The Influence of Redistricting on the U.S. House of Representatives:

7/27/2019 The Influence of Redistricting on the U.S. House of Representatives:

1/96

The Influence of Redistricting on the U.S. House of

Representatives

Claims and Facts on Partisan Advantage,

Polarization, and Competition

Lieuwe M. Verhage

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in

American Studies and the Radboud University Nijmegen.

Thesis supervisor: dr. Thomas W. Gijswijt

August 15, 2011


2/96

Abstract i

Abstract

Redistricting is claimed to effect the composition and polarization of the U.S. House of

Representatives. However, not all academic research supports these claims. Research which

does suggest redistricting has an influence, either shows this is extremely limited, has severe

flaws, or overlooks better explanations outside of the redistricting realm. Redistricting

commissions, often suggested as the silver bullet for the current partisan gridlock in Congress,

is not only an undemocratic solution to a nonexistent problem, but also leads to worse results

when it comes to competition and polarization. If representation of voters is something that

needs to be solved, noncompetitive, homogeneous districts are shown to provide more faithful

representatives, leading to higher voter satisfaction levels of incumbents and Congress as a

whole. This thesis analyzes the most prominent research on the issue, and uses several

datasets to provide compelling evidence refuting the common assumptions on redistricting.


3/96

Acknowledgments ii

Acknowledgments

For most normal people, redistricting is the most boring word in the English

language. But for members of Congress and state legislators, its cause for full-out

panic. This is musical chairs with switchblades. Dan Schnur1

After having done everything in order to postpone writing this thesis for over two years, I am

glad the once blank pages have filled themselves with words, tables and figures, to create

what is the finishing touch to my American Studies degree. While there are many different

reasons for why it took me almost two years after my return from my semester abroad at the

University of California, Berkeley, to sit down and start this project, the best explanation is

that there were too many other things I liked doing other than writing a thesis. From traveling

to Florida; attending lectures and events by some of my personal heroes; working at the

Roosevelt Study Center; and setting up a national organization and conference for American

Studies students, all were things I made sure would keep me away from this last item that

needed to be checked before I could graduate.

However, with the deadline of expiring grades fast approaching, my fascination for

electoral issuespartly awakened by the classes on politics and campaigning of Dan Schnur

at Berkeleyfocused on the redistricting due to a book with old Congressional Districts I

found while working at the RSC. My own opinion on the issue was based of what journalists,

pundits and historians had explained was the deteriorating impact of gerrymandering on

American politics. Quickly, however, I found research contradicting the assumptions I learned.

Particularly this search to uncover the truth about the influence redistricting kept writing this

thesis interesting, and the evidence which eventually made me change my mind on the issue,

forms the basis of this thesis.The fact that this has been such a long process makes me ever more indebted to the people

who have assisted me along the way. First and foremost I like to thank my thesis supervisor dr.

Thomas W. Gijswijt for the debates which forced me to make my thesis even more focused

and hopefully convincing. Furthermore, I would not have been able to write a political science

oriented American Studies Master thesis if prof. dr. Hans Bak and dr. Jac Geurts had not

enabled me to transfer from Groningen to Nijmegen and, together with the rest of the

1 Seema Metha, Redrawing of District Boundaries Will Shake Up California Politics,Los Angeles Times, June

10, 2011, http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-maps-20110610,0,3926097.story (accessed June 25, 2011).


4/96

Acknowledgments iii

American Studies faculty at the Radboud University Nijmegen, welcomed me with open arms.

Next to their interesting classes, I had the pleasure to assist them in the organization of the

successful 16th

NASA Amerikanistendag, which is where the idea for creating the

StudentNASA originated. While I am grateful for the possibilities the various boards of the

Netherlands American Studies Associations (NASA) have given me to pursue this idea, my

thanks goes out to the study associations, students and speakers who were willing to make the

conference we organized a great success. I hope there are ways to continue this cooperation

after my graduation.

Closely linked to the NASA is another organization which greatly influenced my academic

career, namely the Roosevelt Study Center. After working there as an intern in the summer of

2007, this unique research center on American history has not only supported me in every

possible way, but brought me into contact with interesting students, researchers and Fulbright

Scholars who, by telling about their own research, have contributed to my own ideas,

concepts and dreams. Prof. dr. Kees van Minnen, dr. Hans Krabbendam, prof. dr. Giles Scott-

Smith, and Leontien Joosse, I thank you for your continued belief in me, and I look forward to

raising a glass with you this September to celebrate the 25th

anniversary of the RSC.

The change of American Studies programs I made at the beginning of my Bachelor meant

more for me than just finding the right academic focus. It also placed me in a group of like-

minded, enthusiastic, and downright awesome people. Together we organized movie nights,

planed trips to the U.S. Consulate, stalked Twan Huys, experienced Boston, and had long

serious talks about our the future. Boston 10, Chicago 3, San Fran 5, Berkeley 2, Key West 6,

Miami 5, Samson 2, Eindhoven 3, I cannot imagine how my life would have looked without

you all in it, but I am sure it would have been really boring. Your presence and support helped

me to become who I am today, and I doubt I will ever find another group of people who will

be similarly exited over the same country that is just a six to nine hour flight away.

Someone who has been a stable force, motivator, critical reader, but foremost friend for

almost half my life is Anna de Bruyckere. I am unable to reimburse her for all the help and

support she has given me over the years, but at least can acknowledge her crucial assistance in

the final stages of this project, as well as her contributions along the way.

My parents and sister continue to encourage all my plans, are there when I need them, or

when I just feel like going home. I am blessed to have such a supportive family. This thesis is

dedicated to them.

Nijmegen, August 2011


5/96

Contents iv

Contents

Abstract i

Acknowledgments ii

Contents iv

Introduction 2

Chapter 1: Gerrymandering as the Cause of the Broken System 6

Chapter 2: Effect of Partisan Redistricting on Elections in Congressional Districts 15

Chapter 3: Partisan Redistricting and Polarization in U.S. House of Representatives 29

Chapter 4: Unwanted Ramifications of Redistricting Commissions 50

Chapter 5: Better Representation through Noncompetitive Homogeneous Districts 65

Conclusion 77

Tables and Figures 80

Bibliography 83

Datasets 91


6/96

Introduction

Representatives shall be apportioned among the severalStates according to their respective number, counting

whole number of persons in each State, excluding

Indians not taxed.1

1 U.S. Const. amend. XIV, 2.


7/96

Introduction 2

Introduction

In 2000, Illinois State Senator Barack Obama suffered his first, and up till now only election

loss for a seat in public office. In the four way Democratic primary election for Illinois 1st

Congressional District he received a little over 30 percent of the vote, while the incumbent,

Bobby Rush, won with more than 60 percent. Representative Rush enjoyed great popularity in

the poorest, heavily African-American parts of Chicagos South Side, which constituted the

majority of his district. However, the Obamas family apartment lay in Hyde Park, a mostly

white neighborhood at the tip of Rushs district, and an area where Obama defeated the

incumbent with a large margin. Barack Obama saw that when [they] were doing fund-raisers

in the Rush campaign his appeal to young white professionals was dramatic.2

This

growing awareness of his ability to connect to affluent white donors, while retaining a

supportive (African-American) base, would prove to be invaluable in later years, but had not

resulted in a victory over Bobby Rush. However, putting a 30 percent dent into the reelection

of a long time incumbent was and is remarkable, and provided grounds for rumors of another

attempt to win the district at a Congressional election down the line.

However, in 2001, Illinois congressional districts were redrawn following the release of

the Census results. While in 1991, the Republicans held most seats in the state legislature, the

Democratic majority in 2001 took this opportunity to create districts that would be beneficial

to them. Figure 1 shows parts of the results of this redistricting process. The blue overlay

represents the old district lines, in place for the 2000 Congressional Elections, while the red

overlay represents the new district lines for Illinois 1st

district after the redistricting process.

Obamas apartment, first part of the district, due to a curious series of irregular turns,

missed the new district lines by as little as two blocks.3

Figure 1: Illinois 1st

Congressional District and Obamas Apartment

2

Ryan Lizza, How Chicago Shaped Obama.New Yorker, July 21, 2008,http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/07/21/080721fa_fact_lizza.3 Ibid.


