Gerrymandering is when a certain state or district is divided up to give politicians from the dominant party in that state an advantage. Drawing these lines based on race has already been overturned by a number of judges and is generally considered not to be legal. However, drawing lines solely based on political party has not been banned.
At least, until now. There is a case called Gill v Whitford which was heard by the Supreme Court on Tuesday. This case is about the extremely partisan district map of Wisconsin (below) drawn in 2011 by Republican Wisconsin lawmakers. A federal court ruled the map unconstitutional and Wisconsin is trying to appeal the ruling. So far, the Supreme Court Justices seem to be split.
In a similar case in 2004 in the Supreme Court, Justice Anthony Kennedy who was the swing vote (as usual) decided the map in that case was constitutional. However, he did say that if someone could figure out a standard for what makes gerrymandering ok and what doesn't, he would be willing to throw out a gerrymandering map in the future. Once again, the nation turns it's eyes to Justice Anthony Kennedy to see how he swings the decision.
The lawyers that are fighting the state of Wisconsin in this 2017 case have invented a standard that they hope the Supreme Court uses, referred to as the "efficiency gap" to throw out this version of the Wisconsin map. These lawyers argue that this map is designed to "waste" democratic votes. It's a complicated process but basically, they say that Democrats' votes end up only counting in non-competitive districts or not getting counted in districts where their votes could actually matter.
So why is this case about Wisconsin State Assembly Districts not only a matter of enough concern to end up in the Supreme Court but also could change the course of American democracy and elections?
Because gerrymandering is an enormous part of state and local politics, no matter what state you look at. If the Supreme Court puts limits on gerrymandering or even bans it all together--we're going to be looking at a whole new political system.
If states that usually swing Democrat (like New Jersey) or Republican (like Wisconsin) aren't allowed to redistrict every few years or so, the odds are in their favor, they might have to actually go out and win over specific counties instead.
If states are not constantly redistricted, some of them could flip political parties altogether. This could result in changes in voting in even national elections. The fate of the current political system is in the Supreme Court's hands. Let's hope they know what to do with it.
