Supreme Court allows severe partisan gerrymandering to continue

[GMDino]

In what I consider a very dumb ruling even the Justices making it admit the act is bad...but they don't want the federal courts fixing it, while still believing the states can fix it themselves.  Even though the gerrymandering will make it impossible to pass laws to fix the gerrymandering including from judges on the state level.

Maybe someone smarter than me can explain the reasoning.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/27/politics/partisan-gerrymandering-supreme-court/index.html

Quote:The Supreme Court said Thursday that federal courts must stay out of disputes over when politicians go too far in drawing district lines for partisan gain -- a dramatic and sweeping ruling that could fundamentally affect the balance of power in state legislatures and Congress.


Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the 5-4 decision for the conservative majority.


"Excessive partisanship in districting leads to results that reasonably seem unjust. But the fact that such gerrymandering is 'incompatible with democratic principles' ... does not mean that the solution lies with the federal judiciary," he wrote.


"We conclude that partisan gerrymandering claims present political questions beyond the reach of the federal courts," Roberts added. "Federal judges have no license to reallocate political power between the two major political parties, with no plausible grant of authority in the Constitution, and no legal standards to limit and direct their decisions."

Justice Elena Kagan read a scathing dissent from the bench for the four liberals.



"(G)errymandering is, as so many Justices have emphasized before, anti-democratic in the most profound sense," Kagan wrote.



"Of all times to abandon the Court's duty to declare the law, this was not the one," Kagan said. "The practices challenged in these cases imperil our system of government. Part of the Court's role in that system is to defend its foundations. None is more important than free and fair elections. With respect but deep sadness, I dissent."


Roberts said he believes this ruling does not mean there cannot be limits on partisan gerrymandering.


"Our conclusion does not condone excessive partisan gerrymandering," he wrote. "Nor does our conclusion condemn complaints about districting to echo into a void. The States, for example, are actively addressing the issue on a number of fronts."


The court was asked to consider when politicians go too far in drawing lines for partisan gain in a set of cases arising from North Carolina and Maryland.


The North Carolina case was brought by Democrats challenging Republican-drawn maps, while the Maryland case was brought by Republicans challenging a Democratic map.

To describe the results has he did and still think nothing can/should be done is dumbfounding to me.

[*michaelsean*]

I'll take a stab, but could be way wrong. You are asking them to declare that something is unfair to one party over another. Parties are private entities, not a part of the government. Deciding that one party having an advantage over another and fixing it isn't in their jurisdiction. There is no right for a party to have a certain chance of winning. It's hard for me to explain what I'm thinking here.

[Belsnickel]

I was following along on SCOTUSBlog for this and the impression they got is that the opinion of the majority is the the judiciary should not get involved in this because it would embroil the courts in politics, which is not its place. Therefore, the courts do not have jurisdiction.

However, what this means is that this ruling could be used if a racial gerrymandering case comes up since racial gerrymandering could reasonably be argued is about the politics.

In the end, I understand the ruling, but disagree with it.

[GMDino]

(06-27-2019, 12:01 PM)michaelsean Wrote: I'll take a stab, but could be way wrong.  You are asking them to declare that something is unfair to one party over another.  Parties are private entities, not a part of the government.  Deciding that one party having an advantage over another and fixing it isn't in their jurisdiction. There is no right for a party to have a certain chance of winning. It's hard for me to explain what I'm thinking here.

I suppose that makes sense.

I'm just having a problem with the wording of the ruling saying (basically) "Yep.  This is bad.  Undemocratic. Wrong> But, uh, we trust the states where it happens can fix it or something.  Maybe the House and Senate can pass a law to make it better.  Dunno.  Good luck."

LOL

I know I'm over simplifying, but to me if you see/know something is wrong and bad you try and fix it not just shrug your shoulders and say "not our job...this time" because there will be other times they have no problem stepping in on the states.

[CJD]

Let's put it this way:

It's not a coincidence that this vote went along party lines.

