One of the biggest challenges facing our democracy today occurs when congressional district lines that are drawn by elected officials to give one political party an unfair advantage over another. This is called "gerrymandering.” This Teach-Out explores the topic of gerrymandering, considering everything from its history of the original gerrymander, to the current United States Supreme Court cases. You will hear from leading experts on gerrymandering as well as citizen groups who are on the front lines of the redistricting debate. The Teach-Out will address the following questions: What is gerrymandering? What is happening now? Why is this such an important issue today and what does it mean for you? Why did the United States Supreme Court take up the gerrymandering case (Gill v. Whitford)? And what is happening now with this case? How has technology impacted the gerrymandering debate? What are states doing to address the issue? How can you implement change? A Teach-Out is: -an event – it takes place over a fixed, short period of time -an opportunity – it is open for free participation to everyone around the world -a community – it will be joined by a large number of diverse individuals -a conversation – an opportunity to give and take ideas and information from people The University of Michigan Teach-Out Series provides just-in-time community learning events for participants around the world to come together in conversation with the U-M campus community, including faculty experts. The U-M Teach-Out Series is part of our deep commitment to engage the public in exploring and understanding the problems, events, and phenomena most important to society. Teach-Outs are short learning experiences, each focused on a specific current issue. Attendees will come together over a few days not only to learn about a subject or event but also to gain skills. Teach-Outs are open to the world and are designed to bring together individuals with wide-ranging perspectives in respectful and deep conversation. These events are an opportunity for diverse learners and a multitude of experts to come together to ask questions of one another and explore new solutions to the pressing concerns of our global community. Come, join the conversation! Find new opportunities at Teach-Out.org.
What’s Been Done in Other States, With What Results?
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From the course by University of Michigan
The Future of Gerrymandering Teach-Out
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From the lesson
Introduction
Meet the Instructors
John ChamberlinProfessor Emeritus of Political Science and Public Policy at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy
Nancy WangClinical Assistant Professor and the Director of the Environmental Law Clinic at the University of Michigan Law School
Lija HoganIntermittent Lecturer in Information, School of Information, University of Michigan
So thank you for joining us for this segment,
we're going to be talking about what's being done across
the country around managing the redistricting process.
There's been a fair amount of activity,
so I've got Kathay Feng here from Common Cause California.
She's actually the Executive Director there as well as
the national redistricting Director for Common Cause,
so welcome and thank you for joining us today.
Thank you Leah.
So, we'll start off with there's been
a number of states where we've seen some recent activity around redistricting.
Out of those, what are the ones that standout most in terms of
making a lot of progress toward reducing the impact of gerrymandering?
I think that the states really fall into two different buckets.
One is states that have an initiative process and those states
like Michigan and Ohio and now we're looking at states like Colorado and Utah.
Have been moving forward with a pushing for reform that gets at
the heart of the problem of redistricting which is
removing people who have self-interest,
from a process and replacing that with
a more transparent and inclusive process for redistricting.
The other bucket is in states where there's been tremendous partisan gerrymandering,
but because I don't have an initiative process,
it's not easy to push for change
certainly the legislature isn't always willing to give that up.
So the root there for change has been to use litigation.
To challenge the maps and to try to create
hopefully a standard for finding that partisan gerrymandering is unconstitutional.
Therefore, reign in what those states have been doing.
States like that includes Wisconsin, North Carolina, Pennsylvania,
Maryland where we've made our way to
the highest courts and we're now awaiting some kind of judgment.
Great, so when we see different states working towards ending gerrymandering.
I know that a lot of them have had a different set of values,
enshrined in the processes that they're using to draw lines.
I know that that manifest in different ways,
can you share with us some examples of what
the important values are that people are looking to add to that process.
So, I would say that in some states the challenge has been
that there really in a state
where there's a fairly equal number of say Democrats or Republicans,
and they're looking for a compromise where they can
create a group of people oftentimes it's a bipartisan commission.
Where there's a set of checks and balances between Democrats or Republicans so that
no one party can overwhelm the other one or take advantage in a way that is extreme.
