Alex Tabarrok
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The Supreme Court has said that (Wesberry v. Sanders 1964)
that Congressional districts must be of approximately equalsized populations.
 …"as nearly as practicable one man's vote in a congressional election
is to be worth as much as another's.”
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Similar ruling for state legislatures in Reynolds v. Sims (1964).
It follows that political districts must often be redrawn to
reflect changes in population.
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Gerrymandering is the drawing of political boundaries for partisan
or narrowly political purposes.
In 1812 the governor of Massachusetts, Elbridge Gerry, rearranged
election districts in order to benefit the republican party. In an
editorial cartoon, one of the districts, which was said to look like a
salamander, was given a monster's head, arms, and tail and
renamed a "gerrymander."
Gerrymandering in the United States has been used both to dilute
and strengthen the power of minorities.
There are three main methods of gerrymandering, cracking,
packing, and stacking.
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District representation tends to be proportion to minority
representation but only if district and minority lines coincide.
Cracking splits districts to dilute one group’s share of the vote.
Figures from George Clark. 2004. Stealing Our
Votes.
Packing puts as many of one group as possible into a super-district. They will
win that district but at the price of losing other districts in which they are made
the minority.
 E.g. take two districts in which group A has 55% of the vote in both districts and
make it into two districts in which group A has 90% of the vote in one district
and only 25% in the other.
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Stacking, as in stacking the deck, is when district lines are
redrawn to make minorities win in as many districts as
possible.
Similar to packing but the goal of packing is to concentrate a
group to reduce its power while stacking concentrates a group
to increase its power.
Stacking often creates
“bizarre” looking
districts.
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Gerrymandering is not just about who is represented. Perhaps
even more importantly it’s about who gets elected and
reelected and reelected.
Gerrymandering is used to create safe districts.
Packing has been supported by a number of prominent
minority politicians because even though it may dilute
minority vote it makes their seat safe.
 In 2012, Democrats
won 51 percent of the
popular House vote in
Pennsylvania but the
only won 5 out of 18
House seats. A deficit
of 4 seats.
Pennsylvania's 7th district.
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Under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, states must create
districts in which racial minorities have the ability to elect
candidates of their choice, so-called “majority-minority districts”.
 At least if the minority is sufficiently large and geographically compact for
this to be possible and if there is proof of “racially polarized voting,”
meaning that whites and minority voters tend to vote for different
candidates.
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The SC, however, has also ruled, beginning with Shaw v. Reno
(1993), that racial districting is a violation of the Equal Protection
Clause of the 14th amendment.!
Upshot is that racial reasons cannot be the “predominant factor”
in redistricting.
Texas 6th
Texas 30th
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Use an algorithm to
maximize
“compactness“
while keeping
districts of similarsized population.
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Create large, multi-member districts, and using a different
voting system such as cumulative voting.
Cumulative voting e.g. – a state has 5 representatives. Each
voter gets 5 votes which they can allocate in any way that
they want. 1 vote each to 5 candidates. 5 votes to 1 candidate
etc.
Cumulative voting allows for self-defined minorities.