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Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

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Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#11

Post by openasocket »

OT, but there's another really interesting, related problem at the intersection of mathematics and politics, which is apportionment (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_ap...). The US House of Representatives has a certain number of seats (currently 435) and, based on the results of the census, those seats are assigned to the 50 states according to their populations. But the proportions don't always divide evenly, and you can't give a state 7.35 representative seats, so you need a method for determining the fairest division of representatives. And it turns out there is no optimal solution in the general case (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apportionment_paradox).

I point out this problem because it is one of the few times you will find Supreme Court cases and writings by the Founders on what algorithm to use. A bill changing the apportionment algorithm was subject to the very first presidential veto. The first proposed amendment to the Constitution (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_Apportionment_Am...) was on the subject of apportionment. When else will you find the highest levels of government debating the merits of algorithms and mathematics?

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#12

Post by pmc1 »

We desperately need to get away from the hyper-partisan, two party system. An Either-Or system was not what the framers had in mind and is damaging. While not the most popular position, I ALWAYS vote for the 3rd party candidate with reasonable policies for the sake of our country.

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#13

Post by MBCook »

pmc1 wrote: post #12

We desperately need to get away from the hyper-partisan, two party system. An Either-Or system was not what the framers had in mind and is damaging. While not the most popular position, I ALWAYS vote for the 3rd party candidate with reasonable policies for the sake of our country.

Even with only two real parties if things were drawn to maximize competitiveness then at least the parties would be forced to play towards the center instead of their more extreme bases.

Not ideal but much better than what has been going on since the 2000s.

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#14

Post by taoistextremist »

openasocket wrote: post #11

OT, but there's another really interesting, related problem at the intersection of mathematics and politics, which is apportionment ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_ap... ). The US House of Representatives has a certain number of seats (currently 435) and, based on the results of the census, those seats are assigned to the 50 states according to their populations. But the proportions don't…

It's actually one topic I've grown to agree with my extremely conservative father on, that they should have never fixed the seats at 435. This was done long after the founding of the country (relative to the age of the country, that is), but if we had kept the original apportionment we'd have one of the largest legislatures in the world. It wouldn't solve the apportionment problem, but it would make the unfairness of any given solution much less consequential and also it would make gerrymandering harder (though still not impossible).

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#15

Post by garmaine »

Dammit. For some years now I have been pointing out to people who would listen that what we need are policy solutions rooted in mathematical analysis, my go to case being gerrymandering. It seemed quite obvious that we could use geometric smoothing to set district boundaries based on census data to remove people from the process and therefore gerrymandering. Guess I had an untested assumption which wasn’t true, which is humbling.

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#16

Post by vpeters25 »

I have been thinking on a "simple rule" that could mitigate gerrymandering:

1. No congressional district can span more than 1 partial city and/or county.

This will force districts to be drawn to cover whole cities/counties and would stop ridiculous districts such as the Texas 34th which covers parts of at least 8 counties from the gulf coast up to San Antonio

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#17

Post by eli »

Sadly it is a bit out of date (requires Flash), but there is a neat game/simulation where you can test out different redistricting strategies SimCity style: http://www.redistrictinggame.org/

There are no easy answers. I believe the game makers advocate for independent non-partisan commissions who are restricted in how they're allowed to create maps.

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#18

Post by boomboomsubban »

MBCook wrote: post #13
pmc1 wrote: post #12

We desperately need to get away from the hyper-partisan, two party system. An Either-Or system was not what the framers had in mind and is damaging. While not the most popular position, I ALWAYS vote for the 3rd party candidate with reasonable policies for the sake of our country.

Even with only two real parties if things were drawn to maximize competitiveness then at least the parties would be forced to play towards the center instead of their more extreme bases. Not ideal but much better than what has been going on since the 2000s.

I don't see how it maximizes competitiveness. Even in a perfectly split district, the primary generally has to play towards the base, and it's easier to get more members of your base to vote than to convert someone from the other party. The bipartisan attempt to neutralize other parties helps with that, it's easier for a Republican to turn a Libertarian voter to their side than a Democrat voter.

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#19

Post by dragonwriter »

vpeters25 wrote: post #16

I have been thinking on a "simple rule" that could mitigate gerrymandering: 1. No congressional district can span more than 1 partial city and/or county. This will force districts to be drawn to cover whole cities/counties and would stop ridiculous districts such as the Texas 34th which covers parts of at least 8 counties from the gulf coast up to San Antonio

> No congressional district can span more than 1 partial city and/or county.

State legislatures control the definition of administrative subdivisions of the state just as much as they do Congressional districts, so that rule does nothing. A state that is really committed to gerrymandering will just move city and county lines when it redistricts.

A smarter but still corrupt state legislature that wants to gerrymander without disrupting functional local government will make “city” and “county” names of ceremonial subdivisions used for limited purposes, so that redrawing their lines doesn't have much practical effect, and adopt a different set of subdivisions with overlapping lines for most functional local government purposes (“urbanizations” and “parishes”, perhaps.)

Re: Gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

#20

Post by unabridged »

pmc1 wrote: post #12

We desperately need to get away from the hyper-partisan, two party system. An Either-Or system was not what the framers had in mind and is damaging. While not the most popular position, I ALWAYS vote for the 3rd party candidate with reasonable policies for the sake of our country.

I used to think the same way about 3rd party, but now I'm beginning to view the 2 party system including the primary as just a 2 round playoff. If you really have enough support to contend as a third party, you can easily win the primary of one of the major parties.

Your most important vote is in the primaries (especially in areas dominated by a single party), and I think the country as a whole is beginning to realize it.

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