Would you support *THIS* Constitutional amendment to end gerrymandering?

[Del Tachi]

No.  Giving control of redistricting over to anonymous data scientists and impenetrable computer algorithms preempts citizen control of the process and is an affront to democracy. 

What we have right now is an affront to democracy. The fact that IL-4, MD-3, TX-35, and OH-9 even exist to begin with is an affront to democracy. You can complain all you want about how "imperfect" a computer algorithm might be, but it is an obvious improvement over the status quo. The goal is not to replace an imperfect system with a perfect one, but to simply improve upon it.

Those districts exist as the result of democratically-elected legislators engaging in a transparent, regular process playing out before voters and the press.  Computer-drawn districts could never meet a similar standard.

I don't question whether computer-drawn districts could perform better than legislator-drawn districts on the basis of some given "neutral" criteria.  The issue is that ceding complete control of redistricting to computers is undemocratic technocracy only for the sake of some potential marginal improvement thought up by people with think-tank brain (as you admit yourself.)

The algorithm method would be chosen by the legislators when they pass the amendment

There are plenty of redistricting algorithms already out there that legislatures are free to consider when they draw maps.  Enshrining a single one of them into law seems unnecessary and presents problems if it cannot easily be overruled when it produces bad results.

[John Dule]

No.  Giving control of redistricting over to anonymous data scientists and impenetrable computer algorithms preempts citizen control of the process and is an affront to democracy. 

What we have right now is an affront to democracy. The fact that IL-4, MD-3, TX-35, and OH-9 even exist to begin with is an affront to democracy. You can complain all you want about how "imperfect" a computer algorithm might be, but it is an obvious improvement over the status quo. The goal is not to replace an imperfect system with a perfect one, but to simply improve upon it.

Those districts exist as the result of democratically-elected legislators engaging in a transparent, regular process playing out before voters and the press.  Computer-drawn districts could never meet a similar standard.

I don't question whether computer-drawn districts could perform better than legislator-drawn districts on the basis of some given "neutral" criteria.  The issue is that ceding complete control of redistricting to computers is undemocratic technocracy only for the sake of some potential marginal improvement thought up by people with think-tank brain (as you admit yourself.)

You could win a gold medal in mental gymnastics if you ever went pro. Are you seriously defending the redistricting process as "transparent?" Ohio and Texas have their districts drawn by biased partisan hacks under shady circumstances. The "voters and the press" to whom you refer have repeatedly decried this process as unfair, unrepresentative, and contrary to the principles of democracy. But so long as half the electorate (aka the partisan hacks' constituents) don't care about their fellow Americans being disenfranchised, nothing will change.

In fact, an algorithm could be much more transparent than what we have now. We're not talking about something byzantine and complex like Facebook's advertisement algorithms. We're talking about a simple mathematical formula that can be used to calculate compact, equivalent districts. A second-year CS student with a Macbook Pro and Python could build that in a weekend. If you're so worried about the spoooooky computer stuff, then the algorithm could easily be published and reviewed by members of the public.

The rest of your comment is more populist whining about "technocracy," which I won't deign to address.

Exactly, the media and "voter interest" organizations decry partisan gerrymandering all the time and nothing really changes.  It must be the case then that this is an issue few voters care strongly about.  If you think there is a case to be made that transcends partisan or ideological lines, you are welcome to organize, raise money and run for office yourself on a platform of redistricting reform.  This is a feature, not a bug.

Stopped reading here. If you wish to defend gerrymandering just because it helps your party win elections, you're free to do so-- but the argument that the current system is A-OK just because a majority of mouth-breathers in this country don't care enough to change it is flatly ridiculous.

[Del Tachi]

No.  Giving control of redistricting over to anonymous data scientists and impenetrable computer algorithms preempts citizen control of the process and is an affront to democracy. 