8/96

Introduction 3

This is, however, where the facts stop, and two diverging narratives take over. Some argue

that Obama, together with the political consultant in charge of the redistricting process of all

Congressional Districts in Chicago, sat down in front of a computer to draw Obama a new

district composed of more of those wealthier, whiter, more Jewish, less blue-collar, and

better educated voters which had provided him the (financial) support to win 30 percent of

the vote during the campaign against Rush.4

Others argue it was incumbent Bobby Rush who

wished to make it difficult for his opponents to challenge him in future elections.5

The fact

that, next to Obama, also the other two primary contestants were drawn out of Rushs district

provides further evidence for this explanation. Whichever story is true, partisan redistricting

in Illinois may have been the most important event in Obamas early political life.6

While he

eventually did decide against another campaign to become a member of the House of

Representatives, the understanding he gained on his ability to persuade two very different

groups of voters for supportboth financially and with community actionwas of the

essence in both his 2004 Senate bid as well as his 2008 Presidential campaign.

However, not every redistricting story involves a future president, and wile there are

differences in the explanations on why Obamas apartment was drawn out of the

Congressional District he had hoped to represent, both point towards politicians influencing

district lines for their own political benefit. Currently, redistricting has gained renewed

prominence in the public sphere, mainly because most of the 435 Congressional Districts are

redrawn following the 2010 Census results. Additionally, redistricting is also claimed to be

the reason for the growing polarization of both parties in Congress, which, as the recent debt-

ceiling crisis has showed, has the possibility to create legislative gridlock in Washington, D.C.

Recent Supreme Court cases have contributed to the steady stream of editorial columns in

national newspapers claiming the harmful effects of districts being drawn by politicians,

while voters in some states have initiated or approved legislation that will the right of

redistricting away from the politicians and in the hands of special commissions.

Although the narrative on redistricting is controlled by those who compare the practice to

that of totalitarian regimes, a quick glance on academic research on the topic gives a more

balanced perspective on the matter. This thesis, which is rooted in the positive political theory

approach of Political Economy, will therefore question what the influence of redistricting is

on the U.S House of Representatives. Specifically, it describes and analyzes the most

4 Ibid.5

Michael P. McDonald, In Support of Redistricting Reform (Paper, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, May 8,2009), 1.6 Lizza, How Chicago Shaped Obama.


9/96

Introduction 4

influential research on this topic to figure out if the claims made in the debate surrounding

redistrictingwhich have a certain logical appealare accurate, or if they are unsupported by

facts. This also includes assumptions made on the benefits of redistricting commissions over

regular legislative redistricting, as well as on the idea that competitive elections are what

leads to better voter representation in the House.

In Chapter 1, this thesis will first delve into the discussion on redistricting by looking at

the opinion pages in newspapers, the attitudes of voters and politicians, and describing recent

progress on this issue in several Supreme Court cases. Subsequently, Chapters 2 and 3 will

rebuke claims of partisan advantages and influence of redistricting on polarization, and will

provide compelling different explanations for findings by some researchers present as the

effect of redistricting. This is followed by an exposition on the undemocratic consequences of

redistricting commissions, as well as an analysis of the results on competition and polarization

in commission drawn districts in Chapter 4. The closing chapter adds another dimension to

the discussion, pointing out that more competitionsomething which, according supporters

of redistricting reform, districts currently lack due to gerrymanderingleads to worse

representation of voters. The question of the influence of redistricting will be revisited in the

conclusion, which points out that the claims made on the issue, perpetuate by politicians,

pundits, voters and some academics, are largely exaggerated or false. If lack of adequate

representation of voters is something that needs to be solved, the public should be informed

about the benefits of uncompetitive homogenous districts, rather than trying to artificially

create competitive districts through unnecessary and undemocratic redistricting commissions.


10/96

Chapter 1: Gerrymandering as the Cause of the

Broken System

Im the majority leader, and I want more seatsTom DeLay

1

1

Adam Cohen, For Partisan Gain, Republicans Decide Rules Were Meant to Be Broken,New York Times,May 27, 2003, http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/27/opinion/editorial-observer-for-partisan-gain-republicans-

decide-rules-were-meant-be.html (accessed July 7, 2011).


11/96

Chapter 1 6

Chapter 1: Gerrymandering as the Cause of the Broken System in Washington, D.C.

In a widely discussed article published in August 2010, Vanity Fairs national editor Todd

Purdum described the current political situation in the nations capitol as follows:

The evidence that Washington cannot functionthat its broken, as Vice President

Joe Biden has saidis all around. For two years after Wall Street brought the country

close to economic collapse, regulatory reform languished in partisan gridlock. A

bipartisan commission to take on the federal deficit was scuttled by Republican fears

in Congress that it could lead to higher taxes, and by Democratic worries about cuts to

social programs. Obama was forced to create a mere advisory panel instead. Four

years after Congress nearly passed a comprehensive overhaul of immigration laws, the

two parties in Washington are farther apart than ever, and hotheaded state legislatures

have stepped into the breach.2

Purdums article is one of many recent articles, academic books, newspaper editorials and

other publications that have blamed the partisan gridlock in D.C. as preventing actual

solutions to real problems in the nation. Although the Presidents functions as the most visible

target in some of these denunciations, it is Congressthe legislative branch in Americas trias

politicathat has become what Thomas E. Mann and his colleagues at the Brookings Institute

have called the Broken Branch, noting the demise of deliberation and the rise of a

destructive form of extreme partisanship in the legislature at the center of todays problems.3

The general public is not satisfied with the continued bickering in the Capitol, recently

resulting in approval ratings of below 20 percent, the lowest ratings since Gallup began its

polling on Congress in 1974.4

The system is broken, and the people are dissatisfied with those

in charge. With a situation as described above, one would expect Congressional elections

especially in the House of Representatives with all 435 members only serve two year terms

to lead to electoral losses for both Republicans and Democrats. And while these anti-

establishment sentiments were expressed by Tea Party candidates during the 2010

Congressional election cycle, only a small number of seatsroughly 40 in 2010during each

election are close enough to be considered competitive, and incumbent reelection rates are

2Todd Purdum, Washington, We Have a Problem Vanity Fair, September 2010, http://www.vanityfair.com/

politics/feautures/2010/09/broken-washington-201009 (accessed August 17, 2010).3

Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Orstein, The Broken Branch: How Congress is Failing America and How to

Get It Back on Track(New York: Oxford University Press, 2006); Sarah A. Binder, Thomas E. Mann, and Molly

Reynolds,Mending the Broken Branch: One Year Later: In Congress Still the Broken Branch (Washington, D.C.:

Governance Studies at Brookings, 2008), 7.4 Jeffery M. Jones, Congressional Approval Back Below 20%, Gallup, March 11, 2011.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/146567/congressional-approval-back-below.aspx (accessed March 12, 2011).


12/96

Chapter 1 7

well above 90 percent. Seats are considered to be designated for one political party, and once

elected, politicians in the House of Representatives are almost certain of their reelection. The

dissatisfaction of the voters with the way Congress is doing its job and the election results are

at odds; bringing these two back in line is seen by some political pundits as the solution for

solving a host of other problems in Congress: extreme partisanship, polarization and the

legislative gridlock.

