Pennsylvania Supreme Court hears arguments in gerrymandering case
HARRISBURG — Pennsylvania Supreme Court justices on Wednesday interrogated lawyers defending the way the state's congressional districts were drawn, a map opponents have challenged as illegally shaped to benefit Republicans, who hold a majority of its seats in the U.S. House.
Based on the tenor of their questions, a majority of the court, which has five Democrats and two Republicans, appeared open to the argument that Pennsylvania's congressional districts are unfairly gerrymandered. A group of Democratic voters has asked the court to overturn the map and order a new one drawn before the 2018 elections, in one of several such lawsuits nationwide.
And yet the justices, while acknowledging the reality that politics played a role in the boundary-drawing, must decide whether those political concerns crossed the line and deprived Democratic voters of their constitutional rights.
"A test has, I think, eluded every court that has tried to grapple with this," Justice Max Baer, who ran as Democrat, said at one point during the two-and-a-half hour hearing. Over and over, justices asked attorneys for the 18 Democratic voters who brought the suit and for the leaders of the Republican-controlled legislature what the test should be.
Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2018/01/17/Pa-Supreme-Court-arguments-league-of-women-voters-gerrymandering-case-pennsylvania-commonwealth-court/stories/201801170177