<x-flowed>    There are three large problems with Doug Johnson's suggestion:
1.  If the redistricters are good at it, the voters won't be able to overturn a majority, because the minority party will be too packed.  They could do so by an initiative, as in California in 1982, but unless that contained a new method of redistricting, the new legislature would presumably propose a redistricting with a bias similar to the old one, or the old legislature would enact a semi-compromise, as the California legislature did in December, 1982, and if there were a one-bite-at-the-apple provision, as the California Supreme Court ruled there was in a 1983 case, that would be that.
2.  Johnson's proposal has no stopping point.  Why not perpetual redistricting?  What would prevent the Texas legislature from redistricting right now to protect DeLay's district?  Or from redrawing Doggett's and Edwards's and Green's districts, on the grounds that Republicans in the legislature don't want any Anglo Democrats from Texas in Congress, so that Anglo voters can rest assured that the Republican party is the only Anglo party in Texas?
3.  Who decides what an "extreme" gerrymander is?  As I argued above, the voters probably can't.  That leaves judges.  On what basis can they do so, and if they can do so for mid-term redistricting, why not for any regular redistricting?  If they can do so for any regular redistricting, what is Johnson's proposed standard for extreme gerrymandering?
Morgan

Question:
If a state's legislators in 2001 or 2011 enacted or enact an extreme gerrymander, and the voters react and either throw them out of office or (in those states where they have direct power) repeal the new districts, is the argument that the newly-elected legislators and/or the people are not allowed to correct the gerrymander by drawing an improved / corrected / 'good government' plan?
[Note that the new districts would have been used in the same election where the voters show their displeasure.]
- Doug
Douglas Johnson
Fellow
Rose Institute of State and Local Government
doug@talksoftly.com
310-200-2058


Prof. of History and Social Science, Caltech
snail mail:  228-77 Caltech, Pasadena, CA 91125
phone 626-395-4080
fax 626-405-9841
home page:  <http://www.hss.caltech.edu/~kousser/Kousser.html>
to order Colorblind Injustice:  http://uncpress.unc.edu/books/T-388.html
          "Peace if possible, Justice at any rate" -- Wendell Phillips


</x-flowed>