….
Guide to the history of Gerrymandering — including the political cartoon that compared Gerry’s redistricting to a salamander! — available at PQ Congressional (& included with NYLI membership)
And, boy have there been A LOT of Supreme Court cases on the issue of Gerrymandering style redistricting. Consider….
- Baker v. Carr, 369 US 186 (1962) – State reapportionment claims are justiciable in federal court.
- Davis v. Bandemer, 478 US 109 (1986) -upheld Indiana’s redistricting plans as legal and also maintained that federal courts have the right to intervene in such matters.
- Shaw v. Reno, 509 US 630 (1993)- N.C. violated the Equal Protection Clause by drawing district boundaries with the goal of separating voters on the basis of race.
- Vieth v. Jubelirer, 541 US 267 (2004)- Court decided not to intervene because no appropriate judicial solution for political gerrymandering could be found.
- League of Latin American Citizens v. Perry 548 US 399 (2006) held that Texas redistricting didn’t violate the Constitution, but that part of the plan violated the Voting Rights Act.
- Bethune v. Board of Elections 580 US __(2017)- Court clarifies its redistricting and provides Congress with insight into the standards when evaluating claims of racial gerrymandering
And as recently as 2019, it is still a question as to whether Gerrymandering belongs in their Court! In Both Lamone v. Benisek and Rucho v. Common Cause, the Supremes stated that partisan gerrymandering presents a political question beyond their reach.…
So where does Gerrymandering go from here? It’s at 200+ years old…. & seems to show no signs of slowing down…
