Dance of the Districts

Political Panel Praises

Partisan Redistricting,

Solons Are Discomfited

At Koch Remonstrance

The reapportionment dance took a few steps forward and backward today as LATFOR (The New York State Legislative Task Force on Demographic Research) held a public hearing in lower Manhattan. The committee has been traveling around the state to hear from the public, but that is no indication that they will respond to the complaints that have been received from academics, good government groups and potential candidates.

The first grievance, which has been expressed by speakers who caught the road show before it arrived in New York City, was that LATFOR should not exist all, but that an independent redistricting commission should be appointed, rather than leaving the task to the assembly of incumbents now conducting the hearings and charged with preparing a plan for the approval of the Legislature, the body that will be affected by the plan.

The reformers want to prevent self-serving partisan districting, which fulfills the desires of a political party at the expense of non-members of that party. They want nonpartisan districting, either this year by law or permanently by Constitutional amendment. The incumbents' idea of avoiding one-party favoritism is bi-partisan districting, which serves the needs of both the Democratic and Republican parties, at the expense of challengers and independents of all stripes.

The star witness at the hearing was former Mayor Edward I. Koch, co-founder of New York Uprising, which is a coalition of former public officials favoring independent non-political districting. Click here to read Mayor Koch's testimony, an informative review of current state of efforts to draw fair lines.

Under the Constitution of the United States, a census of the population is taken every ten years, and the results determine the apportionment of seats in Congress. Because of New York State's comparatively slow growth, it will lose two seats as a result of the 2010 census. The usual political tradition when New York loses two seats has been to take one upstate Republican seat and one downstate Democratic seat. The situation has been complicated since 2010 by the departure of three members of Congress from New York State because of sexual misconduct, in three cases different from each other and all involving unrequited desires.

The custom in New York has been for the Democrats to draw Assembly district lines and the Republicans the Senate lines. For seats in Congress, the parties had to reach agreement on district boundaries. Because of changing demographics and social attitudes, the Republican hold on the Senate has becoming ever more tenuous. A law adopted when the Senate was in Democratic hands changed the districts that would benefit from the head count of inmates from the upstate counties were they were incarcerated, providing employment to local residents, to the downstate counties where they lived while committing the crimes, largely, felonies that resulted in their being sent upstate.

Some people want the Democrats to win both houses, so responsibility for whatever happens or does not happen can be placed on one party. Others prefer a divided legislature, so that conservatives as well as liberals will be heard. A number of players publicly prefer domination by their own party, but their private opinion is another matter. Common sense tells us that moderate government is more likely to be achieved under diverse leadership than when the legislature is under the control of one party. A political system dominated by either party tends to reduce the importance of general elections and increase the effect of party primaries, where the more extreme members of each party have proportionately greater influence, in part because independents are forbidden to vote.

Redistricting will be an important issue in the months to come, and much will said on the subject. The argument is not ideological, the left against the right, the spenders against the savers, or liberals against social conservatives. The issue here is one of equity and fairness, of expressing the wishes of the people, as opposed to those in both parties who would manipulate the system, deny ballot access to challengers, preserve incumbents by any means available, and place individual legislators under the thrall of the legislative leadership, where any expression of autonomy is punished.

The New York State legislature, periodically derided as the most dysfunctional in the United States, has earned its ill repute, not only through acts of dishonesty by members of both houses, some of which have resulted in prison sentences, but by an arbitrary system of rules and protective walls around the leadership, so that although the great majority of the members are honest, there is precious little they can accomplish without the consent of men who, to put it politely, are more responsive to special interests and individual desires, often paid for by political contributions.

To allow the leaders to retain the power to choose their followers by drawing their districts condemns the backbenchers to little more authority than their constituents, who may decennially be moved like cattle from one district to another to serve the political interests of those whose lack of responsibility and desire for re-election have helped give rise to the state's now acute financial problems.

Do not take this commentary as indicating that any particular legislator is better or worse than any other. Some considered paragons of virtue may never have been subject to temptation. Others usually reviled are not only smarter than most others but are better politicians. And when people elected to high office as reformers are found to have several screws loose which prevent positive interaction with other people, the distinction between intellect and insanity becomes difficult to find.

But regardless of their intellect, ability, integrity or state of rage, all public officials should run in honestly drawn districts, equal in size, compact and contiguous, and linking communities by interest. Political boundaries should not be perpetrated on the public by self-serving incumbents, who have systematically manipulated the electoral system to serve their personal needs at the expense of the public interest in honest government.