What we have right now is an affront to democracy. The fact that IL-4, MD-3, TX-35, and OH-9 even exist to begin with is an affront to democracy. You can complain all you want about how "imperfect" a computer algorithm might be, but it is an obvious improvement over the status quo. The goal is not to replace an imperfect system with a perfect one, but to simply improve upon it.

Those districts exist as the result of democratically-elected legislators engaging in a transparent, regular process playing out before voters and the press.  Computer-drawn districts could never meet a similar standard.

I don't question whether computer-drawn districts could perform better than legislator-drawn districts on the basis of some given "neutral" criteria.  The issue is that ceding complete control of redistricting to computers is undemocratic technocracy only for the sake of some potential marginal improvement thought up by people with think-tank brain (as you admit yourself.)

You could win a gold medal in mental gymnastics if you ever went pro. Are you seriously defending the redistricting process as "transparent?" Ohio and Texas have their districts drawn by biased partisan hacks under shady circumstances. The "voters and the press" to whom you refer have repeatedly decried this process as unfair, unrepresentative, and contrary to the principles of democracy. But so long as half the electorate (aka the partisan hacks' constituents) don't care about their fellow Americans being disenfranchised, nothing will change.

In fact, an algorithm could be much more transparent than what we have now. We're not talking about something byzantine and complex like Facebook's advertisement algorithms. We're talking about a simple mathematical formula that can be used to calculate compact, equivalent districts. A second-year CS student with a Macbook Pro and Python could build that in a weekend. If you're so worried about the spoooooky computer stuff, then the algorithm could easily be published and reviewed by members of the public.

The rest of your comment is more populist whining about "technocracy," which I won't deign to address.

Exactly, the media and "voter interest" organizations decry partisan gerrymandering all the time and nothing really changes.  It must be the case then that this is an issue few voters care strongly about.  If you think there is a case to be made that transcends partisan or ideological lines, you are welcome to organize, raise money and run for office yourself on a platform of redistricting reform.  This is a feature, not a bug.

Stopped reading here. If you wish to defend gerrymandering just because it helps your party win elections, you're free to do so-- but the argument that the current system is A-OK just because a majority of mouth-breathers in this country don't care enough to change it is flatly ridiculous.

Boo hoo

[Alcibiades]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is so inane is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

[The Houstonian]

That would defeat the purpose of single-members districts.

[John Dule]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

You could use Del Taco's argument to justify the status quo for literally anything you like. Police brutality? Rampant campaign finance corruption? Prisons packed with nonviolent offenders? "Well, apparently it's not a big enough problem that we felt we had to change it before now, so therefore it isn't a problem."

[MarkD]

On the one hand, as a stand-alone proposal for an amendment, I would not be in favor of adopting that, because I have no desire to "end gerrymandering." To me, personally, partisan gerrymandering is not unfair to any voters. Partisan gerrymandering is nothing more than an attempt to take advantage of the predictability of the voters. Whether or not a "gerrymandered" map will succeed at electing the specific number of Republican and Democratic politicians that the map-makers hoped for depends on whether voters are consistently partisan in their preferences. Voters can obviously choose to not be completely predictable.

On the other hand, because the idea of "ending gerrymandering" is rather popular with a lot of folks, when I had a goal of my own to rewrite the second sentence of the 14th Amendment (like it says in my signature), I decided to include a provision in my proposal that requires all states to adopt independent redistricting commissions. I included that provision not because it is what I actually hope and want to put in the Constitution, but because I want to broaden the appeal of my overall proposal. I have summarized my proposal a number of times in the Forum Community board, and in those posts I explained how I hope that the proposal might be seen as an acceptable compromise between conservative and liberal points of view.

[vitoNova]

Conservatives would be the most opposed to any solution to gerrymandering that involves mathematical algorithms.

[Starry Eyed Jagaloon]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

You could use Del Taco's argument to justify the status quo for literally anything you like. Police brutality? Rampant campaign finance corruption? Prisons packed with nonviolent offenders? "Well, apparently it's not a big enough problem that we felt we had to change it before now, so therefore it isn't a problem."

