Each state chooses
•U.S. Senators
•U.S. Representatives
to make U.S. statutes.
Choosing U.S.
Representatives
is more
complicated.
Every 10
years, the
U.S.
government
takes a
national
census.
Using census results,
Congress reapportions
435 House seats.
When states learn the number of
U.S. Representatives for their state,
they redistrict their states.
Some states require run-offs so that
candidates will have a majority.
After all the
shuffling…..
Each U.S. House
District
chooses
one
Florida U.S. House District 24
Representative
Honorable Barbara Cubin
Sparsely populated states
choose only one U.S.
Representative!
Rules:
 Baker
v. Carr (1962) The 14th
Amendment’s “equal protection clause”
applies to voting cases.
 Wesberry
v. Sanders (1964) Each
state must insure that each vote counts
equally in selection of members of the
U.S. House
(one-man,
one-vote principle)
To benefit his political
party, Massachusetts
Governor Albridge
Gerry encouraged
his state legislature to
draw a strangelyshaped district.
Gerrymandering
>Constitutional to
benefit one party
over another.
>Unconstitutional to
benefit one race over
another.
Kinds of legal gerrymandering…

Packing place many voters of one type
into a single district to reduce their
influence in other districts

Cracking spreading out voters of a
particular type among many districts in
order to deny them a large voting block in
any district