Editorials

Many newspaper columns have been devoted to what is perceived to be the root cause of

these problemsgerrymanderingand the silver bullet: redistricting reform. The claim made

is that redistricting is extremely partisan and the reason why more ideologically extreme

politician get elected to represent districts in the House. The redrawing of (congressional)

districts usually happens after the decennial Census, and in most states is in the hands of state

governments. This process lead to districts being identified as gerrymandered. The term

gerrymanderingderiving from Massachusetts Governor Gerry, who in 1812 approved a

redistricting plan which created a salamander shaped district to benefit his own political

partyshows that this is an old political practice. However, several changes have occurred in

the past few decades that are believed to have made the practice both more pronounced and

successful. Therefore, while the 2010 Republican takeover of the House made the most

headlines, some political analysts believe the GOPs victory in many state legislature and

gubernatorial races could provide a more lasting impact. As one analyst states, the

Republicans have gained control over congressional redistrictingby way of holding the

governorship and the full legislaturein 10 more states, giving them power over 18 states

containing 202 districts. Democrats are fully in charge of the process in only six states with a

total of 47 House seats.5

For years, editorials in national newspapers and weeklies have

argued that [b]oth parties have succeeded in drawing district lines in ways that cement their

power by eliminating contested elections.6

As a result of limited interparty competition, the

created [s]afe districts tend to drive candidates to the extremes, since their biggest worries

come from primary challengers, not the general elections.7

The turnout in primaries is tiny

[] and tends to be disproportionately composed of activists who are politically slanted to

the left or the right extremes leading to politicians getting the nomination who have more

5

Bob Beneson, In Remapping, No Guarantees, CQ Weekly, March 7, 2011, 518.6 Elections With No Meaning,New York Times, February 21, 2004, sec. A.7 Gridlock in the Forecast, Washington Post, August 18, 2008, sec. A.


13/96

Chapter 1 8

extreme political views as well.8

[A] fact that has lead to greater polarization in the conduct

of the House.9

Although the term and practice of gerrymandering is not new, [p]arty

operatives now use powerful computers to draw lines that guarantee their party as many seats

as possible.10

Until the 1990s, legislators had to draw districts using coloured pens on

acetate sheets spread out on big maps on the floor, but now [n]ew geographic information

systems for mapping and analyzing demographic data cost only a few thousand dollars, work

on ordinary Windows operating systems, and can draw up partisan maps automatically.11

Not only are political parties better able to draw districts to create as many additional seats

as possible, incumbents districts are also reshaped to decrease competition in their districts,

leading to incumbents who worry more about their extreme flanks than about the center,

while redistricting at the same time erodes political accountability for the extreme policies

approved by the incumbent to cater to the party fringe.12

Not only does this lead to bad

representation, but disgruntled voters also have to pay the bill in the form of higher taxes,

because by reducing the fear of being defeated at the polls, gerrymandering increases the

likelihood that members will vote for more and more spendingand eventually, theyll have

to vote for the higher and higher taxes to pay for that spending.13

When the turnover in the

United States House of Representatives is lower than it was in the Soviet Politburo,14

according to these editorials and newspaper articles, Congressional elections can better be

compared to the Iraqi election in 2002, when Saddam Hussein claimed 100 percent of the

vote for his re-election than those of a true democracy.15

Supreme Court Cases

These grave analyses of the current state of the American political system were partly

fuelled by two recent highly publicized cases of apparent gerrymandering; one in

Pennsylvania in and one in Texas. In Pennsylvania, Republicans controlled both chambers of

the state legislature, as well as the governors mansion, at the moment the results of the 2000

8Time to Bury Governor Gerry,Economist, September 10, 2010, http://www.economist.com/node/17202149/

(accessed March 29, 2011).9 Dan Balz, Partisan Polarization Intensified in 2004 Election; Only 59 of the Nations 435 Congressional

Districts Split Their Vote for President and House, Washington Post, March 29, 2005, sec. A.10 Ending the GerrymanderWars,New York Times, May 30, 3005, sec. A.11 How to Rig an Election,Economist, April 27, 2002, 29.12

A Model of Reform, Washington Post, January 19, 2005, sec. A.13 Bill Pascoe, Reinventing Conservatism: Eradicate the Gerrymander, Washington Times, January 6, 2010,

sec. A.14

Adam Nagourney, States See Growing Campaign for New Redistricting Laws,New York Times, February 7,2005, sec. A.15 Elections With No Meaning,New York Times.


14/96

Chapter 1 9

Census were reported. While a majority of the states voters are registered Democrats the

map the Republican state government drew produced a Congressional delegation of 12

Republicans and 7 Democrats.16

When the Census results became available for Texas, the

state had a divided state government, with both the Republicans and Democrats controlling

one legislative chamber, preventing either party of adopting a partisan redistricting plan. In

2003, however, the Republicans gained control over the Texas State House, and while mid-

decade redistricting is uncommon, adopted a plan that redistricted districts so that Republican

controlled nearly two-thirds of the states Congressional delegation.17

As both maps were to

the disadvantage of the Democratic Party, it sued its way up to the Supreme Court, which in

previous cases had dealt with redistricting issues.

Until the groundbreaking 1962 one person, one vote ruling, the Supreme Court viewed

redistricting questions to be in the political thicket. InBaker v. Carrthe Justices decided that

(congressional) districts had to be redistricted following the decennial Census in order to

compensate for demographical changes within the districts. All districts within a state had to

be redrawn in order to have an almost equal number of inhabitants, which some states had

neglected to do for decades. Prior to this ruling, rural voters were overrepresented and urban

voters underrepresented in the House because of years of strong urbanization. After one

person, one vote, districts had to adhere to strict rules with only a small deviation in the

number of inhabitants, as counted by the Census, allowed. In the first few decades following

Bakerredistricting cases mostly dealt with minority representation and state obligations under

the Voting Rights Act of 1965. During the late 1980s also disputes concerning partisan

redistricting were also reviewed by the Court. In the 1986 case Davis v. Bandemer, the

Supreme Court ruled that partisan gerrymandering claims ought to be considered

justiciablemeaning that they were outside of the political question doctrine and that they

therefore could be brought to the attention on the Court.18

In nearly two decades following

this decision, however, there were virtually no successful claims in the lower courts, in part

because the standard announced by a plurality of Justices in Bandemer was apparently

impossible to meet.19

In 2003 Vieth v. Jubelirer, a case dealing with the 2001 Pennsylvania

redistricting plan, was the first high profile case on gerrymandering to reach the Court after

Bandemer. The subsequent 2004 ruling, however, did not provide a clear answer to the

16 Democracy Takes a Hit,New York Times, April 29, 2004, sec. A17 A Loss for Competitive Elections,New York Times, June 29, 2006, sec. A.18

Davis v. Bandemer, 478 U.S. 109 (1986).19 Richard L. Hasen, Looking for Standards (in All the Wrong Places): Partisan Gerrymandering Claims after

Vieth,Election Law Journal: Rules Politics, and Policy 3, no.4 (2004): 626, doi:10.1089/elj.2004.3.626.


15/96

Chapter 1 10

problems at hand. Of the nine Justices, four retracted the decision made inDavis v. Bandemer

in their plurality opinion, and argued that partisan gerrymandering should not be considered

justiciable, because there was no workable test for judging partisan gerrymandering.20

In the years since their 1986 ruling no workable test had been created by the lower courts,

and these four judges therefore questioned if a test distinguishing between normal

redistricting and partisan gerrymandering could ever be created. They concluded that it was

not for the courts to say when a violation has occurred, and to design a remedy for partisan

gerrymandering.21

The three dissenting opinionswritten or joined by four judgesto this

ruling proved the plurality right, because each adopted a different standard to test whether a

gerrymander had occurred. This four-four split in the Court created a pivotal position for the

Justice Kennedy to decide this case. His concurrent opinion joined the plurality opinion in

their statement that up to this point no standard had been provided that would create a

manageable and justifiable way of ruling on partisan gerrymanders. By arguing that[by] the

timeline of the law 18 years [sinceBandemer] is rather a short period, he disagreed with the

other four on the point that since such a test hand not been found yet, it would never be

found.22

However, since no workable standard had been provided by the plaintiffs, he joined

the plurality in dismissing this case concerning the Pennsylvania redistricting. The

opportunity to present a new manageable standard to the court came in 2006 with LULAC v.

Perry, which concerned the Texas mid-decade redistricting. Again, no agreed upon standard

could be adopted by the Court. It furthermore rejected the idea that a mid-decade re-

redistricting is inherently unconstitutional and that redistricting done for no motive other

than partisan gain is inherently unconstitutional.23

The dismissal in both cases of a partisan gerrymander on the basis of the absence of a test,

generated critique on the Courts actions. One editorial published after theLULACruling notes

that in previous cases [t]he court has proved itself capable of thinking up elaborate tests

when it wants toit has made up standards virtually out of whole cloth but is not a

resourceful when in comes to protecting voters rights.24

While the lack of an agreed upon

standard might lead to the conclusion that the Supreme Court is unwilling to act in these cases,

the fact that those Justices in favor of judicial action could not agree on a single

20 Ibid., 629.21

Ibid., 630.22 Ibid., 632.23 Bernard Grofman and Gary King, The Future of Partisan Symmetry as a Judicial Test for Partisan

Gerrymandering afterLULAC v. Perry,Election Law Journal: Rules, Politics, and Policy 6, no. 1 (2007): 3,doi:10.1089/elj.2006.6002.24 A Loss for Competititve Elections,New York Times.


