Opinion of Racial Gerrymandering

[Democratic Hawk]

Extremely negative. 

Black Democrats (particularly in the South) would be better served if their districts were made less black, and incorporated more white moderates and conservatives to make their districts at least more competitive, and forcing them to moderate themselves.  By doing so, it would improve their chances at winning statewide by displaying a more moderate voting record, and I am not just talking about gay marriage, abortion, gun control, and/or affirmative action.  Most importantly, by forcing them to represent those who are not black or liberal, it would help persuade white voters in a statewide race that a black Democrat running for a statewide office will not merely be a shill for blacks or liberals only.

I agree, Frodo.

I think we have to move past thinking that people have common interests based solely on their race/ethnicity.  This type of thinking perpetuates our problems.  We have to forge common interests between people of different races who live in the same areas under the same or similar conditions, and stop making people think that defining their interests begins and ends with race.

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It will come as no surprise that I agree with you guys

Dave

[Bacon King]

How do you redistrict without gerrymandering?  I doubt it's possible these days.  However racial gerrymandering is as stupid as gerrymanderingfor any other purpose-special interest groups, economic status, ect..

See Iowa and Arizona.

Iowa is rather nicely cut-but Arizona??  Have you seen AZ-2?

Arizona's districts are decided by a bipartisan group I believe, similar to Washington. There is reasoning for the way the district is shaped, but I am not very sure right now. Washington's are much nicer looking.

In Arizona, one part of the state follows daylight savings time, while most of it doesn't. The intention was to not have a congressional district that crosses time zones (to have a standardized poll closing time, I would assume)- and the blob on the east side of AZ-2 is a small area that doesn't follow daylight savings time surrounded by the part of the state (the Navajo Nation) that does follow DST. So, it's really the best they could do, I guess.

[Undisguised Sockpuppet]

Proportional representation with 1000 representatives elected from 100 districts of 10 reps with the districts all being of equalo populaiton size and determined soley by population withotu regard to state borders is the way to do. It would prevent rural interests/legislaiton from getting any say whatsoever.

[RBH]

If I wanted to take the risk, i'd post the maps on CQ with such districts as

GA-11 (McKinney): 1993-1997
LA-04 (Fields): 1993-1997
NC-12 (Watt): 1993-1997
NC-01 (Clayton): 1993-2003

Now, those were gerrymanders.

The 1983-1993 Georgia map had three split counties.

The 1993-2003 Georgia map had at least 24 split counties.

[RBH]

North Carolina's 1992 map had two Majority African-American districts, and two more districts with over 20% African-American population. 2/3rds of the districts fell below the state population for African-Americans.

Also, there's various things such as the HW Bush Justice Department ruling on the Alabama map (that allowed a Republican-drawn map to be used)

And the "Circa 1992" map for FL-03 is just flat out nuts. And the PBD gerrymanders are crazy no matter what the reason. Both in 1992 and 2002.