The Crucial Maps

The redistricting process must change if it is to be fair.

If you care about democracy, the map of Louisiana should scare you. I don't mean the regular map of the boot-shaped state; I mean the new Congressional districting map. The United States Supreme Court didn't like it, and neither should you.

In the most recent attempt to redistrict the state of Louisiana, several of the eight districts wiggled and wobbled, extending amoeba-like pseudopods in all directions in attempts to corral voters. Of course, these voters had to meet certain demographic characteristics. One district in the central part of the state wandered in every compass direction and, even worse, wasn't even contiguous. In fairness, Texas, North Carolina and Massachusetts had similarly strange boundaries.

The district in question had been drawn in its tortuous form in order to capture as many Black voters as possible. The leaders of Lousiana's Democratic Party were trying to ensure that a Black, and presumably Democratic, representative would be elected from that district. They had a sociological argument as well: people want to be represented by the person with whom they have the most in common. Let Blacks elect a Black person and Whites elect a White; everyone will think the system works.

The above logic poses an immense threat to the electoral process and the national identity First of all, campaign issues could boil down to race or economic status rather than political stances. In places like Louisiana, integration would become more difficult and virtually race-based provinces like those in South Africa would develop. With homogeneous communities, political machines could be reborn. Because of the relative heterogeneity of different districts, a state's delegation could become fractured.

We can hope that the nation's population will not fall into these traps. But the recent race for mayor of New York highlighted the fact that race has not yet exited politics. People are too lazy to find out where candidates stand, or they still vote by skin color.

The process of redistricting must change. No political party's leadership should be able to stack the deck in its own favor. The redrawing of the political map must be achieved impartially. The Bureau of the Census can do the job. Districts should 1) encompass populations of roughly similar sizes within each state, 2) be contiguous and "star-shaped" (a line can be drawn from the center to any point on the border without exiting the district), 3) respect town borders whenever possible and 4) be drawn with the same basic criteria in every state.

Let's say you want to create districts of approximately 500,000 people each. First, find the average per-square-mile population of the state. Next, draw a grid across its map with squares containing an average of 500,000 people in each one. Now comes the unavoidably subjective part. Squares must be added, subtracted and tinkered with until the populations in each district are correct. If the same algorithm is used for every district everywhere (i.e. start at western portion of the state, always expand districts east, then north, then south, etc.), the system becomes largely impartial over the entire nation.

By eliminating debates and temptations in every state, a new redistricting system would prevent specific political interest from preying on democracy. A computer could complete the whole process in a few minutes.

Daniel Altman's column appears on alternate Mondays.