16/96

Chapter 1 11

gerrymandering test is also significant. While the redistricting practices in Texas and

Pennsylvania seemed to be clear-cut partisan efforts, no test could distinguish between these

types of redistricting and normal deviations within a redistricting process in a winner-takes-all

system.25

The U.S. Constitution does not guarantee proportional representation, and even

without the possible influence of partisan gerrymandering, the current system leads to

variations between the popular vote within a state, and the eventual distribution of House

seats. The fact that there is no single tests that can clearly distinguish between a partisan

gerrymander and normal redistricting, suggest that the difference itself is not as big as the

narrative on gerrymandering portrays it to be. Either way, under the current conditions the

Supreme Court will not likely strike down any plan on the basis of alleged partisan

gerrymandering.

Politicians

However, the Court, in its Vieth plurality verdict, notes another and perhaps more apt

approach to curbing the perceived disturbing effect of partisan redistricting by noting that [i]t

is significant that the Framers provided a remedy for such practices in the Constitution.

Article I, 4, while leaving in state legislatures the initial power to draw districts for federal

elections, permitted Congress to make or alter those districts if it wished.26

Just as the

newspaper editorials, politicians are also convinced of the deteriorating effect of redistricting

in the hands of state governments. Then Senator Barack Obama claimed that political

gerrymandering has led to a generation of politicians who come from safe districts where they

don't have to consider the other side of the debate, which has made compromiseand

therefore legislative progressmore difficult.27

Former House Speaker and current

presidential candidate Newt Gingrich stated that Democrats get to rip off the public in the

states where they control and protect their incumbents, and we [Republicans] get to rip off the

public in states we control and protect our incumbents, so the public gets ripped off in both

circumstances.28

And while, as Justice Scalia notes in the plurality opinion of Vieth v.

Jubelirer, [t]he power bestowed on Congress to regulate elections, and in particular to

25 See Grofman and King, The Future of Partisan Symetry, for the various tests which failed to succeed in both

SCOTUS cases.26Vieth v. Jubelirer, 541 U. S. 267 (2004), 275.27 Joe Klein, The Fresh Face, Time, October 15, 2006, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/

article/0,9171,1546362,00.html (accessed May 24, 2011).28 Juliet Eilperin, The Gerrymander That Ate America, Slate Magazine, April 17, 2006,

http://www.slate.com/id/2140054/ (accessed April 14, 2011).


17/96

Chapter 1 12

restrain the practice of political gerrymandering, has not lain dormant29

referring to several

acts approved by Congress at the end of the 19th

and the beginning of the 20th

century to

curtail gerrymandering practicesin recent decades Congress has hardly even considered

legislation to set national standards for redistricting.30

Currently the only congressional

regulation with regards to redistricting put in place is based on a 1967 act which prevents

states from disregarding districts all together by letting members be elected through statewide

elections.31

This is not to say that no one in Congress is drafting legislation to alter the

current redistricting process; in the past forty years bills ranging from the prohibition of more

than a once a decade redrawing of district lines (H.R. 14998 in 1976), to those that would

require states to redistrict through independent commissions (H.R. 590 in 2011) have been

drafted. However, none of those bills got any further in the legislative process than being

introduced on the House or Senate floor. This is understandable, because those who think they

benefit most from the current partisan system will not approve a bill that could well be

damaging to their political future. This has prevented national redistricting standards to be

adopted, leaving concerned voters to take matters into their own hands, demanding changes to

the redistricting process through statewide ballot measures.

Voters Demand Reforms

These voter initiatives usually demand the creation of some form of nonpartisan

redistricting committees, which they belief would lead to better representation by enhancing

competition and decreasing incumbent reelection. For example, Californias Proposition 20,

which turned the redistricting process of Congressional Districts over to a Citizens

Redistricting Committee, was approved by the voters in 2010, just in time for the new round

of redistricting following the 2010 Census. Arizona, Hawaii, Indiana, Iowa, Maine, New

Jersey and Washington also have commissions composed of voters, (former) justices or equal

partisan representatives in place which redraw the district lines. However, it took California

voters several unsuccessful attempts before getting such a commission approved. Given the

cost of ballot measures, especially when they are not backed by either political party, similar

initiatives in other states might take years before they get approved. Supporters justify this

effort by the claiming the representational improvements following redistricting commissions.

29Vieth v. Jubelirer, 27630Redistricting Legislation in the U.S. Congress, (Maryland: FairVote, January 2004)

http://archive.fairvote.org/redistricting/congress.htm.31 Congressional Research Service, Congressional Redistricting: Is At-Large Representation Permitted in the

House of Representatives? (Washington, DC: CRS, 2003), 2.


18/96

Chapter 1 13

Conclusion

While the media, politicians and voters see redistricting done by politicians as the source

of why Washington is broken, the fact that the Supreme Court is unable to settle on a single

test that would distinguish partisan gerrymandering from regular redistricting, begs the

question if the current situation does undermine the democratic election process, and if

nonpartisan redistricting commissions would necessarily be a fairer way to redraw district

lines. Although in the case of Pennsylvania district boundaries appeared to give Republicans

an unjustified advantage, under the same district lines, Republicans went from a 12-7 edge

after the 2002 elections to a 12-7 deficit after the 2008 elections.32

In addition, the fact that

the Texas redistricting plan was approved by a special commission composed of three judges,

shows that voters demands for nonpartisan commissions do not necessarily lead to different

results than the current system. Both cases received a lot of attention because they appeared to

show the most brazen cases of partisan gerrymandering, resulting in the conclusion that

redistricting in the other 48 states did not lead to situations that appeared to be as grave as in

these two states. Furthermore, the redistricting of the Massachusetts map which led to the

coinage of the term gerrymandering, eventually failed in creating political benefits for

Governor Gerry.33

These facts contradict the claims made on the influence of redistricting. Therefore, the

following chapters will address if dominant description of redistrictingand the lack of

competition it is claimed to causeas a root cause of the problems in Washington, D.C., is

supported by academic research. Chapter 1 will address the benefits parties in control of the

redistricting process are alleged to have.

32

Beneson, In Remapping, No Guarantees, 520.33 Mark E. Rush, Gerrymandering: Out of the Political Thicket and Into the Quagmire,PS: Political Science

and Politics 27, no. 4 (1994): 682, http://www.jstor.org/stable/420367.


19/96

Chapter 2: Effect of Partisan Redistricting

on Elections in Congressional Districts

If competitive elections matterand to much of theworld they are what America stands forthen

redistricting also matters.

Representatives Earl Blumenauer and Jim Leach1

1 Earl Blumenauer and Jim Leach, Redistricting, a Bipartisan Sport,New York Times, July 8,

2003, sec. A.


20/96

Chapter 2 15

Chapter 2: Effect of Partisan Redistricting on Elections in Congressional Districts

Some of the common assumptions underlying the public debate on redistricting may, in fact,

be wrong. Proponents of the partisan redistricting narrative, as shown in the previous chapter,

believe that both the creation of additional partisan districts, as well as incumbency protection

are beneficial factors of controlling the redistrict process. On the one hand parties can redraw

district boundaries with representatives from the opposing party, creating additional districts

where their own candidate can win. On the other hand they can also strengthen the position of

their own incumbents by adding party voters to his or her district, creating what is known as a

safe seat. As the redistricting process usually only takes place once every decade, partisan

benefits created for districts are thought to have long lasting effect on outcome of elections.

