The Electoral Process

1. The Electoral Process Fair Game or Stacked Deck?

3. I. Gerrymanders: The Fix Is In? • ORIGINAL GERRYMANDER • Named for Elbridge Gerry, Governor of Mass., 1810-12 • Later Vice President under Madison • Plan elected Republicans 29-11, even though they received only 57% of the popular vote.

4. A. Political Gerrymanders 1. Generally regarded as legal 2. Easier with modern technology – Geographic Information Systems used to plot voting patterns

6. 3. Simplified Example: Red vs. Blue Gerrymander • 50/50 population  75/25 representation • Technique = “Packing” light green district

7. 4. Mid-Census Redistricting: Texas 2003 • Map: Liberal Travis County divided up to reduced liberal representation / increase conservative representation

8. 4. Statistics: Increasingly Effective Gerrymanders

9. North Carolina’s Gerrymander, 1990

10. The geography of a partisan gerrymander

11. North Carolina’s Sea-Connected District 3

12. B. Incumbent Protection

13. C. Race-Based Gerrymanders 1. Concepts: Dilution and Representation • Republicans sued for packing minorities together or dispersing them in small numbers across districts • Democrats sued for transforming majority-minority districts into 40%-minority districts

14. Example: A divided state • Let’s play the gerrymander game (60:40 population)! • Everyone votes color first, then policy • Purple votes for Purple and united on policy • Beige votes for Beige but divides 2:1 against Purplish policy

15. Example: A divided state • Option 1: Packing (3 Beige, 1 Purple) – All Partisans of Color

16. Example: A divided state • Option 2: Majority-Minority (2 Beige, 2 Purple) – All Partisans of Color

17. Example: A divided state • Option 3: 40/60 (4 Beige, 0 Purple) – 1 Beige Partisan, 3 “Purplish” Beige

18. 2. What does minority representation mean? • Is it better for Purple to elect • 2 Beige partisans and 2 Purple partisans • OR • 3 “Purplish” (pro-Purple agenda) Beige and 1 Beige partisan? a. Descriptive representation: People like me are in office b. Substantive representation: People who vote the way I want are in offfice

19. 3. Recent findings a. Point of equal opportunity now = 40% • Recent elections have seen African-American candidates win 11 of 15 Southern seats from 40-50% districts b. Drawing districts to maximize the number of minorities elected: 62% c.There is now a tradeoff between descriptive & substantive representation

20. Substantive Descriptive Descriptive and Substantive Representation, 1975-1996 60 45 Votes inSupport 40 58 35 56 30 54 25 52 Vote Score Number of Black Reps. 20 50 15 Number of 48 Black Representatives 10 46 5 44 0 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 Congress Emerging tradeoff between descriptive and substantive representation?

21. d. Decreased racial voting in recent decades: Electoral Equations 94th Congress 99th Congress 104th Congress South East Other Decreased racially-polarized voting within the electorate.

22. e. Implications for Substantive Representation • In the 1970s: 100% • Concentrate African-American voters as much as possible • Essentially, no white will vote for black representatives • In the 1980s: 65% • Strategy is still to elect African-Americans to office • In the 1990s & 2000s: 45% • Still a good chance of electing African-Americans • Now better to spread influence across districts

23. 4. The Law on Race and Redistricting: Section V of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 a. “Covered” jurisdictions (including most of the South) need federal approval for changes in laws that might affect voting • Redistricting, at all levels • Changes in Electoral Systems • Annexation/De-annexation of suburbs, etc. b. Unique: prior restraint on state actions c. Not permanent; recently renewed

24. d. Implementation Controversies i. Standard for preclearance is “retrogression” • Examples of retrogression: • Going back to at-large elections from districts • Annexing suburbs to dilute minority voting power in the city as a whole ii. Unclear how this applies to redistricting • Depends on your theory of the relation between districting and representation (substantive vs. descriptive)

25. iii. The Standard Model of Minority Electoral Success • Majority-minority districts are necessary given polarized voting. • Otherwise, with plurality-winner elections, minorities will remain unrepresented. • Assumes no tradeoff between descriptive representation and substantive representation • Old Rule: cannot reduce the number of majority-minority districts

26. iv. Georgia v. Ashcroft: Changing the rules • Georgia reduced majority-minority districts to create minority-competitive districts (i.e. about 45% African-American) • Appealed to the Supreme Court as Georgia v. Ashcroft • Court ruled for Georgia, stating that: • Retrogression is about more than electing minorities to office • Minorities could choose to trade off descriptive and substantive representation

27. v. Limits on Majority-Minority Districts? • Race cannot be only reason to draw a district • Districts must be contiguous (one solid block). • Not much of a limit: This “earmuff” district in Illinois connects two Latino neighborhoods with I-294 corridor

