[EL] Redistricting Commissions and Republicans

[Eric McGhee]

I think there are good points all around in this discussion.  However, I continue to be skeptical of claims that the alternative to a commission in California was a strong Democratic gerrymander.  Absent a two-thirds majority in each chamber of the legislature, it is hard for a majority party in California to push through a partisan gerrymander that will stick.
________________________________
From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] on behalf of LMolton at aol.com [LMolton at aol.com]
Sent: Monday, October 31, 2011 12:42 AM
To: djohnson at ndcresearch.com; levittj at lls.edu; law-election at uci.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] Redistricting Commissions and Republicans

Justin:
Doug:

I agree with both of your analyses, especially Doug's first paragraph below.  Legislative redistricting in CA was expected to produce a gain of about 8 House seats for the Democrats; that now will not happen.

Also, the 2001 bipartisan gerrymander in CA locked in GOP (and Democratic) seats as of 2000.  Republicans are weaker in CA today, so any neutral mapping will give them fewer seats at first than they had in 2001.

Obviously, a party that had a great year in a key state in 2010 would do better with total control of redistricting than with a Commission.  And if it also had control of the same state in 2001, then it will do worse with a Commission than it did the last time.  But that does not imply that a specific party will always do better under one system or another.

There is a political aspect to the CA story as well.  I was involved in the campaign to enact Congressional redistricting by commission (a 2010 ballot initiative).  I also testified before the Commission in 2011, as an adviser to one of the groups that presented (four) sets of maps.

Although there are two current GOP House seats that no longer exist, and one that is now a tossup, at least three redrawn Democratic seats are in serious jeopardy, and more could swing if Republicans regain support in the future.

The rhetoric from some quarters that the Commission cost the GOP House seats in CA is actually the result of intra-party disagreements.  The forces behind the successful enactment of a redistricting commission in CA (and the top two primary in the previous election) have a view of the ideal Republican candidate that is vastly different than that espoused by the national party or its leaders.  There are now opportunities for Republicans to make gains in CA over the next decade that would never have existed without a commission.  But that is considered a defeat by some Republicans, because the winners won't be strong social and anti-tax conservatives.  One conservative national magazine explicitly defined one House seat as lost because a "liberal" Republican may defeat a Democrat next year.  The Commission process will help California Republicans; it just may not help certain factions within the party.


Larry Molton
Castro Valley CA


In a message dated 10/29/2011 5:23:47 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, djohnson at ndcresearch.com writes:
I'd agree with Justin that Republican lack of success in commission states means Republican opposition to commissions. The CA commission provided Democrats with significant opportunities to gain seats. But without the Commission, the Democrats would have had total control of redistricting in CA and the plan would have been significantly more pro-Democrat (with a focus on locked-in Dem seats, rather than the Commission's provision of significant opportunities to gain seats).

In both CA and AZ, the Democrats have proven much more successful at maneuvering in the commission environment. That doesn't necessarily mean Republicans will oppose commissions (especially in California, where the odds of Republicans gaining control by 2021 of even one house of the legislature are near-zero and the governorship seems like a long shot). I suspect it's more likely that the Republicans will spend a lot of time studying what happened this time around, and trying to be more effective in 2021 (just as the Democrats in CA and AZ spent a lot of time preparing for 2011 by studying what worked and what did not work for them in Arizona in 2001).

One final note: be careful about lumping the commission states together: AZ and CA are independently selected commissions that also operate independently. WA and ID are partisan-nominated commissions that then operate independently. NJ has an equal number of partisan appointees and a court-named "tiebreaker" if needed. There are a significant differences among the different structures.

AZ may be a case where Republicans move to abolish a commission. In AZ Republican control of both houses of the Legislature (with 2/3 majorities in both) and the Governorship, and there is talk of attempting to abolish the commission there. But at this time that's still just talk. In part it's a reaction to how badly Democrats have outmaneuvered the Republicans with the Commission in AZ.

