The fact that congressional Dems are making increasingly-loud noises about taking up re-redistricting has apparently irked a couple of editorial boards.
The Washington Post, for example, argued yesterday that Dems shouldn’t copy the Republicans’ underhanded tactics.
An alternative exists to Republicans’ repeating their mischief and Democrats’ mimicking it. Both sides could agree on a national law that sets standards for legislative line-drawing. Clarifying that redistricting can take place only immediately after a census would be a good place to start.
Today, the Chicago Tribune follows suit, criticizing Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) for helping spearhead internal discussions about Dems taking up re-redistricting in states like Illinois.
DeLay, the guy known as The Hammer, is behind a cynical political trend–redrawing congressional district lines not every 10 years, to reflect new census data, but whenever the party in power in a state can gain something by it. In 2003, he pushed the Texas legislature to throw out the existing map and draft a new one to deliver more House seats to the GOP. It worked. Republicans gained 10 more seats in November.
Republicans didn’t stop there. They tried the same thing in Colorado, only to have the new map thrown out by the state Supreme Court. They are at work on a remap in Georgia, where the GOP has gained control of the legislature and the governor’s mansion since the last one.
Emanuel thinks this is a terrible approach — and one the Democrats should use in Illinois.
The Tribune, too, calls for a reform drive that would turn over redistricting responsibilities to “independent, nonpartisan bodies.”
All of this sounds very nice, but what would these critics have Dems do now?
Is the ideal to leave redistricting in the hands of neutral bodies, which would only take up the task once a decade? Absolutely. In fact, I suspect most Dems on the Hill would agree that this is the best solution available.
But the problem is, Dems are the only ones who think so — and they’re not in the majority. In the meantime, Republicans have redrawn lines in Texas to the GOP’s benefit, tried to do so in Colorado, and are about to do so in Georgia. Dems can resist these initiatives, but without the votes, the fight is temporary and ultimately futile.
These editorials describe a scenario in which Tom DeLay and his cohorts pull a ridiculous stunt, but Dems should be above retaliating. This simply doesn’t work. Good-government ideals should never be abandoned, but it’s hard to play nice when your rivals are stealing your seats through ridiculous re-redistricting schemes. It’s the funny thing about disarmament — it’s less effective when only one side agrees.
It’s also a scenario in which DeLay would get away with his stunt. Even if everyone agreed to drop re-redistricting altogether, the damage in Texas would already be done. It’s as if the critics at the Post and Tribune are saying, “DeLay punched Dems in the mouth and knocked out a few teeth, but let’s all agree now that mouth-punching is wrong.”
Republicans pull these stunts if they believe there will be no negative consequences. Unless Dems prove otherwise, it’ll just keep happening. Editorials with romanticized visions of how the system could work won’t change that.