Gerrymandering has been a part of US politics since the beginning of the country. In the 17th and 18th century Britain, English politicians created map that made it easy to buy votes, and thus, elections. The idea of creating districts for political gain hopped over the pond immediately following the founding of the country (Little). However, the origin of the word “gerrymander” is the best to describe its history. For the election of 1812, the Massachusetts governor, Elbridge Gerry, made a map with weird-shaped state districts. Prior to this point, gerrymandering in states such as Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, still had districts that looked somewhat normal. For this reason, political cartoonist Gilbert Stuart of the Boston Gazette made a salamander of the districts in Massachusetts for the slimy nature of the governor’s map. The election of 1812 of the Massachusetts state senate ended with Republicans winning 29 of 40 seats with only 49% of the vote (Little). The term, gerrymandering, is simply the word salamander and “Gerry” (the governor’s name) pushed together.
Before I dive into the issues with gerrymandering, please note that situation also applies for Republicans living in Democrat-controlled districts, but I will explore this issue from my own experience living in a Republican-controlled district. For context, Pennsylvania is a close primary state which means that a person needs to be registered to the party to vote in the primary election. I live in Pennsylvania’s 9th Congressional District. My Representative to the House is Republican Dan Meuser, and he won in a landslide victory of more than 30 points over the Democratic candidate in the 2020 election (Ballotpedia). Looking to the 2022 elections, it is all but guaranteed that the Republican candidate will win the seat. This essentially Thus, it can be concluded that the election is decided in the Republican primary instead of the general election and makes it so that a Democrat’s vote in the general election will be useless. This begs the question, should Democrats register as a Republicans? This would give them the ability to vote in the Republican primaries and thus their opinion would be more valuable.
Now the question of, “should Democrats register as a Republicans?” is ridiculous. Since I am making a legitimate argument for it means the system is currently inadequate for picking the Representative that best represents the people of the district. To reform this, 2 solutions would need to be implemented. Firstly, gerrymandering would have to be limited as much as possible. Voters would need to vote people out of office that are continuously making the cycle go around. Secondly, primaries need to be changed so that the best candidate to represent the entire district wins the primary. In a presentation by former Congressman Charlie Dent, hosted by Penn State’s McCourtney Institute for Democracy, explained current systems of primaries lead to more fringe people to get by as the moderates share the votes of the more centrist voters while there are fewer extreme candidates to share the more extreme votes. The example Congressman Dent gave was the nomination of Marjorie Taylor Greene as Georgia’s Republican candidate for Georgia’s 14 District. I believe that creating many marginal districts is important in keeping more moderate representatives in the House. The more moderate representatives should make it easier for compromises to be made and bills to be passed that would benefit the American people.
To solve these issues, I believe that having open, rank choice primaries and elections will lead to the best representatives for the districts. Open, rank choice election would allow their opinion to be heard even if their first candidate isn’t likely to be voted in. This would allow Democrats to rank Republicans so, in a Republican “safe district,” Democrats would be able to support moderate Republicans instead of fringe Republicans. This would lead to elected officials catering to all people of the district instead of just one party and the voices of each person is equally heard.
Works Cited
Ballotpedia. “Pennsylvania’s 9th Congressional District.” Ballotpedia, https://ballotpedia.org/Pennsylvania%27s_9th_Congressional_District.
Little, Becky. “How Gerrymandering Began in the US.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 20 Apr. 2021, https://www.history.com/news/gerrymandering-origins-voting.
Personally, I disagree with the idea of rank choice voting. I believe that the closed primary system as we have it allows for candidates to be chosen by their party and best represents the interests of people registered in that particular party. But I believe that Republicans should vote in Republican primaries and not affect the democratic race, just like the reverse is true. I believe that implementing a new system of rank choice will cost more and create more complications in our elections. That said, I believe that gerrymandering should be reduced.