{"id":1172,"date":"2021-06-30T17:23:58","date_gmt":"2021-06-30T17:23:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bendingtowardjustice.cah.ucf.edu\/?page_id=1172"},"modified":"2022-07-12T16:30:38","modified_gmt":"2022-07-12T16:30:38","slug":"gerrymandering","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/bendingtowardjustice.cah.ucf.edu\/index.php\/gerrymandering\/","title":{"rendered":"Chapter 11: Shaping Voting Outcomes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 and subsequent amendments addressed inequities that disfranchising laws (1890-1908) enacted and perpetuated in the American South.  It did not end efforts to shape the outcome of elections and raise new barriers to discourage some voters from casting their ballots.  The advent of the digital age with its ever-more-accurate algorithms facilitated the drawing of district maps that advantaged one party over the other.  The continued use of commission government inhibited the election of Black and Hispanic candidates in local elections.  Voter ID laws raised issues regarding what constituted a valid ID by accepting for example a hunting license but not a student ID.  Limiting the number of days for early voting and the number of polling stations made voting more difficult for some.  After the 2020 election the widespread use of mail-in ballots produced new legislation in a number of states, particularly in the South, to limit access to this form of voting and limit the times and places for depositing ballots.  The highly-charged rhetoric surrounding voting rights seems likely to continue long into the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Redistricting<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The U.S. Constitution requires a decennial census for the purpose of determining representation in the House of Representatives.  States also use population figures to apportion representation in their respective legislatures, and city and county governments likewise depend on federal population counts for political apportionment. Although the concept is simple and straight-forward, the practice is fraught with problems and conflicts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Apportionment Act of 1911 required congressional and legislative districts be contiguous, compact, and equally populated. The Reapportionment Act of 1929 removed size and population requirements, allowing each state to set its own district standards. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Until 1913, the addition of new states and the growth\nof population produced a growth in the number of representatives in\ncongress.  At that time, congress\ndetermined that population growth threatened to create an unmanageable number\nof representatives and capped the size of the House at 435.  The growth in population would be managed\npolitically with reapportionment that redistributed the 435 representatives\namong the states every ten years, with rapidly growing states receiving more members\nand states with declining populations losing representation.  Internally, each state would redraw district\nlines to reflect increasing population and shifts in population from rural to\nurban areas. The House failed to reapportion after the 1920 census and the\nfirst example of the new metrics for representation occurred in the 1930s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Florida\u2019s representation remained steady or rose slightly during the its first century as a state, rising from 2 to six representatives as its population grew from 87,445 (1850) to 2,771,305 (1950).  Politically, the Democratic Party dominated Florida government and apportionment conflicts centered on battles between rising urban population with more liberal tendencies and the more conservative rural areas.  The so-called \u201cpork chop gang\u201d of rural conservatives dominated the legislature until the 1960s and blocked urban reforms.  Florida was not unique in its disproportionate rural influence.  Southern states adopted a variety of strategies to obstruct the liberal and modernizing trends of urban voters.  In all cases the result was a lopsided over-representation of rural views.  In 1962, the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Baker v. Carr<\/em>, a case originating in Tennessee, ruled that the Court had jurisdiction over state reapportionment.  Subsequent rulings refined the initial case and upheld the expectation of \u201cone person, one vote.\u201d In Reynolds v. Sims<\/em> (1964), the Court ruled states must redistrict to have state legislative districts of roughly equal population.  In 2016, the Court ruled states must use total population figures when drawing legislative districts.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Florida population exploded after World War II from 2,771,305 in 1950 to 21,538,187 in 2020, and state politics became more competitive, the battles over redistricting intensified and both federal and state district boundaries sometimes assumed bizarre and convoluted shapes.  The use of complex algorithms to create redistricting maps enabled mapmakers to consider minute shifts in racial, ethnic, and partisan makeups that advantaged one party over the other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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