News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Unratified Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. Parent comment

Re:Unratified Amendments to the U.S. Constitution by austincheney on Sunday March 11, 2018 @07:01PM (#16565199)
You can fix gerrymandering without changes to congressional limits. Simply use this criteria:

* All boundaries of a congressional district must be either a state's boundaries or fixed to a single latitude and/or longitude and meet at an approximate 90deg.

* Exceptions to the prior mentioned rule are acceptable only in the cases of remainder space, which is space remaining for a congressional district only after the prior rule is otherwise fully executed.

* Remainder space districts must not be adjacent.

---

An alternative approach:

* Congressional districts must be limited to county borders in the case of low population density districts that may comprise multiple counties or subdivided entirely within a single county for high density districts.

* Subdivision of a county must occur strictly upon either points of latitude or longitude, but not both and cannot exceed the borders of any single county.

---

I believe the shape and size of congressional districts should be flexible to account for variances of population density. I happen to live in a state with a huge population and perhaps the most wild fluctuations in population density. For horrid examples of gerrymandering view our current congressional districts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_de...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Unratified Amendments to the U.S. Constitution by philwelch on Sunday March 11, 2018 @10:10PM (#16565792)
Sure, but passing a federal law or constitutional amendment that would implement that solution is unlikely, because it is against the vested interests of the congressmen from gerrymandered districts who would be voting on it in the first place. On the other hand, ratifying the apportionment amendment would create so many congressional districts that gerrymandering would be effectively impossible.

Also, if you're going to go straight into fantasy land to solve gerrymandering, you can just do party-list proportional representation by state, or STV for smaller states, and then there's no districting at all. There's nothing in the constitution requiring congressional districts at all.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Unratified Amendments to the U.S. Constitution by austincheney on Monday March 12, 2018 @05:37PM (#16571891)
To me that doesn't make any sense. If it is in the vested interest of a congressman to maintain the convention of gerrymandering then any action to the contrary is equally unlikely. A constitutional amendment is the least likely scenario since it requires majority support of the congress as well the senate and states.

If you cannot expect congress to act in the peoples' interest the only viable solution is through federal court action. In the mean time, since I am in fantasy land (as you call it), I will prefer practical solutions no matter how improbable in the real world over constitutional amendment which is even more imaginary.

Also there is no reason to expect increased seats in congress will have any effect upon gerrymandering and may even make it substantially worse. It certainly won't make law making more efficient.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Unratified Amendments to the U.S. Constitution by philwelch on Monday March 12, 2018 @08:48PM (#16573030)
The apportionment amendment was already passed in the eighteenth century, so it just needs to be ratified by the states. No Congressional action necessary.

And while you could try to gerrymander an 11,000 seat House of Representatives, it would be a lot harder.

[ Parent | on HN ]