- Doug

Douglas Johnson
Fellow
Rose Institute of State and Local Government
m 310-200-2058
o 909-621-8159
douglas.johnson at cmc.edu





From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Justin Levitt
Sent: Saturday, October 29, 2011 4:58 PM
To: law-election at uci.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] ELB News and Commentary 10/29/11

I don't doubt Rick's projection: some will see the redistricting facts below, and draw the conclusion Rick that suggests may be drawn.  But that'd be a pretty shabby reason to draw that conclusion.

This is a version of the correlation-causation problem that I've discussed<http://www.senate.gov/fplayers/jw57/urlMP4Player.cfm?fn=judiciary090811p&st=4914&dur=2700> in the ID context.  Once again, the data comes from a really small sample of states: "Dems made gains" in California, might possibly make gains in Arizona, probably won't in Washington, and didn't in Idaho.  In 2 out of 4 states with independent commissions for congressional lines, Dems seem to have done better in this cycle; in the other 2, they seem to have done about the same.  If four people play a single hand of blackjack, and 2 out of 4 win one hand and the other two push, that doesn't really tell you much about their chances of continuing to win against the house.  I'll happily take the other side of that bet.

In addition to the exceedingly small number of data points, the causation argument also doesn't account for all of the other factors at play, other than the fact that commissions were involved.  In the last cycle, for example, California's notorious plan aimed to preserve as many incumbent seats as possible, including some significant Republican-leaning gerrymanders.  Perhaps the change in this cycle is simply regression to the mean.  Perhaps not.  My point is that there's just not enough information to know whether it's the fact of a commission doing this work, or some other factor (or dozens of other factors).  And I'm not the only one on this list to have made that point: see, e.g., here<http://department-lists.uci.edu/pipermail/law-election/2011-October/001412.html> and here<http://department-lists.uci.edu/pipermail/law-election/2011-October/001415.html>.

As I've written<http://ssrn.com/abstract=1710191>, even when a commission is well-designed, there may be good reasons to prefer commissions, and good reasons not to prefer commissions.  (And not every commission is well-designed: there are Aston Martins of the commission world, and there are Pintos of the commission world.  Details are important.)  But the political results so far from the 2011 cycle don't add up to a reason one way or another: the fact that California's commission in the 2011 cycle may have resulted in a net gain of a few seats favoring Democrats doesn't really tell you much about a different variation of the form in a different state in a different year.

Justin

On 10/28/2011 8:30 PM, Rick Hasen wrote:
“2012 redistricting update: Republicans and Democrats fighting to a draw in battle for new seats”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=24737>
Posted on October 28, 2011 2:50 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=24737> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

According to The Fix<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/2012-redistricting-update-republicans-and-democrats-fighting-to-a-draw-in-battle-for-new-seats/2011/10/28/gIQAoM9uPM_blog.html>, Republicans made gains with partisan redistricting but Dems made gains in states with redistricting commissions.

If this pans out, it is likely to increase Republican opposition to commission-based districting.
[http://www.addtoany.com/share_save#url=http://electionlawblog.org/?p=24737&title=“2012 redistricting update: Republicans and Democrats fighting to a draw in battle for new seats”&description=]<http://www.addtoany.com/share_save#url=http%3A%2F%2Felectionlawblog.org%2F%3Fp%3D24737&title=%E2%80%9C2012%20redistricting%20update%3A%20Republicans%20and%20Democrats%20fighting%20to%20a%20draw%20in%20battle%20for%20new%20seats%E2%80%9D&description=>
Posted in citizen commissions<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=7>, redistricting<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=6> | Comments Off




--

Justin Levitt

Associate Professor of Law

Loyola Law School | Los Angeles

919 Albany St.

Los Angeles, CA  90015

213-736-7417

justin.levitt at lls.edu<mailto:justin.levitt at lls.edu>

ssrn.com/author=698321


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