Below is a sampling of decisions issued by the Supreme Court of the United States that are related to partisan gerrymandering. The high court remanded both cases to their respective lower courts with instructions to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction. In the court's opinion, Roberts noted that the Framers, "aware of electoral districting problems … [assigned] the issue to the state legislatures, expressly checked and balanced by the Federal Congress, with no suggestion that the federal courts had a role to play.
Roberts went on to address the assumptions underlying partisan gerrymandering claims: [18]. Kagan wrote the following in her dissent: [18]. Harris v. At issue was the constitutionality of state legislative districts that were created by the commission in The plaintiffs, a group of Republican voters, alleged that "the commission diluted or inflated the votes of almost two million Arizona citizens when the commission intentionally and systematically overpopulated 16 Republican districts while under-populating 11 Democrat districts.
The plaintiffs claimed that the commission placed a disproportionately large number of non-minority voters in districts dominated by Republicans; meanwhile, the commission allegedly placed many minority voters in smaller districts that tended to vote Democratic.
As a result, the plaintiffs argued, more voters overall were placed in districts favoring Republicans than in those favoring Democrats, thereby diluting the votes of citizens in the Republican-dominated districts. The defendants countered that the population deviations resulted from legally defensible efforts to comply with the Voting Rights Act and to obtain approval from the United States Department of Justice. At the time of redistricting, certain states were required to obtain preclearance A jurisdiction subject to preclearance needed to get approval from the U.
Department of Justice before changing election laws or district maps. Holder On April 20, , the court ruled unanimously that the plaintiffs had failed to prove that a partisan gerrymander had taken place. Instead, the court found that the commission had acted in good faith to comply with the Voting Rights Act.
The court's majority opinion was penned by Justice Stephen Breyer. Vieth v. Jubelirer was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States in The case was brought by a group of Pennsylvania Democrats who alleged that the state legislature, controlled by Republicans at the time of the redistricting cycle, had developed a congressional district map that constituted an illegal partisan gerrymander.
The plaintiffs alleged that the map "violated the one-person, one-vote principle of Article 1, Section 2, of the Constitution, the Equal Protection clause, the Privileges and Immunities clause, and the freedom of association [clause]. Because the plaintiffs had shown that it was possible to create districts with smaller differences, and because the defendants had failed to justify the disparities resulting under their plan, it was therefore unconstitutional.
At issue in the case were the following questions: [22]. On April 28, , the court issued a split decision with no majority opinion, declining to intervene in the case. Referring to Davis v. Bandemer , a decision in which the high court ruled that partisan gerrymandering claims can be tried in court under the Equal Protection Clause, Scalia wrote the following in the court's plurality opinion: [23].
Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote a concurring opinion that, according to Oyez , argued the court "should rule narrowly in this case that no appropriate judicial solution could be found, but not give up on finding one eventually.
Bandemer that partisan gerrymandering claims are justiciable under the Equal Protection Clause Souter's opinion also proposed a new test for proving claims of illegal partisan gerrymandering. Associate Justices Stephen Breyer and John Paul Stevens penned separate dissents, both asserting the justiciability of partisan gerrymandering claims.
There is a wide variety of opinions regarding the justiciability of partisan gerrymandering claims i. In April , Ballotpedia spoke with several election policy experts to get their positions on the issue in connection with two relevant cases being considered by the Supreme Court in Rucho v.
Their responses are presented here in full. State powers governing means of elections and qualifications therein help prop up the federalist balance of power. Allowing the federal judiciary into purely political squabbles will upset that balance. Federal interests, for generations, have not feared that states would choke out Congress by refusing to perform elections.
States should maintain their powers here, and the Supreme Court should reverse the prior decision. A majority of the court, however, is likely to be persuaded by a combination of factors — the history of controverted partisan gerrymanders long preceding the adoption of the Constitution; the fact that a growing number of state legislatures are abolishing or seriously constraining the practice and that this trend seems likely to continue; and the further constraint on it provided by state governments in which partisan control of the chambers and the governorship is divided between the parties and sharply contested in each election cycle.
But the most important factor why I believe that the court will stay its hand, and the main reason it will give for doing so, is a lack of justiciability owing to the absence of both 1 any agreed-upon definition of 'excessive' as applied to partisan gerrymanders; and 2 any workable test for excessiveness other than vote-seat efficiency.
