Cross-Posted from Left It Up — wp.me/...
According to a national NBC/Wall Street Journal poll released last Friday, 47% of polled voters want Democrats to lead Congress - 4% more than the 43% who want Republicans to control the legislature.
Despite this, it's highly unlikely that even if this holds, Democrats will take back the House. Over the past decade, Republicans have mobilized at the local level to control a majority of the state legislatures that control the drawing of congressional districts. These new congressional maps are drawn in a calculated way - concentrating Republicans to create a district that is heavily Democratic or spreading Democrats out among districts so that they will always come close to winning but never actually do.
Because of Republican gerrymandering, it is nearly impossible for Democrats to take back the House. However, this doesn't mean that Democrats should try to gerrymander as well. It makes strategic sense, but is as unfair to the Republicans as Republican gerrymandering is to the Democrats.
The solution to this is a non-partisan, criterion-driven commission similar to the one in California. This is the fairest way to set congressional boundaries.
Legislatures should not decide the boundaries of congressional districts because they have a personal stake to set the boundaries to favor themselves. It's like you let the kid who cheated on a test to set his or her own punishment.
If incumbents set their own district's boundaries, of course districts favor incumbents. This is why there are so few competitive districts. After chopping up the map, all the leftovers are made into a district. Because that district is probably the most diverse, it is the most competitive.
These commissions won't just decide on a whim. The California plan established criteria for how the boundaries should be decided based on population equality, the Voting Rights Act, geographic contiguity, geographic integrity, and district compactness. This ensures that the process is transparent.
Previously, with legislature-controlled redistricting, law makers could make a congressional map that suited their interests behind closed doors. Of course there would be public hearings and perhaps controversy, but there was nothing that forced lawmakers to justify their decisions.