A TURNING TIDE AGAINST PARTISAN GERRYMANDERING | SCOTUS To Race Congress On DACA Decision | It’s a Frog Eat Frog World
January 23, 2018
BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD
|Yesterday, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled the state’s 2011 congressional redistricting map is in violation of the state’s constitution and gives Republicans an unfair political advantage. Five of the seven justices on the court agreed with the League of Women Voters and others who brought the case that the map is a “partisan gerrymander.” The court gave the Republican-controlled legislature until February 9 to draw up a new map for approval by the Democratic governor.
OH THE TIMES THEY ARE A'CHANGING
|Nate Cohn for The New York Times explains just how big of a deal it is that Pennsylvania will have to re-draw its congressional map. For helpful context, Pennsylvania has one of the harshest gerrymanders in the country. Cohn notes, “If the ruling holds — and it is expected to, because it’s based on state law, not federal — this will be the fourth Republican gerrymander to be eroded by the courts since the 2014 midterm elections. It will probably cost the Republicans at least one seat in this year’s midterms, while eroding their position in several others.” And although it’s impossible to predict what exactly the new map will look like, who would Nate Cohn be if he didn’t provide us with some predictions for how this all plays out.
GERRYMANDERING ACTUALLY
|“Across the nation, judges are discovering that if you look for it, partisan gerrymandering actually is all around.” Who doesn’t love a little Hugh Grant-inspired wisdom on a Tuesday? I’m all for it and so is David Graham with The Atlantic who suggests the Pennsylvania decision could be part of a tidal wave of change for partisan gerrymandering in this country. “The Pennsylvania decision may be the only one to directly affect the 2018 elections and boost Democrats, but the growing judicial willingness to strike down maps deemed excessively partisan will remain important well after November…If the recent trend holds, however, judges will be looking over the shoulders of whoever wins in two years, and they will be less willing to tolerate partisan gamesmanship.”
IT'S A FROG EAT FROG WORLD
|ICYMI, the Supreme Court decided it will hear a case about the dusky gopher frog which is now confined to only a single pond in Mississippi where it goes to mate. The dispute is over this “critical habitat” which conservationists say protects the frog from extinction.
TOP-ED
|Tina Rosenberg in The New York Times opines on the issue of partisan gerrymandering and the effort of citizen voters to end the practice.
HOLD ONTO YOUR HATS
|The Supreme Court decided today that it’s ready to race with Congress in deciding the future of American Dreamers currently protected under the DACA program. The justices agreed to speed up their decision on whether to hear the Trump administration’s appeal of a federal district court’s order to restart the program without waiting for an appeals court ruling. The high court will likely consider the request at its February 16 conference.
SO WHAT'S IT GONNA BE
|Chris Geidner with Buzzfeed previews the upcoming SCOTUS case involving public sector unions which will come before the justices on February 26. He notes that states are split on the issue of whether these unions can assess “agency fees” against nonunion employees. Geidner writes that with the addition of JUSTICE GORSUCH to the bench, the justices are likely to overrule their 1977 decision allowing unions to collect such fees.
SUPREME FRATERNIZATION
|The newest Supreme Court justice continues to ruffle feathers this week, getting some attention for his Monday evening plans in which he dined with Republican senators and other Washington officials. Republican SENATOR LAMAR ALEXANDER tweeted today that he enjoyed having dinner last night with the justice at the home of SENATOR JOHN CORNYN.
QUOTE DU JOUR
|The New York Times calls out JUSTICE CLARENCE THOMAS for its quote of the day which was sourced from the justice’s majority opinion in yesterday’s decision. The high court ruled that police were entitled to arrest partygoers at a vacant house, some of whom claimed they were using the house for a bachelor party. But Justice Thomas said no sir, not today. He wrote, “People normally do not throw a bachelor party without a bachelor.”
THE LINCHPIN OF DEMOCRACY
|CNN’s Laura Coates writes that she wasn’t surprised to learn JUSTICE RUTH BADER GINSBURG is a member of the #MeToo club — a club that she refers to as “nothing more than an acknowledgement of how deep the roots of oppression can run in a country whose historical soil is fertilized with inequality.” Coates points out, “Climbing the professional ladder, whether as the first tenured woman at Columbia Law School or a Supreme Court justice doesn’t elevate you beyond the reach of bigotry. It merely gives you a better vantage point from which to observe the problems below.”
WAR NOT WON
|It’s been 45 years since the Supreme Court affirmed a woman’s right to privacy, extending to medical decisions including abortions. But abortion is still one of the most contentious political issues of our time, with laws across the country cropping up with the intention of limiting a woman’s access to the procedure. Meghan Keneally with ABC News reports on where abortion laws currently stand almost five decades after Roe v. Wade.