Beware the Gerrymander

Common Cause Drawing Lines

For Legislative Redistricting,

LATFOR Holding Hearings

Writing a blog has many satisfactions. One can share information and opinions with thousands of people who have elected to receive them. One can affect the public's view of issues. On some occasions, one can publish material previously unknown or unconnected to the larger universe of public policy issues.

A blog also has its frustrations. The blogger can draw conclusions and make proposals, in a loud or soft voice, but there is no assurance that anyone will do what he recommends. In most cases, there is a reason that officials will not do what you suggest. The most common reason is their own self-interest.

It is an ancient truism that the first law of nature is self-preservation. The thought was expressed elegantly by Andrew Marvell in 1675 in England in a metaphysical poem, "Hodge's Vision from the Monument".

"Self-preservation, nature's first great law,
All the creatures, except man, doth awe."

BTW, the gifted Marvell (1621-1678) is the author of another iconic couplet, well known for centuries:

"The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace."

The importance of self-preservation was doubtless in the minds of our ancestors, the cavepeople, whether they expressed that view in their speech or not. When one watches nature programs on public television, and sees the way animals treat, and eat, each other, the priority of survival for any living creature is evident.

The relevance of these observations to today's politics arises when we consider the decennial issue of redistricting. The Constitution of the United States (Art. I, Sec. 2) requires the enumeration of the population by means of a census to be taken every ten years (the first was in 1790), and the assignment of seats in the House of Representatives based on roughly equal districts. It is left to the state legislatures to draw the lines, either as a body, through a committee, or by taking recommendations from a group they appoint for that purpose, be it judicial, academic, nonpartisan or bipartisan.

New York State is historically noted for egregious gerrymandering. For roughly the last half century, the Assembly has been districted to elect Democrats, whereas the Senate lines favor Republicans. The steady growth in allegiance to the Democrats and the relative depopulation of upstate has made it increasingly difficult to draw Senate lines to keep the Republican Senate majority.

In 2008, the Democrats actually gained a Senate majority because of the high vote for President Obama. They managed their majority so shamefully and corruptly that the Republicans narrowly regained control in 2010. During the campaign, all the Republicans promised in writing to support an independent redistricting commission in order to win the approval of Mayor Koch and an organization he and others formed called New York Uprising.

After the Republican victory, owing in part to the use of the Koch pledge in their literature, they concluded that the independent commission they promised to support could not come into effect until the state Constitution was amended, an event that would not take place before 2013, at the earliest, and would not apply until the 2022 election. What happened, of course, was that once they had a majority, the Republicans repudiated their pledge, as it was no longer in their self-interest to honor it.

Governor Cuomo has repeatedly pledged to veto any districting plan that is not prepared by an independent commission. He does, however, leave himself some wiggle room by requiring that the plan be fair, reasonable and nonpartisan, without re-emphasizing the necessity for an independent commission.

To his credit, the Governor has stated that he does not believe that the committee of state legislators charged with statutory authority to draw the lines, the New York State Legislative Task Force on Demographic Research and Reapportionment (LATFOR), can see past their own personal and political interests and create district boundaries that are equitable. LATFOR has so far had two hearings upstate, with another scheduled tomorrow in Albany. Five hearings will be held in New York City in September, one in each borough (Queens - Sept. 7; Bronx - Sept. 8; Brooklyn - Sept. 20; Manhattan - Sept. 21; and Staten Island - Sept. 22). Their locations have not yet been announced.

If the Governor vetoes a districting plan, it will be up to the legislature to sustain or override the veto. To override requires a two-thirds vote in each house, which means that both the Democratic and Republican leadership would have to agree on a plan. Enough legislators have signed the Koch pledge to sustain a Cuomo veto, but will they keep their word?

Another possible scenario is that, anticipating Governor Cuomo's veto, the Legislature will avoid the political consequences of overriding the Governor's honest and populist stance and instead stall as long as it can, perhaps until February 2012, before issuing its suggested lines.

The aim of this strategy would be for the legislature to make the case to the state or federal courts, which would be charged with drawing the lines in the event the state does not adopt any, that there would not be enough time before the April 24, 2012 primary date to come up with new lines, and thus there would be no alternative but to adopt the LATFOR lines.

