Shoutin' About Redistricting

Sorry it's been a while since the last post, but things have slowed down in the Governor's Eastern Office since the General Assembly adjourned.  However, with the Assembly planning to reconvene for a four day session beginning next week to discuss electoral redistricting, Tar Heel politics is about to heat up once more.  With the numbers in from the 2010 Census, districts have to be redrawn to represent the changes in states.  And while North Carolina came up short of acquiring a 14th seat in the US House, lines will be redrawn.  And like I learned in Ms. Enright's AP Gov class several years ago, the party that controls the NC Assembly redraws the lines.  For the first time in nearly a century, the Republican Party will get the task, or more accurately, the opportunity.

Redistricting is politics plain and simple.  There's no hiding that whatever party runs the state will hammer new districts into shapes that increase its chances of winning down the road.  Everyone does it.  Consider the NC 12th Congressional District.  Literally, I've opened up text books and seen it provided as the example of Gerrymandering.  No Republican has a shot at winning that district; it was made that way by Democrats.  Consider the NC 5th, which is a Republican safe seat.  Republicans in the 2011 General Assembly will set forth to create a red state out of North Carolina.  Aside from some requirements for minority districts via the Voting Rights Act, there is nothing to restrain Republicans.  They'll need a simple majority in the Assembly (which they have) and its a type of bill that Governor Perdue can't veto.

Basic strategy for Republicans: Cluster Democratic precincts into minority precincts.  With minority districts required by law (which almost always vote Democratic), Republican legislators will try to pack these districts as liberal as they can make them.  Essentially, they'll seek to make a handful of districts ultra-liberal and dominated by minorities, leaving the rest and majority of the districts for them at best conservative, and at worst moderate.  For example, Greensborians can think of a neighborhood like Westerwood.  Westerwood is a very white, very liberal neighborhood.  Republicans will seek to put neighborhoods like Westerwood into minority districts like those found in East Greensboro, thereby conceding a liberal district they couldn't win anyway, and making Westerwood's former district more moderate.  This will likely result in black politicians representing a higher percentage of Democratic seats both in Congress and the Assembly.  NOTE: this is an example, I don't actually know of any plans specifically regarding Westerwood.  But hopefully for this post, the strategy for Republicans is clarified by such an example.  

To take a title from a book my mother read, "It's All Over But the Shoutin'."  With little the Democrats can do but file inevitable lawsuits, shoutin' is about all that will be done in Raleigh next week.  Here's to hoping the office doesn't get bombarded with people calling and shoutin' at me.