However, creating additional districts and incumbent safety are two conflicting gains, as

shown in Figure 1. Increasing the safety of districts for a partywhen a party is sure to get at

least 80 percent of the votemeans placing more of party voters in into a select number or

districts, point A in Figure 1. This means that the total number of districts where this party has

the majority of votes decreases. However, increasing the number of additional districts where

a party will win the election (perhaps with just 51 percent of the vote) results in spreading the

limited number of party supporters amongst several districts, point B, reducing the safety of

these districts. Due to the limited number of party supporters, it is impossible to increase the

safety of districts while at the same time also winning additional districts. Furthermore, these

two assumed benefits from controlling the redistricting process also reveal conflicting

interests between the party leadership and its incumbents. Whereas a political party wants to

increase the total amount of seats, incumbents like to increase their chance of getting reelected.

Thus it is possible that the party leadership, in order to gain a higher seat advantage through

redistricting, wants to turn safe seats into competitive districts. The risk, however, of

spreading supporters too thin as to be beneficial to the opposing party, as well as incumbent

demands, will often prevent this from happening.2

A partisan redistricting plan therefore often

reflects a tradeoff between these two demands.

2 J. David Gopoian and Darrell M. West,Trading Security for Seats: Strategic Considerations

in the Redistricting Process. Journal of Politics 46 (1984): 1080, doi:10.2307/2131243.


21/96

Chapter 2 16

Figure 1: Tradeoff Between Additional Seats

and Safety of Seats

This tradeoff works differently in the case of bipartisan redistricting plans, which have

become more common due to the increase in divided state governments. In most states,

control of both state legislative chambers as well as the governors mansion is needed in order

to approve a partisan redistricting plan. While it is not uncommon for one party to control all

three at the same time, the occurrence or dividedor split state governments has increased

since the 1960s up to the situation from the mid 1980s onwards where the majority of states

has a divided state government in place.3

In this situation, a partisan redistricting plan

favoring one political party will undoubtedly be either not approved by at least one of the

state legislative chambers, or vetoed by the opposing partys governor. In this situation,

according to those supporting the idea that redistricting is a destructive force, both parties

agree to only increase the safety of the states incumbents, regardless of their political

affiliation, and not try to draw districts lines unfavorably to each other.

Figure 2: Partisan State Governments

0

10

20

30

40

1960

1970

1980

1990

2000

Year

Totalnumbe

rof

states Democratic State

Government

Republican StateGovernment

Divided StateGovernment

3 Morris P. Fiorina, An Era of Divided Government, Political Science Quarterly 107, no.3

(1992): 388. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2152437.


22/96

Chapter 2 17

Measuring effects

Having established that there are two possible benefits to controlling the redistricting

processadding additional seats and creating safe seatsshowing the impact of redrawing

CDs becomes essential. While the idea that controlling the redistricting process will influence

elections sounds convincing, conclusively showing the existence of an effect proves to be

more difficult. Not only can the use of different datasets distort the final results, researchers

have also devised different methods of interpreting their data. Whereas some research focuses

on the seats-to-votes ratio as an indication of partisan redistricting, others look at the number

of competitive seats or incumbency displacement. Comparing their results is additionally

challenging due to the two conflicting objectives of a possible gerrymander, which are often

incompatible to evaluate at the same time. This section will therefore analyze several ways in

which researcher have tried to measure the influence of partisan redistricting.

Additional districts

While there are several ways to measure the effect of partisan redistricting on the creation

of additional seats, one method that sticks out in both its effectiveness and

straightforwardness, is Abramowitz 1983 method of measuring the before and after

redistricting swing ratio in Democratic, Republican and dividedly controlled states.4

The

swing ratio, or seat-to-vote ratio, measured between a pre-redistricted and post-redistricted

election, reflects whether a party was successful in creating districts where a small increase in

the percentage of votes resulted in a much larger increase in the percentage of seats. It

assumes that parties with full control over the redistricting process will use this control to

establish this situation. In its most basic form the swing ratio is the change in the percentage

of seats held by one party in two successive elections divided by the change in the percentage

of votes over the same period or, in equation form, (%seatst2%seatst1) / (%votest2

%votest1).5 A swing ratio of 1 indicates that a party gained the same percentage of additional

seats as the higher percentage of the vote it received on election day. A higher swing ratio, for

instance 5.0, means a party was able to get a larger increase in the share of seats, in this

example 10 percent, than justified on the basis of a smaller increase in votes, here 2 percent.

Abramowitz compared the 1980 and 1982 election results for the Democrats, and found that

while the national swing ratio in 1982 was 6.0 / 4.0 or 1.33 the swing ratio was much

4 Alan I. Abramowitz, Partisan Redistricting and the 1982 Congressional Elections,Journal

of Politics 45 (1983): 767. doi:10.2307/2130716.5 Richard G. Niemi, and Patrick Fett, The Swing Ratio: An Explanation and an Assessment,

Legislative Studies Quarterly 11, no. 1 (1986): 77, http://www.jstor.org/stable/439910.


23/96

Chapter 2 18

larger [] in the seventeen states in which the Democratic Party had complete control of

redistricting.6

Table 1 shows that for every percentage Democrats gained in Democratic

controlled states, they received an additional 3.2 percent of seats. In states with Republican or

divided control, Abramowitz found swing ratios close to 1, meaning that an increase in the

Democratic vote there was reflected by a similar increase in Democratic seats.

Table 1: Party Control of State Government and the Results of the 1982 Congressional Elections

Republican

control

Divided

control

Democratic

control

Change in avg.% Dem. vote 1,9 4,7 2,2

Change in % Dem. seats 2,0 5,2 7,1

Swing ratio 1,1 1,1 3,2

Number of states 5 22 17

Number of seats in these states in 1980 52 215 161


The methods simplicity, directness and concreteness led other researchers to duplicate

Abramowitz method to measure the 1970-1972 Congressional redistricting effect, while at the

same time adapting the process slightly.7

Whereas Abramowitz had used state level

aggregated election results to determine the increase in percentage of Democratic voters,

Niemi and Winsky used district level results to better account for statistical anomalies such as

uncontested seats.8

Although Democrats lost votes and seats during the 1972 congressional

elections, the swing ratios in between these two elections still clearly reflect a partisan

advantage in controlling the state government. In Republican controlled states, Democrats lost

1.7 percent in votes, but almost 5 percent in seats, resulting in a swing ratio of 2.9. While

Democrats did far worse in states controlled by Democrats, loosing 5.5 percent of the vote,

partisan redistricting prevented substantial losses and resulted in a 0.3 swing ratio.


Republican

control

Divided

control

Democratic

controlChange in avg.% Dem. vote -1,7 -1,8 -5,5

Change in % Dem. seats -4,9 -2,8 -1,9

Swing ratio 2,9 1,6 0,3




6 Abramowitz, Partisan Redistricting, 769-70.7 Richard G. Niemi and Laura R. Winsky, The Persistence of Partisan Redistricting Effects in

Congressional Elections in the 1970s and 1980s.Journal of Politics 54, no. 2 (1992): 565-572.doi:10.2307/2132040, 565.8 See footnote 3, 567 in Niemi and Winksy (1992) for full explanation.


24/96

Chapter 2 19

While both the results for the 1970s and 1980s redistricting provided support for the idea

that controlling the redistricting process resulted in beneficial results in the following

elections, Niemi and Abramowitz had less success in proving the same after the 1990s

redistricting. While they had expected that mapmakers [had become] more skilled at partisan

line-drawing and therefore that their previous results would be confirmed or even surpassed,

the results from the 1990s indicate that, on average, partisan control of state government did

little or nothing to enhance partisan gains from redistricting.9

Since Republicans controlled

only two states 1992, with no changes in the number of seats, states controlled by Democrats

are left to show possible partisan advantages. However, as Table 3 shows, in states the

Democrats controlled, the GOP gained 1,86 percent more seats per percentage win of votes.

This means a reverse effect of controlling the state government on the election results

harming instead of beneficial to a party. The authors give two possible reasons for the fact

that gerrymandering did not seem to have an effect in the 1992 congressional elections. On

the one hand it could be that Republican state legislatures in Democratic controlled states

actively fought against Democratic redistricting plans, although they were in the minority. On

the other hand, the 1986 Davis v. Bandemer Supreme Court verdict made gerrymandering

justiciablemeaning that legal complaints raised on partisan redistricting had standing in

courtcould have restrained state legislatures in drafting district lines predominantly

beneficial to one political party.