To thwart this potential manipulation, Governor Cuomo should take Bill Samuels' suggestion and appoint a nonpartisan, independent commission now that would draw up equitable lines which the Governor would be comfortable adopting. This commission's recommendations would not be binding, nor would they carry official weight, but they would be valuable if the redistricting battle winds up in the courts, and the judiciary needs a viable alternative to the LATFOR lines to consider in a short period of time.

Common Cause New York deserves praise for the substantial labor that it is currently performing to create their own set of lines, drawn up according to the principles commonly held by good government groups. Basic fairness requires that legislative districts be compact, contiguous, equal in population, reflect communities of interest, and not be stacked, packed, hacked or cracked, which are terms used to describing either stuffing members of one group into a district in order to control it, or breaking up natural concentrations of people to diminish their power to elect a member of their group.

It will be interesting to see how different Common Cause's lines will be, when they are completed in the coming months, from the ones LATFOR ultimately draws. Close examination of the differences are likely to reveal the partisan self-serving motives of the legislators.

There is still a possibility that the Legislature will honor the pledge it made to Mayor Koch, the former mayors and governors who are part of New York Uprising, and Citizens Union, a leader in the struggle and the organizing force behind the ReShape New York coalition, of which New York Civic is a member, and hold a special session to appoint an independent commission in place of LATFOR. That is, however, highly unlikely as it would almost certainly frustrate the Senate Republicans's desire to maintain their majority, which they may lose unless President Obama's defeat in 2012 is as massive as his victory was in 2008.

There are many injustices in politics, such as the denial of ballot access to independent candidates, the use of technicalities in the election law to exclude legitimate candidates, the use of public resources by incumbents to promote their re-election, soliciting and securing campaign contributions from people and organizations candidates have assisted financially, usually with public funds, vacancies artfully created by timely resignations of incumbents, so the positions will be filled by special or midsummer elections with minimal voter turnout, and the prevention and suppression of primary elections through political or economic intimidation, not to mention old-fashioned voter fraud, such as multiple voting, and a variety of other 'dirty tricks'.

The struggle for clean elections and clean district lines are part of the effort to insure fair, open and honest elections so that the voters' choices will be respected. Unfortunately, insiders in the political system will often use every sort of chicanery to prevent a free election. In these contests, the insiders have a great deal at stake. It is their boodle, pelf and spoils that they are trying to preserve.

The voters have a right to choose their elected officials. The officials do not have a right to choose their voters, although in fact they try to do just that. Sometimes they even succeed. In New York State they usually do.

"Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty" was said by Wendell Phillips in 1852, in a speech to the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. That statement is still true today, and applies particularly to those who would tamper with the electoral process in order to gain private, personal or partisan preference.

The least one can expect in a competitive election is a map with clean district boundaries. Sadly, for far too many office holders, that is the last thing they want to see happen. We will watch closely for the next few months, looking out for attempts to manipulate the process. If the past is any indicator, machinations are likely to be attempted by those who hold legislative power. This is an early warning that there will be trickery afoot.

Win Some, Lose Some

Cuomo Reaffirms Commitment

To Independent Redistricting,

But Promulgates Calendar

That Will Bar Primaries

Politics has its ups and downs, as this week's events show.

There was a bright spot. Governor Cuomo reaffirmed his decision, first announced in February, that he would veto any redistricting bill passed by the Legislature that did not provide for an independent districting commission to draw the boundaries of Congressional, state senate and assembly districts.

Under the Constitution of the United States, (Art. I, Sec. 2), a census is to be taken every ten years, and seats in the House of Representatives are to be allocated to the states in proportion to their population. Since 1790, the enumeration has been conducted in years ending in zero. It is called the decennial census.

Under the first census, the population of the United States was counted at 3,922,214, and New York State had 340,120 residents, which was 8.656 per cent of the U.S. total. The most recent census, taken in 2010 and reported in 2011, showed the population of the United States at 308,745,538, of whom 19,378,102 lived in New York State.

In the ten years since the previous census, New York State gained only 2.1 per cent in population while the nation's population rose 9.7 per cent. New York State's share of the nation's population is 6.276 per cent. Since there are now 50 states while in 1790 there were 13, New York has held up fairly well over the 220 years of counting heads. The last half-century, however, has not been kind to the Empire State, which peaked at 45 Congressional districts in 1930 and 1940, but has steadily declined in political strength since World War II.