[SunsetBengal]

In other SCOTUS News, ACA one step closer to being completely wiped.

[*michaelsean*]

(06-27-2019, 12:24 PM)SunsetBengal Wrote: In other SCOTUS News, ACA one step closer to being completely wiped.

Let's just go single payer.  We will be there eventually anyway.  I hate the fact that I'm at this point, but it's the only way to fix it now.

[BmorePat87]

(06-27-2019, 12:01 PM)michaelsean Wrote: I'll take a stab, but could be way wrong.  You are asking them to declare that something is unfair to one party over another.  Parties are private entities, not a part of the government.  Deciding that one party having an advantage over another and fixing it isn't in their jurisdiction. There is no right for a party to have a certain chance of winning. It's hard for me to explain what I'm thinking here.

This makes sense and, as Matt said, I get why it was ruled this way. The Courts can intervene when gerrymandering creates scenarios where citizens are not equally represented. In Tennessee, the state refused to redraw maps to show the population shift from rural to urban, resulting in the underpopulated urban areas to have more seats than the cities. As a result, Baker v Carr allowed the Judiciary to come in and force them to have equal representation.

In these cases, people are equally represented, but their political affiliation is not. There's no constitutional right to that equal political representation.

The liberal justices dissent and say "but the fact that this is happening essentially means our democracy is being significantly harmed" and that's true. Whether or not a justice can make a power grab for the good of democracy (a bit of a contradiction) is then their question, but the conservative justices are not on board with that. 

End result is whoever gerrymanders better and at a higher rate (Republicans) will continue to succeed at it unless there's a constitutional amendment (which there won't be because of gerrymandering) or their state constitutions are amended (possible in some of those states). I can see Maryland doing the latter but not North Carolina, and that is why Democrats lose elections.

[Belsnickel]

[*michaelsean*]

(06-27-2019, 05:05 PM)Belsnickel Wrote:

He said there is no legal standard.  Someone presenting something to the court doesn't make it a legal standard.  And comparing social (soft) science to physical (hard) science is ridiculous.  

[Belsnickel]

(06-27-2019, 05:13 PM)michaelsean Wrote: He said there is no legal standard.  Someone presenting something to the court doesn't make it a legal standard.  And comparing social (soft) science to physical (hard) science is ridiculous.  

How so?

[*michaelsean*]

(06-27-2019, 05:18 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: How so?

They aren't anywhere near equal in predictability.  There are no laws in sociology.  An experimenter cannot have total control, and control of one experiment can't be exactly replicated.  Social sciences are very good tools, and we learn more every day, but they can't possibly be the equal of the hard sciences.  

[Dill]

(06-27-2019, 05:05 PM)Belsnickel Wrote:

George Will makes a similar complaint about the "social science" used to establish Brown vs Board.  (In his new book, The Conservative Sensibility.)

[Belsnickel]

(06-27-2019, 05:32 PM)michaelsean Wrote: They aren't anywhere near equal in predictability.  There are no laws in sociology.  An experimenter cannot have total control, and control of one experiment can't be exactly replicated.  Social sciences are very good tools, and we learn more every day, but they can't possibly be the equal of the hard sciences.  

I would very much beg to differ, but that is another conversation entirely. As a statistics junky in the social sciences I could provide many comparisons.

[NATI BENGALS]

Sorry.. I read some crazy stuff somewhere. Whatever that literature was it made it really seem like this whole supreme court gerrymandering failure was a major abuse that hurts our people. 

Something like...

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.


For the life of me I can not remember where I got those crazy ideas though. 

[*michaelsean*]

(06-27-2019, 10:11 PM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: Sorry.. I read some crazy stuff somewhere. Whatever that literature was it made it really seem like this whole supreme court gerrymandering failure was a major abuse that hurts our people. 

Something like...

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.


For the life of me I can not remember where I got those crazy ideas though. 

Absolute despotism is it now.