Republican

control

Divided

control

Democratic

control

Change in avg.% Rep. vote 2,49 1,62 1,95

Change in % Rep. seats 0,00 1,55 3,63

Swing ratio 0,00 0,96 1,86




Extending the research to the new millennium in Table 4, the redistricting advantage

becomes apparent again, especially in Democratic controlled states where Republicans gained

more than 2 percent in votes, but lost almost 4 percent in seats. Both under Republican and

divided control, however, the swing ratio was almost 1, resulting in a high level of

responsiveness to the election outcome, but low indication of partisan gerrymandering.

9 Richard G. Niemi and Alan I. Abramowitz, Partisan Redistricting and the 1992

Congressional Elections,Journal of Politics 56, no. 3 (1994): 815, doi:10.2307/2132195.


25/96

Chapter 2 20


Republicancontrol

Dividedcontrol

Democraticcontrol

Change in avg.% Rep. vote 4,15 2,17 2,17

Change in % Rep. seats 5,32 1,79 -3,93

Swing ratio 1,28 0,83 -1,81Number of states 8 27 8



When comparing the votes-seats relationship in all four elections, the overall low swing

ratio is often quite low, especially during the 1992 and 2002 elections. Furthermore, it varies

less in states that are not controlled by either party. This could lend support to the theoretical

trade-off between security and seats which forms the basis of the hypothesis of bipartisan

gerrymandering, although this would be circumstantial as the swing ratio in dividedly

governed states often is close to 1, the number reflecting no influence of redistricting at all.

By and large however, the fact that the swing ratio does not indicate huge benefits of partisan

control of the state government, or even a reversed effect on the swing ratio in 1992,

undermines the narrative often portrayed about the large impact of gerrymandering.

There are some additional questions that can be raised on measuring the impact of partisan

redistricting by using the swing ratio. As is true in the results for 1972 and 1992, the most

significant swing ratio is based on only a small number of states, which does make itsusceptible to small anomalies within the data. Furthermore, the test does not take into regard

those states that had commission or court ordered redistricting plans. Their removal from the

measurements might produce a more explicit effect of partisan control of state governments.10

Campagna and Grofman take opposition with what they see as Abramowitz doubly flawed

methodology by mixing responsivenessare votes reflected by seat returnswith biasis

the system biased towards one party, as well as using the swing ratio as a measurement all

together.11

Although their objections on the former is a definitional matter on which there is

no consensus, their objections with regards to using the swing ratio have been widely

accepted.12

In an article exclusively dealing with the swing ratio, Niemi and Fett argue against

using what they call historical swing ratiohistorical meaning based on historic election

resultsstating that [e]ven when the focus is on a single pair of years, as in Abramowitz

10 Janet Campagna and Bernard Grofman, Party Control and Partisan Bias in 1980s

Congressional Redistricting,Journal of Politics 52, no. 4 (1990): 1243, doi:10.2307/2131690.11 Ibid.,1244.12 Niemi and Winsky, The Persistence of Partisan Redistricting, Footnote 2, 566.


26/96

Chapter 2 21

(1983), its extreme sensitivity to small changes in input makes its use questionable.13

Had

Abramowitz method resulted in a more obvious result pointing towards a large benefit in

increasing the number of districts for a party controlling the redistricting process, these

objections would have been futile. That this is not the case tells more about the actual impact

of gerrymandering than about the method itself.

Competitive Districts

Besides to looking at the swing ratio, there are other measurements that could indicate the

influence of gerrymandering, for instance the competitiveness of districts. There are different

interpretations as to why redistricting would affect competitiveness. On the one hand, with

partisan gerrymandering plans, a party could create additional safe district in which they face

little to no opposition by packing as many of the opposing party supporters in as few as

possible districts.14

It could also split opposing party voters of one competitive district, and

divide them evenly amongst several safe districts, increasing the competition in those districts

slightly, but not enough to make them into competitive districts, and thus increasing the total

number of noncompetitive districts (a process that is know as cracking).15

With bipartisan

redistricting plans, both parties could agree to protect the incumbents and draft districts where

they would not face opposition from opposing parties. In both situations the number of

competitive districts would decline, while the number of safe and unopposed districts would

increase in the election following redistricting.

In a hypothetical state with 200 Republican (red) and 100 Democratic (blue) voters with 6

Congressional Districts, each district would be composed of 50 voters. In the most

competitive plan, as is shown in Figure 3, this would create four competitive districts, where

both parties have an equal change of winning, and creating two districts with a Republican

majority. If a Republican gerrymandering plan would be enforced, however, they could adopt

a plan in which the Democratic voters would be divided amongst six districts. In each one of

these districts, however, Republican voters are in the majority, resulting in six Republican

representatives. Figure 5 reflects another possibility in the case of a partisan or bipartisan

redistricting plan. Both supporter groups are packed into their own districts, leading to no

competitive districts, but with two Democratic, and four Republican representatives.

13 Niemi and Fett, The Swing Ratio, 78.14 Michael Cooper, 5 Ways to Tilt an Election,New York Times, September 25, 2010,

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/weekinreview/20100925-redistricting-graphic.pdf (accessed January12, 2011).15 Ibid.


27/96

Chapter 2 22

Figure 3: Most competitive Figure 4: Cracking Figure 5: Packing

A decrease in the number of competitive districts was noticed early on after the 1962

Supreme Court ruling mandating states to redistrict. In 1973, Tufte noticed that the percentage

of districts in which the victory margin was less than 5% percent, declined from 22 percent in

1958 to only 13 percent in 1970.16

Seats in the U.S. Senate, where redistricting could not

influence the number of competitive districts, had roughly the same percentage of marginal

victories between in this period. Tufte concluded that a major element in the job security of

incumbents is their ability to exert significant control over the drawing of district

boundaries.17

Also more contemporary research notes the impact of redistricting on the

number of competitive districts. Fiorina et al. points towards a remarkable situation:

[A]s elections have gotten closer in the aggregate, the number of competitive

elections have declined. In 2000, when the presidential race was a cliff-hanger, only

seventy-four of the 435 House seats were won by margins of less than 55 percent. In

2002, following the decennial reapportionment and redistricting cycle, the number of

such competitive districts fell to forty-seven.18

According to Fiorina et al. this was the result of a bipartisan gerrymander that left almost 90

percent of U.S. House seats safely in the hands of one or the other of the two parties, despite

the close division of the aggregate vote.19

Just as was the case with measuring the swing ratio, the analysis depends on how the data

is interpreted, and, as McDonald shows, also on the decision which dataset to use. McDonald

compared before and after redistricting levels of competitiveness using three different data

sets and two brackets of competitivenessone with districts within the 45-55% election

results, and one with an even stricter measure of 48-52% resulting in a maximum of a 4

16Edward R. Tufte, The Relationship between Seats and Votes in Two-Party Systems,

American Political Science Review 67, no. 2 (1973): 550, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1958782.17 Ibid., 551.18

Morris P. Fiorina, Samuel J. Abrams, and Jeremy C. Pope. Culture War? The Myth of aPolarized America. (New York: Longman, 2004), 108.19 Ibid., 109.


28/96

Chapter 2 23

percent victory margin.20

Although Table 5 shows that not all operationalisations show a

decrease in the number of competitive districts in both brackets during all three redistricting

cycles, in general redistricting seems to have resulted in a decline in the number of

competitive districts.

Table 5: Number of Competitive Districts, 1980-2002

While the numbers both Tufte and McDonald point towards a decrease in the number of

competitive districts due to redistricting, others have found evidence confirming a decline in

competitive districts, but suggests that this is not due to redistricting. In a rebuttal to Tuftes

findings, John A. Ferejohn suggests that in order for gerrymandering to have an influence on

the decline of competitiveness of districts, one must see a difference between districts that

have been redistricted, and those that have not.21

While he also finds that the percentage of

competitive districts drops after being redistricted, almost the same drop can be measured for

districts that had not been redistricted between 1962 and 1970. As the decline occurred in

unredistricted areas as well, this suggest[s] that redistricting has no influence at all on the

number of competitive districts.22

This analysis is furthermore supported by more

contemporary research by Abramowitz, Alexander and Gunning. A visualization of the

changes between the number of competitive seats before and after redistricting, as shown in

Figure 6, does seem to confirm McDonalds numbers, but also shows that [t]he most

significant changes in the competitiveness of House districts occurred between redistricting

20 Michael P. McDonald, Drawing the Line on District Competition, PS: Political Science and

Politics 39, no. 1 (2006): 92, doi:10.1017/S1049096506060161.21

John A. Ferejohn, On the Decline of Competition in Congressional Elections,AmericanPolitical Science Review 71, no. 1 (1977): 168, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1956960.22 Ibid.