New York's slow increase in the most recent decade, compared with the much faster gains of states in the South and Southwest, has resulted in the state's loss of two House seats, which in the 2012 election will bring our total number of districts down from 31 to 29. Texas gained the largest number of seats in the last decade, going from 32 to 36. Nevada had the highest percentage increase, 35.1 per cent. The Silver State still has fewer people than the norm for one district, now about 710,000. The red states generally outgrew the blue states in the early 21st century, and as the Constitution makes this a zero-sum game, the gains came at the expense of the blue states.

With the loss of two New York seats, the question arises: which two districts out of the 31 will be made to disappear by whichever legislative body, independent commission or Federal court ends up drawing the final lines? Normally when the flock is culled, the weaker sheep are slaughtered, but New York has a plethora of rookies, as a result of libidinous mishaps.

The last seventeen months have seen three sudden departures of New York State Congressmen, all based on a variety of sexual acts and images, although none involved actual intercourse. The first to go was Democrat Eric Massa, from the southern tier of upstate counties, who was credibly accused of groping his young male staffers and resigned in March 2010. Next was Chris Lee, a Republican whose district lies between the suburbs of Buffalo and Rochester, who resigned in February 9, 2011, the day a photograph of the shirtless legislator appeared on Craigslist. He was outed by Gawker, but exposure is almost inevitable when one trolls for companionship on the Internet.

The most important legislator to fall, also entangled by the Web, was Democrat Anthony Weiner, who accidentally posted a sexually suggestive photo of himself on Twitter on May 27. After a prolonged period of denial, followed by apology and refusal to resign, Weiner gave in on June 16 and left his Democratic seat in Brooklyn and Queens vacant. Queens Democratic leader Joseph Crowley selected Assemblyman David Weprin to run in a special election September 13 to fill the position through the end of next year, when it is likely to be abolished. If that does occur, David Weprin will be in the unique position of being a former member of the State Assembly, the City Council and the United States Congress, as well as being the son of the late Assembly Speaker, Saul Weprin, and the brother of City Councilman Mark Weprin, who is regarded as upwardly mobile.

The reform movement in New York State public affairs, which consists of traditional, well-regarded government organizations, joined by Mayor Ed Koch's New York Uprising, has made independent redistricting a priority for 2011. So far the legislature has ignored their wishes, instead convening its own instrument for redistricting, called LATFOR, an acronym for Legislative Task Force on Demographic Research and Reapportionment. The Albany Times-Union, in a well-written account by Casey Seiler and Jimmy Vielkind, brings us up to date on the latest skirmish. The article is worth your attention.

LATFOR met Wednesday for the first time. Its co-chairs are Republican Senator Michael Nozzolio from Seneca Falls and Democratic Assemblyman Jack McEneny of Albany. The meeting was brief and uneventful, but after it ended Mr. McEneny called Governor Cuomo's potential rejection "a very petty approach" based on "a dumb reason". Those remarks were gratuitous and injudicious, even from the assemblyman's point of view. One does not attack a popular governor without some preparation, definition of the issue, and sophisticated choice of language.

Reformers had worried about Governor Cuomo's adherence to his pledge to veto lines not drawn by an independent commission, fearing that as the price for the enormously successful legislative session, he may have promised to let the legislative leaders have their way on redistricting, which is of the utmost concern to them because it may determine who controls the Senate next year. The Assembly is 2-1 Democratic so the Senate will be the battle ground. The last time the Democrats organized the Senate, 2009-10, was considered a disaster. Previously the Republicans had held power for 44 years, in good part due to gerrymandering under an unspoken understanding in which each party controlled one house. Divided government was helpful to whomever was governor. At the same time, it made it more difficult to fix responsibility for anything, and in the long term was not helpful to the State or its fisc.

The McEneny sally Wednesday and the press inquiry that followed it provided an opportunity for Cuomo to express his views. The governor said that his attitude "is crystal clear, has been for a long time: I understand the assemblyman's point of view, he wants to draw his own lines... I want to have lines drawn that represent the people of the state of New York, not a particular assemblyman."

In a move announced late last Friday (considered the optimal time to put out stories of divorces and other possibly ill-received news), Governor Cuomo did make a concession to the state's party bosses, in particular Democratic Leaders Joseph Crowley of Queens and Vito Lopez of Brooklyn. In a move slammed by the editorial pages of The Daily News and The Times, Cuomo set dates for special elections to fill six vacant Assembly seats and one Congressional seat (Anthony Weiner's). The election date is September 13, which coincides with Primary Day, if there are any primaries.