Yeah, it's bad logic, but that doesn't mean his criticisms of this are wrong. You don't create a constitutional amendment--which, presumably, we'd be stuck with forever--unless you're completely sure it's loophole-free and will lead to the results you want. And as things stand, redistricting algorithms create bizarre, meaningless districts that just don't work well. If you try and program around this to--for example--pay attention to certain mountain ranges or not split certain municipalities, you're literally introducing all the same biases you'd have in a redistricting committee and things still probably wouldn't work well because there are so many weird, site-specific criteria that should go into each district. Is it objective? No, but it doesn't have to be.

Besides, there are so many other examples of countries with redistricting commissions and it's completely fair. . I'm no Luddite but the whole Silicon Valley technogimmickpolicythink gets really tedious when they try and come up with a convoluted new solution to an American problem when we can just copy best practices from other countries.

[The Mikado]

The arguments in this thread just go to show that FPTP is a completely arbitrary and fundamentally unfair system which should be done away with. The more I see of it, the more I loathe it.

Seems like your issue is more with Single Member Districts than with First Past the Post, given the problem you're pointing to wouldn't be fixed by these districts adopting IRV or two round runoffs.

[Alcibiades]

The arguments in this thread just go to show that FPTP is a completely arbitrary and fundamentally unfair system which should be done away with. The more I see of it, the more I loathe it.

Seems like your issue is more with Single Member Districts than with First Past the Post, given the problem you're pointing to wouldn't be fixed by these districts adopting IRV or two round runoffs.

Yeah, you’re right. I do marginally prefer the other two methods you mention, as at least the elected member will have the support of the majority of their constituents in some form.

[John Dule]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

You could use Del Taco's argument to justify the status quo for literally anything you like. Police brutality? Rampant campaign finance corruption? Prisons packed with nonviolent offenders? "Well, apparently it's not a big enough problem that we felt we had to change it before now, so therefore it isn't a problem."

He's defending a decision-making process, not a policy, institution, or outcome. That's the distinction. There's a reason why both reformists who favor drawing by ostensibly neutral boards and full-on defenders of the smoke-filled room are united in arguing against redistricting by algorithmic fiat. You're on a board full of people who were drawn here by an interest in politics and few here will be inclined to join in any cheers for its digital annihilation.

Anyway, the map is not the territory, and only humans with embodied knowing can account for that distinction. There's also nothing inherently unfair about a district that isn't compact, particularly in urban settings where small districts render moot most considerations about travel time. Contorted pictures of grotesque, sprawling districts make for good anti-gerrymandering propaganda, but the idea that we should strive for pretty maps above all else is ridiculous, and ultimately the case for compactness comes back to that assumption.

Wouldn't the decision-making process be preserved by the fact that commissions would have to choose the algorithm?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Depends on how it is worded and structured.

[Del Tachi]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

You could use Del Taco's argument to justify the status quo for literally anything you like. Police brutality? Rampant campaign finance corruption? Prisons packed with nonviolent offenders? "Well, apparently it's not a big enough problem that we felt we had to change it before now, so therefore it isn't a problem."

Citizen control and input over the redistricting process is itself a value worth protecting.  Not everything has to be a practice in utilitarianism.  Think tankers can keep their equations and narrow, motivated definitions of what a "fair map" is to themselves.  Most people will be happy with the maps they draw for themselves. 

[Del Tachi]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

You could use Del Taco's argument to justify the status quo for literally anything you like. Police brutality? Rampant campaign finance corruption? Prisons packed with nonviolent offenders? "Well, apparently it's not a big enough problem that we felt we had to change it before now, so therefore it isn't a problem."

