Free at last?
Sen. Jeff Wentworth’s redistricting commission bill, which has passed the Texas Senate twice, has a fighting chance this session since Tom Craddick’s no longer speaker.
Wentworth, who presented his bill to the Senate State Affairs Committee, tells me he has confirmed pledges from six of nine Senate committee members to vote for his plan to turn congressional redistricting over to an independent commission. He gave a compelling — if lengthy — argument at State Affairs today for a new congressional redistricting mechanism, noting that lawmakers of both parties have been guilty of overreaching, vengeful actions that lead inexorably to expensive court appeals every decade.
He’s optimistic about his chances in the House, since it died there last session since “Craddick personally killed it.” Here’s the story: Wentworth had pledges from more than a majority of the House committee, but chairman Joe Crabb told him Craddick had instructed him to sit on the bill. Wentworth then collected signatures form 20 House chairman in support of his bill, but Craddick wouldn’t relent. Why? Wentworth says Craddick instructed him to go read ”Craddick vs. Smith” — a 30-year-old lawsuit over Craddick’s mistreatment during redistricting at the hands of Democrats. (Wentworth’s bill doesn’t touch legislative redistricting, but oh well, ….)
Could Texas really go a less bloody form of congressional redistricting? There were two opponents at Monday’s hearing — the executive director of the Republican Party of Texas, and a witness one purporting to represent the Republican County Chairman’s Association (turns out his group hadn’t actually taken an official position on the bill.) Still, things are looking up for Wentworth: Joe Straus was one of the signatures on his letter supporting the bill last session.
Wentworth also claims that Gov. Rick Perry “wants to sign this bill.”
Anonymous says:
Maybe this time we can keep our members in state during redistricting.
Most likely not the time and place, but I want to say good luck to Durward Curlee “the notorious ‘High Flyer’ S&L ‘looters lobbyist’” (as labeled by the “public i” during questions to Phil Gramm in 1996) who is now employed by the Texas Legislative Council. I guess his job is to lobby for the current administration’s jobs. He will have his hands full.
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Pat says:
The real question is whether legislators will give up the ability to draw their own districts?
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Art Vandelay says:
You’ve got to hand it to the RPT leadership. First they send up a SREC member and County Chairman (a 17 year county chair!) who misrepresents his authority to speak on behalf of an organization. He gets owned by Wentworth.
Then they send up Executive Director Eric Opiela, who testifies against the bill (even when he hates to testify against bills filed by Republican members) even though the Party has not taken an official position on the legislation. He has nothing meaningful to contribute in his testimony and his lack of a viable alternative results in him getting owned by Carona.
Congratulations on your skill in the RPT circular firing squad.
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José says:
Would the lege still have the right to reject the commission’s map and draw one of their own? This is a nice idea in principle, but I wonder how it will work in practice.
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Spiro Eagleton says:
I think TX should look at how districts are drawn in Iowa. Its always best when voters pick their elected officials and not elected officials picking their voters. I’d also like to see us do away with twisted and convoluted district lines that are created to elect a particular racial group or a particular party or candidate. The crazy twisted districts in Harris County’s congressional delegation are a classic example of this.
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Anonymous Reply:
March 3rd, 2009 at 9:46 am
Yeah, Spiro! Finally something we agree on. But there are some fairly unique things about Iowa that make application in Texas more difficult, e.g., the relative absence of racial and cultural minorities.
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Spiro Eagleton Reply:
March 3rd, 2009 at 1:46 pm
Where in the Constitution does it say anything about drawing districts to elect certain groups? Why do we have to have districts that are “black” or “Latino” or “white”? Why do we need to further isolate ourselves into narrow groups? Do “minorities” really think whites won’t vote for them? That’s absurd.
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Anonymous Reply:
March 3rd, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Which way did you vote on the anti-gay marriage amendment, Spiro? No question that Repubs love to nominate/elect minorities whose political views are out of the mainstream for their particular minority group, then claim that the minority is “represented.” Clarence Thomas comes to mind — as a replacement for Thurgood Marshall…yeah, right!
slick Reply:
March 3rd, 2009 at 3:59 pm
Seriously, Spiro — you ask why? Because we treated these folks like shit for a over a century and a half or so, used our government to treat them as not legally existing, or considering them to be 3/5 of a person. We went through a little thing as a nation that we sometimes refer to as a civil rights era, where we, at least tacitly, recognized our past sins and pledged to address them in the future. Maybe you were absent that day.