States like Ohio have pursued
bipartisan commission reforms or both their state and a Congressional line drawn.
That essentially creates a commission where no one side
can totally take advantage of the situation and sweep the other party out.
That ballot initiative is due to be voted on by voters May 8th,
so it's right around the corner and we'll see
if Ohio adopts that for the congressional lines.
In other states like Michigan,
they have really look to try to create a set
of standards but also to convene a group of people,
who would be entirely independent of the political establishment,
and they're what they're looking for is a group of citizens who
are diverse and represent the entire states demographics,
who are talented and thoughtful and who come together without any specific tie or
interests in how the districts will ultimately be drawn for personal or partisan reasons.
So to that group of citizens and we draw the lines and
the idea behind it is that redistricting really
ought to be forward-looking and auto-reflect where our communities
and the testimony around changing demographics goes and the only way to do that,
is to cut the strings that tie
the current redistricting process to incumbents and party operatives,
and put it in the hands of a group of independent citizens to draw those lines.
So the thought is, let's make that a citizen-driven process, where community,
testimony and demographics are really
the driving force behind how we draw the lines as opposed
to doing something where
the legislature has control and is always looking at how to preserve its own power.
So finally, that's really great contexts to have because it helps
to give a sense for what people really care about
when they're creating these independent commissions.
So what is the impact been of these different types of policies?
Yeah. Well, there have been a number of states that have had
some version of an alternative to
the legislature drawing it's own lines or drawing congressional lines.
And I would say it's on a spectrum,
there's less than a half dozen that have something that I would
say get close to an independent commission.
In most states that have tried to credit commission,
they started out by creating something that was
essentially an equal number of Democrats and Republicans,
and where there might be a fifth person who
is quote unquote independent or not aligned with either of those parties.
Oftentimes, those individuals have indirectly appointed
by somebody in the legislature or an elected official.
So, the direction that we've been moving,
is towards something that is even more independent than that.
So states like California and maybe Michigan passes its initiative,
would have something where the group of people who are
ultimately chosen to draw the lines,
really are not chosen by the legislature,
they have conflicts of interest requirements that cut ties.
So that can't be staff,
that can't be family of legislature,
that can't be donors of candidates
and really they're making those decisions independent and
hopefully any ties or connections to the legislature or political party interests.
So that kind of Independent Commission,
can produce a number of things.
One is that when it has hearings around the State,
it's truly taking in testimony with an open mind,
without any bias towards trying to skew those lines to
favor one party over another or benefit one incumbent or another.
The second thing that it can truly do in listening to that community testimony,
is to be very forward-looking about where our demographics are moving us to.
So in California, we have people who are moving from one part of the States,
so the western coastal part of the state more inland,
and really thinking about where those population changes are happening.
But also that our demographics in terms of ethnicity and race are changing,
and so thinking about where the emerging communities are.
When you have a group of people who are not tied to partner incumbents,
then they're much more able to reflect the changing demographics of the state,
by drawing lines that start to capture
where those emerging communities are and not just
them looking back to holding onto old constituencies.
Then I'd say the last thing is that in doing so,
sometimes what happens is because they're not
trying to protect incumbents or parties specifically,
you end up with a lot of districts where there's a shakeup.
So in California, a lot of incumbents were essentially displaced,
and they had to campaign for the first time in a very long time
to earn the right of being able to represented those districts in a hard way.
Then the second piece is that,
it's not always a give me that one party or another will win that district.
So in some districts,
there's a true fight between the two parties
again to earn the votes of their constituents.
That creates a very vibrant democracy where our legislature has
been far more responsive to voters because they have
to earn those votes and they can't just take them as a given,
and our congressional members have been,
I would say again far more responsive to voters.
It means that maybe there are sometimes when they're not
taking an ideological or a party stands,
they're really thinking about where their constituents are coming from,
it also means that in our state legislature,
we've seen far less gridlock and
more ability for both sides to come together around really important issues.
Great. So thank you for that context it's very helpful.
So thank you for joining us for this segment.
We will hope that you continue to watch, listen,
and learn and join us as we continue
the conversation around gerrymandering around the country.
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