Supreme Court Agrees to Settle Meaning of ‘One Person One Vote’

[jimmy olsen]

A unanimous ruling! Yay!

http://trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com/2016/04/supreme-court-unanimously-upholds-one-person-one-vote-in-texas-case.html/

Supreme Court unanimously upholds 'one-person, one-vote' method to draw districts in Texas case

Bobby Blanchard

AUSTIN — The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously upheld a Texas law that counts all residents, not just eligible voters, in drawing voting districts.

The case was brought last year by two Texans, Sue Evenwel of Mount Pleasant and Edward Pfenninger of Montgomery County, who argued that districts should be divided by the number of eligible voters. They argued the current system gave oversized political clout to cities and urban areas with bigger youth and immigrant populations that cannot vote.

Texas' Senate districts have vastly different populations when counting just eligible voters. Political districts are required to be about equal in population.

Had the conservative-backed challenge to the law been victorious, advocacy groups argued, it would have harmed minority groups in Texas.

But the court rejected the challenge to Texas' method, which is used by all 50 states.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who wrote the majority opinion, said that the current method was constitutionally sound.

"Jurisdictions may design state and local legislative districts with equal total populations, we hold; they are not obliged to equalize voter populations," Ginsburg wrote. "Adopting voter-eligible apportionment as constitutional command would upset a well-functioning approach to districting that all 50 states and countless local jurisdictions have followed for decades, even centuries."

She went on to write that the challengers had "shown no reason for the court to disturb this longstanding use of total population."

"As history, precedent, and practice demonstrate, it is plainly permissible for jurisdictions to measure equalization by the total population of state and local legislative districts," Ginsburg wrote.

Advocacy groups celebrated Monday, and political analysts called the ruling a victory for Democrats.

"With this ruling, jurisdictions will and must continue to redraw district boundaries in an inclusive manner while adhering to the fundamental principle of one person, one vote," said Kristen Clarke, president and executive director of Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. "Today's decision renders null and void efforts to marginalize minority communities from having an equal seat at the table in our political process."

ACLU Legal Director Steven Shapiro praised the decision, saying "government actions affect everyone, not just eligible voters."

"There is a reason that every state has chosen to apportion its state legislative districts based on total population," Shapiro said, "The argument that states are forbidden from treating everyone equally for redistricting purposes never made any constitutional sense and was properly rejected today by a unanimous Supreme Court."

In a statement, Texas Democratic Party Chairman Gilberto Hinojosa called the ruling a victory for democracy.

"For decades, the democratic principle of 'one person, one vote' has ensured everyone in America, regardless of who they are or where they live, is entitled to equal representation," Hinojosa said.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement that he was pleased with the ruling.

"My office is committed to defending the Constitution and ensuring the state Legislature, representing the citizens, continues to have the freedom to ensure voting rights consistent with the Constitution," Paxton said.

[celedhring]

Interesting, so the American philosophy is even though you might not have the right to vote, you still have the right to representation. Can't say I'm against that.

That said, Spain uses the same philosophy and still manages to over-represent rural areas over cities (our proportional system gives all provinces a minimum amount of MPs, regardless of population). It's supposed to help out fighting rural neglect, but in practice just props up big parties and gives them a big bag of captive vote. We really need to reform our electoral system.

[viper37]

Interesting, so the American philosophy is even though you might not have the right to vote, you still have the right to representation. Can't say I'm against that.

That said, Spain uses the same philosophy and still manages to over-represent rural areas over cities (our proportional system gives all provinces a minimum amount of MPs, regardless of population). It's supposed to help out fighting rural neglect, but in practice just props up big parties and gives them a big bag of captive vote. We really need to reform our electoral system.

it is unavoidable that some rural areas will be over represented in a democracy.  And besides, even if a big city has theoritically less MPs to represent the population than rural areas, it is simply untrue in practice.  Say, Montreal.  It's under represented.  However, when they want more funding for public transit, a new highway, a new bridge, when they don't want to pay for it with a toll, they can count on 30-40 MPs to represent them.  When a rural area wants a dangerous road to be repaired/redone, if we want an highway because there's a lot of accidents that could be avoided, we have exactly 1, maybe 2 if we count the Federel level MPs working for us.  And when an MP covers 1/3 of the territory, you can see why some distant communties become neglected.  No roads, a part-time often broken ferry, no hospitals, a doctor visit once per month, etc, etc.