Texas Redistricting Round Up
To put it mildly, the redistricting process in Texas is never smooth. But this time around it seems exceptionally bumpy. In particular Texas has four new Congressional districts, and how those districts are drawn could determine whether the GOP keeps control of the House after the 2012 election. Important stuff.
One reason that things are different this time around is that this is the first time since 1960 – before the enactment of the Voting Right Act – that there’s been a Democrat in the White House and therefore a Democratic Justice Department. Which means that for the first time, in a long time, Republicans have to deal with an unfriendly, (to their partisan interests), Justice Department. If they assumed that their current plans would be treated like those in years before, that was a miscalculation. And likely a reason for the exceptional bumpy-ness.
But redistricting is the height of politics. This is about power, partisanship, and survival. Why would a sitting President just sit by and let the opposition party get away with a redistricting plan that looks to have serious legal issues, and puts his party at a disadvantage? And conversely, why wouldn’t the other party try and enact a redistricting plan that is most beneficial to their side? Both sides have much at stake and what’s going on now is how our current system works.
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Section 5 of the Act requires that the United States Department of Justice, through an administrative procedure, or a three-judge panel of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, through a declaratory judgment action “preclear” any attempt to change “any voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure with respect to voting…” in any “covered jurisdiction.”
http://eyeonwilliamson.org/?p=10388
The article also has connecting links regarding the DOJ amicus brief in favor of interim maps and whether the Texas Voter ID law will survive.