Tracy says:
Be still, my heart. This is a classic example of “the right thing to do” getting thwarted by political cronyism. I hope people look at the pricetags of the multiple special sessions in 2003 and realize that an independent commission is best.
Hey Anon: Members don’t leave the state during legitimate redistricting; they leave when Craddick is being Tom DeLay’s waterboy in the off-season. How quickly we all forget.
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Anonymous says:
Oh please people, Wentworth’s bill passed last time because every Democrat Senator knew that Craddick would kill the bill in the House.
Democrats believe that they have a shot at the House in 2010. Why on earth would they support this now? DC Democrats don’t want our Lege to turn this process over to a bunch of people that they may no leverage over. They WANT this thing to go to court.
And Rick Perry wants to sign this bill? Is Wentworth smoking crack? Facing a primary against Kay Bailey Hutchison he’s not about to give party activists one more reason to abandon his candidacy. He would veto this sucker with the biggest rubber stamp he can find.
And I’m sorry Art, but getting attacked by that little twirp John Carona – the tax increasing, pro-gambling casino Senator – is a red badge of courage in the GOP right now. Eric Opiela did good.
This thing will die another death and Jeff Wwntworth will continue to be an obnoxious Aggie about it – not understanding why people just don’t fall in love with his ideas on the spot.
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ATXDem says:
“The real question is whether legislators will give up the ability to draw their own districts?”
Absolutley not, but this is definitely a step in the right direction.
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Daniel says:
A commission is nice, but a completely objective algorithm is better.
1. Start with the boundary outline of the state.
2. For N districts, let N=A+B where A and B are as nearly equal whole numbers as possible.
(For example, 7=4+3. More precisely, A = ceiling(N/2), B=floor(N/2).)
3. Among all possible dividing lines that split the state into two parts with population ratio A:B, choose the shortest. (Notes: since the Earth is round, when we say “line” we more precisely mean “great circle.” If there is an exact length-tie for “shortest” then break that tie by using the line closest to North-South orientation, and if it’s still a tie, then use the Westernmost of the tied dividing lines. “Length” means distance between the two furthest-apart points on the line, that both lie within the district being split.)
4. We now have two hemi-states, each to contain a specified number (namely A and B) of districts. Handle them recursively via the same splitting procedure.
Note: If anybody’s residence is split in two by one of the splitlines (which would happen, albeit very very rarely) then they are automatically declared to lie in the most-western (or if line is EW, then northern) of the two districts.
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Miss Jeri Mander says:
Daniel – as we used to say in the old days, you’ve taken a trip and never left the farm!
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Daniel Reply:
March 9th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Miss Jeri Mander – As Voltaire said in the old days…a witty saying proves nothing. And that wasn’t that witty anyway. Next time, try a real argument.
The Voting Rights Act reason is a decent one. But I think a completely objective algorithm might pass muster.
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José says:
Oh, Spiro! Removing any mention of racial/ethnic considerations does not mean that the districts will be drawn neutrally and fairly. In fact, it pretty much guarantees that someone can and will abuse the system somehow to the detriment of the minorities. And if you’re suggesting that minorities ought to be happy to let the majority make their decisions for them, everywhere and every time, well that’s a bit naive even in the 21st century. A highly diluted vote is not much of a vote.
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WURSPH says:
You would have to get the U.S. Congress to repeal the federal Voting Rights Act to do most of the “simple” methods of redistricting. There is a small chance the U.S. Supreme Court will make some changes in the coverage of the Act when it rules of that “special district” case out of Texas…but I doubt even that court will go as far as to shoot down the Act.
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Miss Jeri Mander says:
If you are referring to that North Austin MUD Case before the Supreme Court, that stems from local crackpot used car salesman Don Zimmerman. They lost two rounds in Federal Court and it’s a surprise that the Supremes took the case.
But a lawyer I know in DC says the Libs on the Court want to sue the case as a way to reaffirm, strengthen and EXTEND the voting rights acts throughout the electoral process.
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