This efficiency test, as I previously pointed out on this site , suffers from several difficulties. One is that the court is now more sharply divided ideologically than at perhaps at any time since the court-packing crisis of the late s, and another is that the public's approval rating of the court has declined along with that of Congress and the Presidency although less sharply than the other two institutions have.
The court majority, led by a chief justice who is keenly aware of both of these difficulties, will resist any test of partisan excessiveness whose application by the justices in particular disputes will plausibly seem arbitrary and partisan.
And it can gild its nonpartisan lily by refusing to adjudicate flagrant gerrymanders by both of the parties. Ballotpedia features , encyclopedic articles written and curated by our professional staff of editors, writers, and researchers. Click here to contact our editorial staff, and click here to report an error.
Click here to contact us for media inquiries, and please donate here to support our continued expansion. Share this page Follow Ballotpedia. The two-sample t-test, perhaps the most widely used statistical test of all time , tests how similar two groups of numbers are. In the case of gerrymandering, the t-test can determine how similar the winning vote shares are for the districts won by Democrats to those for districts won by Republicans.
In a perfectly fair world, it could be assumed that these two groups of vote shares would be very similar. Each party might expect to see wins in a mix of strongly partisan districts, moderately reliable districts, and tossups—but each party should expect to have a roughly similar mix.
In a gerrymandered state, by contrast, the victim party mostly has strong wins in their packed districts and the perpetrating party mostly has small but safe wins. The t-test can check for this distinctive pattern of lopsided outcomes, and can check for the probability that such a pattern might have arisen by chance.
If an outcome was unlikely to have occurred by chance alone, that may indicate that the state suffered a partisan gerrymander. We use the two-tailed t-test, which can be performed in Microsoft Excel using the T.
Test function. But time is running short. The Census Bureau released data to the states for redistricting on August If new laws are to have the maximum impact, Congress needs to act quickly.
Fair representation depends on it. Latinos powered population growth in the last decade, but it remains to be seen whether they get the political representation they deserve. Explore Our Work. Here are six things to know about partisan gerrymandering and how it impacts our democracy.
Gerrymandering is deeply undemocratic. There are multiple ways to gerrymander. Gerrymandering has a real impact on the balance of power in Congress and many state legislatures. Gerrymandering affects all Americans, but its most significant costs are borne by communities of color. Gerrymandering is getting worse. Federal reform can help counter gerrymandering — but Congress needs to act soon. November 4, October 28, When are congressional district lines drawn?
Who draws the lines? State legislatures: Legislatures draw congressional district lines in 31 states, and state legislature district lines in 30 states. These maps often follow the same legislative process as any other bill in the legislature, meaning they must pass the legislature and, in most states, can be vetoed or signed by the governor.
Independent redistricting commissions: In other states, independent commissions, comprised of people who are not lawmakers or public officials, draw the lines. Political commissions: In some states, maps are drawn by a political appointee commission whose members are selected by lawmakers or party leadership.
In Arkansas, maps are drawn by a commission made up of legislators themselves. Backup commissions: Some states have a backup commission that draws the lines if the legislature is deadlocked. Advisory commissions: In some states, an advisory commission drafts the maps, which are then voted on by the state legislature. How are lines drawn? Federal law mandates certain requirements for district lines. Equal population: Voting districts must contain equal populations, as mandated in the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.
Therefore, as people move around, states must update their district maps to ensure equal representation. Note that equal representation does not mean fair representation.
Single-member congressional districts: Each congressional district will be represented by a single member. DNC that significantly undermined Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, it is currently unclear how successful future challenges to gerrymandered maps will be. Here a few examples of common criteria adopted by states: Contiguity: District should be a single, unbroken shape.
Racial fairness: Maps should not intend to or have the effect of diluting the power of minority voters or their ability to elect candidates of their choice. Preserve communities of interest: Districts should keep communities together that share similar historical, cultural, policy, or economic interests or whose shared concerns would be affected by legislation. A community of interest should not be defined by political affiliation. A community of interest can include, for example, neighbors who have been advocating to increase public transit routes, residents who organized to prevent Amazon from moving into their city, or families with a shared interest to increase language access in public schools.
Communities of interest can often share racial or ethnic backgrounds, but that cannot always be the sole identifier of that community.
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