28. 5. Accidental Gerrymanders: State Lines and Racial/Ethnic Plurality If the US was 100% regionally segregated: 34 Non-Latino White states 8 Latino states 7 African-American states 1 Asian-American state Reality: 50 Non-Latino White states

30. D. Who should decide? 1. Does the system make a difference?

31. a. Legislatures are biased

32. b. Courts are biased

33. 2. Proposals for Reform • Nonpartisan commissions: Iowa’s Legislative Services Bureau • Rules: The four criteria for the Bureau's plans, in descending order of importance, are: • population equality, • contiguity, • unity of counties and cities (maintaining county lines and “nesting” house districts within senate districts and senate districts within congressional districts), and • compactness. • Forbidden: political affiliation, previous election results, addresses of incumbents, or any demographic information other than population.

34. b. Math: Shortest Spline Algorithm • For N Districts: • Let N=A+B where A and B are as nearly equal whole numbers as possible. (For example, 7=4+3.) • Among all possible dividing lines that split the state into two parts with population ratio A:B, choose the shortest. • Repeat within each part, until N districts created. • Advantages: Simple, cheap, unbiased. • Disadvantages: Ignores geographic features and communities with common interests

35. Shortest Spline: Example • Before: • After (sketch):

36. Is geography important? Arizona’s “Grand Canyon” District 2

37. c. Compactness • “Isoperimetric Quotients” • Compare the area of a circle with a district’s border to the area it actually encompasses • Try to minimize this number • Effect: Attempt to create nearly-circular districts if possible

38. 3. Obstacles to Reform • Most gerrymanders – even partisan ones – attempt to preserve most incumbents. • Single-state neutrality is difficult – if all Republican states go neutral, Democrats could gain huge majorities by continuing to gerrymander their states • Binding national reform requires constitutional amendment

39. II. Voting Methods: Are Ballot Systems Equally Fair? • Systems of representation • Single-member districts (SMSP) • Produce strategic voting and two-party systems • Minimize representation of dispersed minorities, may maximize representation of concentrated minorities • Facilitate single-party majority government by turning pluralities into majorities • Value some votes more than others in vote-to-seat conversions • Create incentives to gerrymander

40. 2. At-Large Elections • Minimize representation of minorities • Give parties greater power than individual candidates

41. Natural experiment: SMSP (House) vs. At-Large (Senate) elections

42. 3. PR and STV • Proportional Representation: Seats allocated on basis of vote share • Maximizes representation for dispersed minorities • Encourages third parties • Reduces impact of negative ads (reducing single opponent’s vote share might not increase own share) • Progressives adopted in early 20th century municipal elections – paired with STV…

43. b. Single Transferable Vote: Your vote ALWAYS matters! • Step I: Any candidate with at least the quota of votes is declared elected. • Step II: If any candidate has received more than the quota of votes then the excess or 'surplus' of votes is transferred to other candidates remaining in the count. Any candidate who obtains the quota is declared elected and the count returns to Step I. Otherwise it proceeds to Step III. • Step III: The candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated or 'excluded' and his or her votes are transferred to other candidates remaining in the count. The process is then repeated from Step I until all seats have been filled.

44. 4. IRV • Also allows rank-ordering of candidates • If no candidate receives majority: instant runoff(s) • Drop the weakest candidate from the field and assign his/her votes to voters’ second choices • Repeat until one candidate has a majority • Usage: • Cities: San Francisco, Burlington, Ferndale, Berkeley • State: North Carolina adopted instant runoff voting for judicial vacancies. • Special: Arkansas, Louisiana and South Carolina all use forms of instant runoff voting on ballots for military and overseas voters

45. 5. Strategic Incentives Under Each System • If voters are smart, what tactics will they use? • Compromise (vote for lesser evil): Most intense in SMSP and At-Large, less in IRV and STV • Push-Over (if favored candidate likely to make the runoff, then cast top vote for extremist on other side, not popular moderate on other side): IRV, STV

46. 6. Rewarding Sincerity: Approval Voting • Method: Vote checks off all acceptable candidates • Minimizes strategic voting: • Voting for someone never reduces the chance they are elected • Never necessary to vote for less-liked candidate to avoid disliked candidate’s election • Reduced incentives for negative campaigning • Danger: Can result in lowest common denominator win (OK to many, but loved by none)

47. B. The Electoral College • Adoption: Alternative to previous drafts that had Congress appoint President. • Goals = independence of executive from Congress, give slave states ability to block more populous states, distrust of democracy

48. 3. How Democratic is the Electoral College? p (your vote counts) = p (your vote determines your state) * p (your state determines the election) • Favors small states over large ones

49. How easy is it to determine which elector is selected? • Lower = Better for the Voter

50. 3. How Democratic is the Electoral College? p (your vote counts) = p (your vote determines your state) * p (your state determines the election) • Favors small states over large ones • Favors close states over safe ones