29/96

Chapter 2 24

cycles.23

For instance, the number of competitive districts declined with 34 from 1992 to

2000.24

Both Ferejohn and Abramowitz et al. show that redistricting can not be blamed for the

decrease in competitive districts, as it also happens in unredistricted areas, as well as between

rather than during redistrict cycles.

Figure 6: Number of Competitive Districts Before

and After Redistricting, 1980-2002.

Incumbency

Part of the influence of the redistricting narrative as portrayed in the media, is the

incumbency protection it would provide both in partisan but even more so in bipartisan

redistricting plans. Since bipartisan redistricting has become more common due to the

increase in states with split governments (figure 2), recent redistricting cycles should have

been good times for incumbent House members. With reelection rates having increased since

the 1960s to sometimes more than 95 percent, the data seem to support this effect of partisan

redistricting. Lyons and Galderisi, in their 1995 article on the partisan redrawing of

Congressional Districts lines in the 1990-92 redistricting cycle, measured the incumbent

displacementthose candidates who were not reelected as representativesunder partisan

and bipartisan redistricting plans.25

Although they expected incumbency protection to be part

of a partisan redistricting plan, they believed the creation of additional partisan districts (as

shown in figure 4) would be at the forefront in those plans. This might have an adverse affect

23 Alan I. Abramowitz, Brad Alexander, and Matthew Gunning, Incumbency, Redistricting,

and the Decline of Competition in U.S. House Elections,Journal of Politics 68, no. 1 (2006): 79,

doi:10.1111/j.1468-2508.2006.00371.x.24 Ibid., Don't Blame Redistricting for Uncompetitive Elections. PS: Political Science and Politics 39, no. 1

(2006): 88, doi:10.1017/S1049096506060185.25 Michael Lyons and Peter F. Galderisi, Incumbency, Reapportionment, and U.S. House

Redistricting, Political Research Quarterly 48, no. 4 (1995): 850, http://www.jstor.org/stable/448978.


30/96

Chapter 2 25

on incumbency reelection. On the other hand, with bipartisan redistricting plans, incumbency

protection might be the only benefit both parties can gain, so the authors expect less

incumbent displacement in those states. During reapportionment process some states gain

while other states loose CDs. Since this might affect the focus of the redistricting planwhen

seats are lost more attention is paid towards retaining the partys incumbentsthis too is part

of the research. As shown in table 6, incumbent displacement was at its lowest in states which

held the same number of seats before and after reapportionment, and were redistricted in a

bipartisan fashion. This outcome supports the idea that incumbents receive most protection

from bipartisan redistricting plans if the political landscape is not in turmoil. The variations

between partisan and bipartisan plans in other categories, however, do not always appear to

support general ideas about which type of plan would be favorable towards incumbents. For

instance, in states losing seats, incumbents are better of with partisan instead of bipartisan

redistricting plans. However, from these numbers Lyons and Galderisi concluded that

incumbents do seem to benefit from partisan redistricting.

Table 6: Incumbent Displacement in 1992 by Type of Plan

This result is remarkable, because research in decade following the 1962 Supreme Court

decision regarding redistricting focused on an averse affect of redistricting on incumbency

reelection. As Charles S. Bullock notes in his 1975 research on this topic, redistricting had

the potential of introducing uncertainty into all multi-member congressional delegations.26

While he finds no support for higher incumbency defeat or even more retirements due to

redistricting, other research does support the idea that redistricting does not have a positive,

but rather a negative effect on incumbency reelection. For instance Friedman and Holdens

article discussing the rise in incumbency shows that redistricting since the 1970s resulted in

26 Charles S. Bullock, Redistricting and Congressional Stability, 1962-72,Journal of Politics 37, no. 2 (1975):

569, doi:10.2307/2129009.


31/96

Chapter 2 26

almost 7.6% less reelection success for incumbents in the 2000s.27

Although their specific

model prevents easy comparison with other research, the basis of their method is similar to

other arguments against an effect of redistricting on incumbency reelection. Since

redistricting usually only happens after the Census, its effect on incumbency would be easily

identified as a once a decade impact. Measuring the direct consequence or redrawing district

lines, they conclude that its disruptive nature has negative implications for incumbents. While

models as this one measure the impact of partisan redistricting through a regression analysis

hard to explain in laymens terms, there is other research available that is easier to grasp,

while at the same time more effective in rebutting the idea that incumbents would benefit

from bipartisan redistricting. The increase in incumbency reelection is not limited to the U.S.

House of Representatives, where redistricting could have had an effect, but an increase of

roughly the same degree is also measured for incumbents in the U.S. Senate and all statewide

offices in the United States. Such a striking, common trend suggests that there is likely a

common cause, which could impossibly be redistricting as senators and statewide offices get

elected on the basis of statewide districts which are not redrawn every decade.28

While Lyons

and Galderisi provide compelling evidence that suggests incumbents have a higher reelection

rate under (bi)partisan redistricting plans than those under nonpartisan plans, other research

shows that incumbency is negatively affected by redistricting. Although these two outcomes

are incompatible, the general increase in incumbent reelection rate sine the 1960s amongst

both redistricted and statewide political offices suggests that if redrawing district lines has an

influence, this is extremely limited. This does not support the narrative which suggests that

partisan redistricting provided increased incumbency protection.

Conclusion

Combining the results of the several measurements does not result in the kind of clear

conclusion expected from the elegant narrative describing the effects of redistricting.

Although there are decades in which research shows modest support for the idea that partisan

governments are able to redistrict in ways that result in a larger increase in seats than in votes,

the method showing this effect is not without flaws and does not provide convincing results

for all redistricting cycles. Furthermore, although at first sight the numbers seem to suggest a

27 John N. Friedman and Richard T. Holden, The Rising Incumbent Reelection Rate: Whats Gerrymandering

Got to Do With It?,Journal of Politics 71, no. 2 (2009): 602, doi:10.1017/S0022381609090483.28

Stephen Ansolabehere and James M. Snyder, Jr., The Incumbency Advantage in U.S.Elections: An Analysis of State and Federal Offices, 19422000,Election Law Journal: Rules, Politics, and

Policy 1, no. 3 (2002): 319, doi:10.1089/153312902760137578.


32/96

Chapter 2 27

decline in competitive districts due to redistricting, the fact that this number also declines in

areas unaffected by redistricting proves that redistricting has little to do with this decline.

Besides, most of the changes in competitiveness occur outside rather than during the

redistricting process. Because incumbency reelection rates changed almost roughly at the

same time that redistricting became required practice, a connection between the two was

made early on. While both the redistricting narrative as well as different studies claim a

beneficial effect of redrawing district lines on incumbency reelection, other research in the

decade following the Supreme Court reached opposite conclusions. The disruptive effect of

redistricting would be harmful instead of beneficial towards incumbents. While the research

results are difficult to compare, more compelling evidence that redistricting does not affect

incumbency reelection is given by the overall rise of reelection rates in both district as well as

statewide elected offices. This suggests that there is another reason for the increase in

incumbency reelection. Overall, the research shows that the effect of redistricting on the

composition of the U.S. House of Representatives is not as clear as the (media) narrative

portrays it to be. If there is an effect of redistricting at all, this is likely to be extremely limited

in scope. However limited, this effect is claimed to increase polarization in the House, which

is and issues that will be discussed in the following chapter.


