Exam Monday
• slides up on web page
• review questions up on web page
Minority Representation
• Why value, what effects
• Descriptive
– legislature mirrors population
• Substantive
– legislature approves policies in group’s
interest
Minority Representation
• Why value?
• Fairness
– history of explicit disenfranchisement
• Empowerment
– Trust
– Participation
– Contacting representatives
Minority Representation
• Descriptive
• US pop, 2000
– White
71%,
– Hispanic
12%,
– African Am 12%,
– Asian/Pacific 4%,
– Native Am. .7%,
86% of US House
4% of US House
9% of US House
1% of US House
n/a
Minority Representation
• Descriptive Representation
• How facilitate via elections?
• Voting Rights Act Amendments
– registration without representation?
– maximize opportunities for real representation?
– since 1970s, Act used to challenge local election
systems that ‘dilute’ minority representation
Minority Representation
• Majority Minority Districts
– Local “at-large” elections original target
– “sweep effect” group w/ 40% could lose all
seats
– Gingles v. Thornberg, 1986
• “at-large” illegal if:
– minority group politically cohesive
– minority could be a majority in potential district
– majority votes as block against minority
Minority Representation
• Racially polarized voting
– in parts of US, this has been a fact of life
– southern parts of the US, in particular
– do the math: if white majority won’t vote
for minority candidates.....
Minority Representation
• US House districts also suspect
– Remedy: Minority / Majority Districts
• 1990 US Congress Redistricting
– Maximize number of majority / minority
districts in US House, state legislatures
– Bush Dept. of Justice, Latino and African
American litigants in synch
Minority Representation
• Majority Minority Districts
– once estimated that district must be at
least 65% minority to guarantee election of
minority candidate
• Congress elected in 1992
– first since new system
– record number of African Americans,
Latinos
Minority Representation
• Majority Minority Districts
• Partisan consequences
– Overwhelmingly safe Democratic seats
– Mostly in South, Southwest
– Demise of Democratic voters in “influence
districts”
– Surrounding districts more competitive for GOP
– 1992 Bad election overall for Dems (9 seat loss)
Minority Representation
• Majority Minority Seats
• Partisan Consequences?
– 1994 ‘Republican Revolution’
– GOP gain 54 seats
• many gains in southern states
• some in formerly majority Dem districts.
– GOP assumed control of US House /
Senate
Minority Representation
• Challenges to Majority Minority Districts:
– ‘Unfair’ to white voters
– trade-off, loss of substantive representation
– “Bizarre” contours to districts
• difficult to draw, at times
North Carolina as Example
• 1991 State leg plan, 1 minority CD
– state 22% African American, 12 districts
– ‘proportionality’ = at least 2 seats (2.64)
• Population more concentrated in North
• Dem state legislature changed plan to
add 2nd minority district
North Carolina 12th CD, 1992, 64% Black
WSJ:
“political pornography”
North Carolina as Example
• Shaw v. Reno (1993)
– legal challenge to NC 12th CD map
• when a State concentrates a dispersed
minority population in a single district by
disregarding "traditional districting
principles such as compactness,
contiguity, and respect for political
subdivisions" the State is drawing a racial
gerrymander that is subject to strict scrutiny
North Carolina as Example
• Shaw v Reno 1993
• ‘By perpetuating such notions, a racial
gerrymander may exacerbate the very
patterns of racial bloc voting that
majority-minority districting is
sometimes said to counteract’
North Carolina as Example
• Shaw v. Reno 1993
– race-based redistricting not always
unconstitutional
– states did need to comply with Section 2
and Section 5 of Voting Rights Act
– but...race can’t be main factor, district
must be compact
North Carolina 12 CD, 1997; 52% white
New map,
another lawsuit
North Carolina as Example
• Cromartie v. Hunt, 1998
– complaint alleged that the new 1st and
12th congressional districts are unjustified
racial gerrymanders. The new 12th, was
"fruit of the poisonous tree"--the poisonous
tree being the old 12th and the poison
being its racially gerrymandered origins
North Carolina as Example
• Cromartie v. Hunt, 1998
• 12th of 1997 was noncompact and showed
evidence that race was the predominant
factor in its design. The Court noted that as
the district wound through certain counties
and towns, the deciding factor in which
precincts it picked up along the way
seemed to be race rather than party.
Third Time’s a Charm? NC 12th CD, 1998
More compact,
but not quite...
NC 12th CD post 2000 census, 47% white, 45% Black
Represented by Mel Watt (D) since 1993
Partisan View of Law?
• Shaw case
– two judges appointed by Democrats and one by a
Republican.
– ruled against complaint three times to uphold a
plan or the use of a plan.
– Each time the Republican dissented.
• Cromartie case
– two Republican appointees and one Democratic
appointee.
– ruled 2-1 in favor of complaint, with the
Democratic appointee dissenting
Minority Representation
• Future of Majority Minority Districts
• Minority litigants sensitive to partisan
consequences (substantive rep.)
– in 2000, tables turned re: GOP vs. Dems
• Compactness
– depends on segregation
• What about groups that are geographically
dispersed
– Latinos?
Minority Representation
• Alternatives to Majority Minority Districts
• Cumulative Voting
– A remedy in several VRA cases at state
and county levels in
• TX, SD, AL, NC
Minority Representation
• Cumulative Voting
• How’s it work
– ‘modified at-large’ system
– multi-member districts
– Voter casts votes equal to number of seats being
selected
– voter can ‘plump’ all votes to one candidate,
spread votes around...
Minority Representation
• Semi-proportionate
– threshold of exclusion = 1/(m + 1)
– 2 seats up = 33%
– 3 seats up = 25%
– 4 seats up = 20%
– 5 seats up = 17%
– 6 seats up = 15 %
Minority Representation
assume 3 seats up, 10,000 voters (30,000 votes)
If ‘at large,’
65% white voters, 35% Latino voters
6500 white voters, 3500 Latino
• if racially polarized voting....
Minority Representation
• Cumulative Voting 3 seat example
Ethn.
name
votes for
W
L
W
A
F
H
6,000 elected
3,500
500
W
L
W
B
D
E
4,000 elected
3,500
2,500
W
L
C
G
6,500 elected
3,500
seat 1:
seat 2
seat 3:
Minority Representation
• CV, 3 seat example; 600 votes shift
Ethn.
name
votes for
W
L
W
A
F
H
6,000 elected
3,500
500
W
L
W
B
D
E
3,400
3,500 elected
3,100
W
L
C
G
6,500 elected
3,500
seat 1:
seat 2
seat 3:
Cumulative Voting
• Evidence
– more candidates
– more campaigning
– more turnout
– more minority representation
Minority Representation
• Cumulative Voting
• Minority representation w/o the
acrimony?
• Not automatic
• Not ‘tokenism’
• Cross-racial coalitions?
Minority Representation
• Is racially polarized voting a thing of the
past?
• If so, how defend majority-minority
districts?
• Any evidence that we are ‘beyond
race?’