98.2%

That was the incumbent re-election rate for the United States House of Representatives. Only 7 of the 399 incumbents who ran for re-election lost. In fact, eighty-five percent of them won with at least 60% of the vote.

Read that again. Let it sink in.

Despite this anathema to democracy, voters in California and Ohio overwhelmingly rejected initiatives aimed at creating more competitive Congressional districts last week. In California, Governor Schwarzenegger’s Proposition 77 sought to hand over districting power to a panel of three retired judges. A study by Claremont McKenna College’s Rose Institute of State and Local Government predicted that the measure could have increased the number of competitive Congressional and legislative races six-fold. Although there was no guarantee that Proposition 77 would increase the competitiveness of seats (a similar statute in Arizona had little impact), its passage would have been a step in the right direction and would have certainly been better than the status quo.

Unfortunately, political gerrymandering has become a staple facet of American democracy, dating well back into the 19th Century. Every ten years, states must reapportion their Congressional districts in accordance with the new federal census. In most states, the legislatures take charge of Congressional redistricting (and in some cases, their own!). Essentially, the politicians pick their voters, rather than vice versa. After months of political bickering, the party in power typically maximizes its representation in Congress. In the 1980s and 1990s, the Democrats gerrymandered Texas, for which the Republicans only recently took revenge. These zero sum games are not uncommon across the United States.

The past fifteen years have been worse than usual, however. According to Ed Kilgore, Vice President for Policy of the Democratic Leadership Council, the number of safe (uncompetitive) House seats rose from 281 in 1992 to 356 in 2002. Congressional expert Gary Jacobson notes that only 15 seats nationwide were competitive in 2002. Moreover, in California and Ohio, not a single seat changed hands in 2004. The crucial factor explaining this disturbing trend is technology.

Technological advances now allow politicians to crack, pack, and kidnap, the three chief mechanisms of gerrymandering, with pinpoint efficiency. Remarkable software allows legislators to comb through massive amounts of data (e.g., voting habits, party registration, etc) to create the optimum (read: demographically favorable) district. In cracking, legislators split a group’s voters into two or more districts, as to dilute their voting power. Packing involves concentrating a party’s voters in one district, sacrificing that district, but diluting that party’s vote in the surrounding ones, while kidnapping involves pitting one incumbent against another. The new technology makes these processes virtually foolproof.

Safe districts decrease accountability, the staple component of any democratic process. Without concern for re-election, politicians become less responsive to the needs and concerns of constituents. In fact, gerrymandering has perverted the democratic vision of the Constitution. Senators, elected to six-year terms, were supposed to be more isolated from daily politics so that they could concentration on governing. Representatives, on the other hand, were supposed to be more responsive to the concerns of citizens. Now, however, Senators have to pander more frequently to the moderate statewide electorate than Representatives, some of whom can pursue extreme policies.

These distorted districts increase the partisanship and polarization of American political parties. Since a representative in a safe district coast to victory in the general election, competition is restricted to the primary, in which party activists vote. In order to secure the nomination, candidates have to pander to party extremists, their core base. Furthermore, once in office, they simply have to keep this core constituency happy, allowing them to take up more extreme positions. In the aggregate, this increases partisanship in the House, elevates political tensions, and moves representatives ideologically further away from the median voter.

Something needs to be done.

It’s a shame that the initiatives in California and Ohio did not pass. The claim that a mid-decade redistricting attempt would be unethical was political hogwash. The Democrats in California and Republicans in Ohio simply stood to lose Congressional seats. Moreover, the initiatives were only remedying an already unfair situation.

There are many solutions to gerrymandering: judge panels, bipartisan commissions, and court ordered maps are just a few examples. Iowa, which has the most competitive districts in the country, uses an independent non-profit group to recommend districting proposals to the legislature. Unfortunately, elected officials will not fix political gerrymandering – it is up to the voters to change the system. Any initiative that takes a step in that direction is worthwhile.