33/96

Chapter 3: Partisan Redistricting and Polarization

in U.S. House of Representatives

A house divided against itself cannot stand.Abraham Lincoln

1

1 Abraham Lincoln, Speeches and Writings, ed. Roy P. Basler (New York: The Library of America, 1989), 461.


34/96

Chapter 3 29

Chapter 3: Partisan Redistricting and Polarization in U.S. House of Representatives

With claims on the partisan advantages of controlling the redistricting process proved to be

inconclusively supported by research, this chapter turns to a perhaps even more destructive

attributed claim of redistricting: its influence on the polarization of the U.S. House of

Representatives. In much of the opposition to redistricting in the hands of politicians the

creation of additional party seats is seen as only the first step of its destructive impact. The

democratic process in Washington, according to advocates of the influence of partisan

redistricting theory, is not helped by a procedure that they belief decreases competitive

elections. What really worries many editorial writers, politicians, and voter groups advocating

for nonpartisan redistricting practices, however, is the influence of gerrymandering on the

partisan and ideological divide between the two parties. While their claims will be developed

in further details further on in this chapter, the basic premise consists of a three step argument:

First, partisan redistricting increases the number of safe, noncompetitive and politically

homogenous Congressional Districts. Second, primary voters, who due to a lack of substantial

opposition in the general election de facto elect representatives in these districts, have

stronger and more extreme political beliefs than the general public. Representatives elected in

these districts therefore cater to these primary voters, and are more partisan and ideological

members of the House. This pulls the two parties to opposite ends of the political spectrum

and creates a legislative gridlock.

Similar to the claim of electoral advantages gained from controlling the redistricting

process, this reasoning sounds both reasonable and logical. However, research shows the

redistricting effect on polarization is not supported by evidence. Presented evidence can be

explained through more compelling and better supported studies which conclusively show

that partisan redrawing of district lines has no effect on the level of polarization in the House.

This is not to say that Congress has not become increasingly polarized over the last couple of

decades; redistricting, however, is not to blame.

This chapter will analyze the academic debate on the partisan redistricting causes

polarization narrative, and subsequently provide evidence to the contrary. It will start,

however, with an explanation on the median voter theorem, and the polarization of the House,

since both provide the foundation of this debate.


35/96

Chapter 3 30

Median voter theorem

Although not coined by Anthony Downs, the median voter theorem received its popularity

due to his bookAn Economic Theory of Democracy from 1957. It describes inter alia the

situation that in a two party system both parties move to the political median of all

constituents in order to win the majority. The median is the position most voters hold on a

scale from left to right with on either side the extreme (ideological) positions on a single

issue. Figure 1 shows that the median of each party is either left or right of the ideological

scale. However, Figure 2 shows that if you combine the frequency of positions of both parties,

the median shifts to the exact middle of both extremes. The median, in short, is where most of

the voters are positioned. This means that, in order to win the majority, candidates from both

parties have to win the votes of those constituents in the middle of both parties ideologies.

Moving away from the center median by taking more ideologically extreme positions, in line

with the parties own median, would mean less votes. Since extremist voters would be forced

to vote for the one [party] closest to them, no matter how distasteful its policies seemed in

comparison with those of their ideal government, there is politically speaking little risk of

this move to the center.2

Figure 1: Ideological Position of Each Party Figure 2: Ideological Position of Total

Constituency

Extreme differences between the two parties are not expected in the median voter

theorem. However, Democrats and Republicans in Congress are now more distant than they

have ever been in recent history. Moving away from the median would suggest that parties

either disregard moderate voters in favor of more ideological partisan supporters, or that the

constituency became more partisan and ideological. These two competing explanations for

polarization are discussed below, but both use redistricting as an explanation for polarization

in addition to existing levels.

2 Anthony Downs,An Economic Theory of Democracy (New York: Harper & Row, 1957), 118-9.


36/96

Chapter 3 31

Polarization of Congress

With the current debate focusing on the dire consequences of party polarization in

Congress, it seems hard to imagine a time when [c]ommentators derided the two parties as

Tweedledum and Tweedledee and warned that a lack of opposing, coherent visions of

policy threatened to undermine Americans faith in their democratic institutions.3

This was,

however, the case only a few decades ago. Since then, parties have not only become more

partisan and cohesive, they have also ideologically drifted apart, with Republicans getting

more conservative, and Democrats becoming more liberal.

The continuing polarization in Congress is widely acknowledged. Although there are

several methods for measuring the polarization of both Houses, either based on ideological

self-identification or special interest scoring cards, the DW-NOMINATE program is most

often used in academic research. This dataset contains all votes of members of Congress,

which are ranked according to ideology. The scale goes from -1, extreme liberal, to 1, extreme

conservative. The distance between the mean score of both parties politicians is the amount

of polarization in both chambers of Congress. Figure 3 shows how both the House and the

Senate have polarized substantially especially since the mid-1970s. While in recent years the

Senate seems less polarizedan issue that will be addressed later on in this chapterthe

ideological differences in the House have reached nearly 1. Figure 4 and 5 show how in forty

years the representatives have moved away from the ideological center towards more liberal

or conservative extreme positions.

Figure 3: Distance Between Parties

3

Michael P. McDonald, Representational Explanations of the Ideological Polarization of the House ofRepresentatives,Legislative Studies Section Newsletter22, no. 2 (1999), http://www.apsanet.org/

~lss/Newsletter/jul99/polar.html.


37/96

Chapter 3 32

Figure 4: DW-NOMINATE Scores 89th

House, 1965-1967

Figure 5: DW-NOMINATE Scores 109th

House, 2005-2007

The reason why politicians have polarized, however, is widely debated. There is no

agreement whether it is limited to elite polarization, or if the general public has polarized as

well. Most common object of discussion is the importance of the realignment of the South

after the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Some point out that [o]nce the Democrats became the

party of civil rights, their conservative Southern members began leaving the party that had

called home since the Civil War, to become, or be replaced by, conservative Southern

Republicans.4

If issues of race, and the top-down Republican Southern Strategy focusing

on states rights, is the reason for this realignment, or if it was caused by economic changes

in the South which led to the creation of a sizable new wealthy suburban class who began

4 Paul Waldman, How Congress Became Polarized,American Prospect, October 19, 2010,

http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=how_congress_became_polarized (accessed June 29, 2011).


38/96

Chapter 3 33

to vote for the party that best represented its economic interests, is part of further debate.5

McCarty, Poole, and Rosenthal point out that the realignment-induced replacement effect

cannot be the whole story.6

Figure 6 shows that the polarization of the House with and

without the Southern members is highly correlated, meaning that they are almost the same,

which suggests that polarization among non-southern legislators is the driving force of this

polarization trend, not the Souths change from a Democratic into a Republican stronghold.7

Figure 6: Distance Between Parties

With and Without the South, 1959-2007

The discussion on other reasons for the polarization of Congress is again split between

those who believe that rising polarization is due to large demographic and social changes of

the American publiclike Stonecash et al. who inter alia combines increasing district

disparities in immigration figures, median family income and urbanization numbers to show

why voters elect more polarizing legislators,8

and those who blame political elites. Fiorina etal. sees little indication that voters are polarized now or that they are becoming more

polarized, but points to the political classoffice holders, candidates, party activist, and

interest group leaders who with rhetoric, strategies and behavior have created elite

5 Clay Risen, The Myth of the Southern Strategy,New York Times, December 10, 2006,

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/10/magzine/10Section2b.t-4.html (accessed August 4, 2011).6 Nolan McCarty, Keith T. Poole, and Howard Rosenthal, Polarized America: The Dance of Ideology and

Unequal Riches (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2006), 32.7

Ibid.8 Jeffrey M. Stonecash, Mark D. Brewer and Mack D. Mariani,Diverging Parties: Social Change, Realignment,

and Party Polarization (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2003), 69-80.


39/96

Chapter 3 34

polarization that is largely without foundation in a polarized electorate.9

Hetherington, who

points to at least 12 different possible sources of polarization both on the political level

changes in the Rules Committee in the Houseas well as on the level of the general public

the influence of polarizing mass media, believes that there is a connection between both levels

of polarization through the great sorting outa movement of politicians and voters into

two ideological camps.10

With polarization on the elite level, the general public better

understands the ideological differences between the two parties and sorts accordingly to their

own ideology, while with party sorti

Documents

The Influence of Redistricting on the U.S. House of Representatives: