Undergrads Urge Redistricting

An Institute of Politics (IOP) undergraduate group is releasing a final report on redistricting today, recommending that states adopt non-partisan committees to oversee how voting districts are defined for state and congressional elections.

“[The issue] is a little mundane and not necessarily the sexiest thing, but it gave us the chance to really do...some original research and get some opinions that would be useful,” said group Co-Chair Eric P. Lesser ’07. “It’s an extremely important issue.”

Over 20 undergraduates are members of the Redistricting Policy Group, which was formed at the beginning of the school year to study the history and practice of congressional apportionment in order to understand an issue that, Lesser said, is particularly important in the current political environment.

“This was initiated by the students out of a concern for the political situation,” said Phil Sharp, director of the IOP.

Lesser said the issue is particularly salient because of three recent developments—an abuse of power in Texas redistricting, a Supreme Court decision that upheld a deeply partisan redistricting in Pennsylvania, and new technologies that allow demographers to accurately assess location and voting behavior. These technologies resulted in a 99 percent reelection rate for House incumbents in 2004, Lesser said.

“Politicians are now picking their voters instead of voters picking their politicians,” Lesser said.

To address this problem, the group’s final report recommends the creation of independent redistricting boards to combat gerrymandering and malapportionment.

The group released a draft of the proposal on February 28, 2005 at a convention on redistricting held at the IOP.

At the event, the group received input from attendees and leading scholars, policy advisors, bureaucrats, and politicians. They included Sharp, a former Congressman, Kentucky Secretary of State Trey Grayson, Iowa Secretary of State Chet Culver, and former Congressman Martin Frost.

According to Lesser, the group has high hopes for the proposal, but according to the draft of the report, “We harbor no illusions that redistricting reform will be an easy task.”

The group hopes to disseminate their findings and lobby for their implementation across the country, according to the IOP website

The final report states: “It is the fervent hope of every member of our policy group that by [the 2010 census], in each of the fifty states, a system is in place to redistrict sensibly.”

Arizona serves as a model to other states because in 2000, it successfully changed its redistricting policy through the use of a ballot initiative. Against resistance from many leading politicians in Arizona, the proposal was supported by 56 percent of the public, according to the final proposal.

Lesser said that proposals for the instituting independent redistricting commissions have already started in California, Maryland, and Massachusetts, and he and the group hope other states will follow suit.

Some of the students involved were invited to testify at a meeting of the Massachusetts Joint Committee on Election Laws as it debates a bill which incorporates an independent redistricting commission for the state—a move similar to group’s recommendation.

“People are starting to think about redistricting policy,” Lesser said. “We hope to get our report and information in the hands of all politicians looking at the issue.”

“We at the institute will be glad to help them,” Sharp said. “We foster student activity...they decide what they want to do and where they want to take it from here.”