He's defending a decision-making process, not a policy, institution, or outcome. That's the distinction. There's a reason why both reformists who favor drawing by ostensibly neutral boards and full-on defenders of the smoke-filled room are united in arguing against redistricting by algorithmic fiat. You're on a board full of people who were drawn here by an interest in politics and few here will be inclined to join in any cheers for its digital annihilation.

Anyway, the map is not the territory, and only humans with embodied knowing can account for that distinction. There's also nothing inherently unfair about a district that isn't compact, particularly in urban settings where small districts render moot most considerations about travel time. Contorted pictures of grotesque, sprawling districts make for good anti-gerrymandering propaganda, but the idea that we should strive for pretty maps above all else is ridiculous, and ultimately the case for compactness comes back to that assumption.

Wouldn't the decision-making process be preserved by the fact that commissions would have to choose the algorithm?

If commissions get to pick the algorithm (or even just program it not to do things a human would find suboptimal, like crossing the Cascades in WA) then it is ultimately just going to incorporate all of the subjective biases that human redistrictors would.  The only difference is that we would be excluding from citizens the record created by legislative statements, debates and votes that accompany "partisan redistricting" (MarkD gave a great post on why this term is really a misnomer) in favor of impenetrable lines of computer code you'd need a college degree in data science to understand.  It unnessecarily obfuscates the whole process. 

[Alcibiades]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

You could use Del Taco's argument to justify the status quo for literally anything you like. Police brutality? Rampant campaign finance corruption? Prisons packed with nonviolent offenders? "Well, apparently it's not a big enough problem that we felt we had to change it before now, so therefore it isn't a problem."

Citizen control and input over the redistricting process is itself a value worth protecting.  Not everything has to be a practice in utilitarianism.  Think tankers can keep their equations and narrow, motivated definitions of what a "fair map" is to themselves.  Most people will be happy with the maps they draw for themselves. 

This is like saying because 50% + 1 of people vote to commit egregious violations of minority groups’ civil rights, or ban opposition parties, it’s A-OK. I’m not morally comparing gerrymandering to that, I’m just saying that arguing that it’s fine if it has a democratic mandate is not convincing.

[thumb21]

Algorithms can help out with drawing fair districts but they aren't perfect and enshrining them into the constitution to determine how districts are drawn with little input from the people who will be affected is a very bad idea IMO. Independent commissions seem to do the job just fine and if they want to use a program to help them come up with good ideas then they can, but designing fair districts is something humans are perfectly capable of doing so long as the process is independent.

[Del Tachi]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

You could use Del Taco's argument to justify the status quo for literally anything you like. Police brutality? Rampant campaign finance corruption? Prisons packed with nonviolent offenders? "Well, apparently it's not a big enough problem that we felt we had to change it before now, so therefore it isn't a problem."

Citizen control and input over the redistricting process is itself a value worth protecting.  Not everything has to be a practice in utilitarianism.  Think tankers can keep their equations and narrow, motivated definitions of what a "fair map" is to themselves.  Most people will be happy with the maps they draw for themselves. 

This is like saying because 50% + 1 of people vote to commit egregious violations of minority groups’ civil rights, or ban opposition parties, it’s A-OK. I’m not morally comparing gerrymandering to that, I’m just saying that arguing that it’s fine if it has a democratic mandate is not convincing.

If your argument is to basically envoke Nazis and Jim Crow then you already know you're playing a losing hand, lol

I never said any value was absolute.  But, as has been said by posters of several different ideological persuasions in this thread already, algorithm-drawn maps do not really perform better than those drawn by independent commissions (or even partisan legislatures.)  Using algorithms to achieve such a debatable and tenuous benefit is undemocratic because of the technical barrier it presents to people trying to understand and influence the process. 

[Alcibiades]

Part of the reason why the argument that gerrymandering is fine because politicians have a democratic mandate to do it is that it is such an unfair system in the first place because it is self-perpetuating; politicians draw the lines to make sure they get re-elected, so that they can continue to gerrymander.

