4/30 - Spotlight: Florida Redistricting Maps

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gerry. You're going to find there is a constitutional barrier for using race as that dominant factor, and no longer would you see a district drawn in Florida like you saw with Corrid Brown. Separately, on the partisan gerrymandering, the court has actually said, as distasteful or as unpleasant as this may be to some, that's outside the jurisdiction of the court, but that's up to the states and Congress to regulate. And as we talked about earlier in 2010, the state of Florida did try to regulate that with a constitutional amendment to the Florida Constitution, and that was the Fair District's amendment provision to try to do just that. Did the Supreme Court hollow out the landmark rule that's been a law that's been in effect for six decades? No, there's a disagreement on this, but it goes back to the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and Section 2 of that act, and some of you Section 2 as a basis for creating majority-minority districts and assuring proportionate representation. The court yesterday, however, said... Section 2 is still important in ensuring the right to vote, but you can no longer use race as a dominant consideration in gerrymandering these districts. That's a violation of the Equal Protection Clause. That's pretty consistent with what they did in affirmative action when it comes to higher education admissions, and that is this use of race as a violation. of the Equal Protection Clause. Might there be a day since it's been six decades at least that in the current state of affairs, the Congress takes up a new Voting Rights Act? Potentially, I do think when we get past this midterm election, there's going to have to be a lot of thought given to how we move forward because these redistricting wars that we've seen around the country that has really been unprecedented. Usually you have redistricting every 10 years. This has been sort of in the middle of that cycle. It has been done for partisan advantage. And the Supreme Court has said it is up to Congress, it is up to state to address this partisan gerrymandering issue. It's a very significant one. It's very consequential because it affects the balance of power in Congress. Power is an addictive drug, obviously, in politics. Appreciate the insight. WOKV. Political and legal analyst, Rick Mullaney with the Haskell Public Policy Institute at Jacksonville University.