You could use Del Taco's argument to justify the status quo for literally anything you like. Police brutality? Rampant campaign finance corruption? Prisons packed with nonviolent offenders? "Well, apparently it's not a big enough problem that we felt we had to change it before now, so therefore it isn't a problem."

Citizen control and input over the redistricting process is itself a value worth protecting.  Not everything has to be a practice in utilitarianism.  Think tankers can keep their equations and narrow, motivated definitions of what a "fair map" is to themselves.  Most people will be happy with the maps they draw for themselves. 

This is like saying because 50% + 1 of people vote to commit egregious violations of minority groups’ civil rights, or ban opposition parties, it’s A-OK. I’m not morally comparing gerrymandering to that, I’m just saying that arguing that it’s fine if it has a democratic mandate is not convincing.

If your argument is to basically envoke Nazis and Jim Crow then you already know you're playing a losing hand, lol

I never said any value was absolute.  But, as has been said by posters of several different ideological persuasions in this thread already, algorithm-drawn maps do not really perform better than those drawn by independent commissions (or even partisan legislatures.)  Using algorithms to achieve such a debatable and tenuous benefit is undemocratic because of the technical barrier it presents to people trying to understand and influence the process. 

I wasn’t actually arguing for algorithm-drawn maps, but simply arguing against gerrymandering, which I thought you had defended as a legitimate use of political power. I stand by my claim that it is one of the worst examples of majoritarianism in the modern United States.

[Vosem]

Yes, something along these lines would obviously be the ideal solution and it's what I've supported since I started thinking about gerrymandering back in middle school or whatever. My only quibble is that I would give zero weight to county lines, since existing governments could always try to alter those in ways that induce the algorithm to gerrymander on behalf of a certain party in a predictable way.

FPTP districts should be designed to represent communities on the ground--that's the reason why single-member seats exist. Arbitrary algorithms defeat the purpose.

They do not; algorithms which predict communities of interest very well already exist and have existed for a long time: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/redistricting-maps/#algorithmic-compact

This method has existed for a while and you will notice that it is very good at identifying communities of interest, such as areas with unusual racial demographics (Mississippi Delta, for instance) or that urban and rural areas vote differently. Other algorithms exist but my understanding is they are not as good (shortest-splitline might be the best known, but it struggles with large cities located in the middles of states, such as Denver).

Generally, the whole problem with non-partisan commissions is that they are often easy to game. In 2011, it was very obvious that Republicans "won" the commission in New Jersey but Democrats "won" the commission in Arizona. In the upcoming cycle, the Republican party has manipulated commission selection mechanisms to get better redistricting results in some states (especially Arizona and Virginia). Commissions might ameliorate the problem of gerrymandering, but they cannot solve it.

An algorithm that is set in stone forever would be perfectly fair to all parties; even if the one you set up favors one side or the other (in the 2000s shortest-splitline was thought to somewhat favor the GOP), because of coalition shifts this effect will probably disappear quickly. If we want boundaries to respect communities of interest -- methods exist for algorithms to do that! But I think gerrymandering can only be solved by eliminating the human element, and an algorithm that just draws boundaries completely randomly would probably be superior to the system we have. The US is large enough that all of its weird decisions would just cancel out.

[Sol]

FPTP districts should be designed to represent communities on the ground--that's the reason why single-member seats exist. Arbitrary algorithms defeat the purpose.

They do not; algorithms which predict communities of interest very well already exist and have existed for a long time: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/redistricting-maps/#algorithmic-compact

This method has existed for a while and you will notice that it is very good at identifying communities of interest, such as areas with unusual racial demographics (Mississippi Delta, for instance) or that urban and rural areas vote differently. Other algorithms exist but my understanding is they are not as good (shortest-splitline might be the best known, but it struggles with large cities located in the middles of states, such as Denver).

Umm, but it literally isn't? Take a gander at the Shenandoah Valley, or the Navajo Reservation, or Idaho, or Rochester.