Cuomo was not mandated to call special elections, and could have let the voters in the affected districts select their own party nominees in a September primary leading to a November general election. Instead, the party leader in each county will choose their party's nominees for the vacant public offices. Since Democrats prevail in most districts, that means the Democratic county leaders will decide who the incoming elected officials will be. In the normal course of events, this would make the elected officials particularly responsive to the wishes and preferences of the county leaders who have selected them to hold office. The public is effectively removed from the selection process until two years have passed, during which the selected nominee will have all the privileges of incumbency.

On one hand, how much heavy lifting is it fair to ask Governor Cuomo to do? On the other, what kind of democracy allows one man to choose so many public officials without the consent of the governed?

P.S. It doesn't bother me much that the Queens leader, Joe Crowley, lives in Virginia with his wife and kids. Why pick on one elected official who really seems to want a relatively normal family life, which at a minimum requires the presence of one's family, particularly young children? I object to a few of Crowley's political decisions, but choosing to live with his wife and kids is not one of them. In fact, for a public official, it is wholesome.

Pants Heating Up

Dean Skelos Iffy

On Redistricting

Promise He Made

Word is out that Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos may not intend to comply with the promise he made to New York Uprising that the Republicans in the state senate would support an independent commission to redraw senate and assembly district lines for the 2012 elections. (Click here to see Senator Skelos' signature on the New York Uprising pledge and a copy of his letter to Mayor Koch.) So far, the story has appeared in City Hall News, a weekly publication.

The entire Republican caucus in the Senate endorsed New York Uprising's proposal for an independent non-political redistricting in October. The G.O.P. Senators and candidates for seats held by Democrats were recognized for their decision by being authorized to use the New York Uprising logo and the designation "Hero of Reform". The approval by the group headed by former Mayor Ed Koch was valuable to Republican candidates, who won control of the Senate by the narrowest of margins, 32 to 30. Several of the seats won by Republicans were carried by margins of a few hundred votes. 29 Republicans agreed to the pledge, the total number of Republicans serving in the senate at that time. One Republican passed away early in July.

Mayor Koch has written several letters to Mr. Skelos, proposing a meeting to discuss compliance with the commitment to an independent commission, but has not received a response. Other politicians say that when the Republicans were in the minority in the State senate, from 2009 through 2010, it was easy to make promises which would never have to be kept unless and until they won control of the senate. They did win control in December 2010 when the last race, in Nassau County, was decided in favor of the Republican challenger over the Democratic incumbent, who had lost at the polls and appealed to the courts, which found no reason to interfere with the decision of the voters.

The United States Constitution (Art. 1, Sec. 2) requires a census to be taken every ten years, and the congress to be reapportioned pursuant to the results of the census. As a result of the 2010 census, New York State will lose two seats in Congress (going from 27 to 25 districts). Under the 1930 and '40 censuses, New York held 45 of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives. In the following seventy years, the New York delegation shrank by 44 per cent. Since present trends in the movement of population to the south and west and away from the rust belt and blizzard states are expected to continue, it is reasonable to assume that New York will suffer a further loss of House seats in 2020 and the years beyond.

Within the state, the population loss came upstate rather than downstate (New York City and suburbs) so the northern seats should be vulnerable. In the 111th Congress, there were only 3 Republicans in the 29-member delegation. In the 112th Congress, which has just begun its work, there are 8 Republicans, following a turnover of 4 seats upstate and one on Staten Island.

It is the State Legislature that draws the lines of the new Congressional districts. Since the Senate is Republican and the Assembly Democratic, it is likely that the results will represent a compromise between the political leaders of both major parties. Governor Cuomo has stated that he will veto any redistricting legislation that does not contain a provision for an independent districting commission. It will require some twisting for the three men in a room to reach agreement.

If they do not agree, the state courts will eventually take over the redistricting process (unless federal laws are violated). The court will bring in independent experts to draw the lines, subject to judicial review and approval. Equitable and reasonable district boundaries are usually unacceptable to both political parties. After the rivals see what the court has done, the Republicans and Democrats scurry to make a deal to create or abolish districts so as to protect their favorites and discommode their known enemies, rivals or potential adversaries.

The leaders of the Assembly and the Senate can use their power of districting to reward or punish legislators who do not obey their instructions, or who demonstrate undue independence in voting and sponsoring legislation. The leaders also determine the legislative payroll; giving ordinary members more or fewer staff members, depending on their fidelity to the wishes of the powers that be. They also award member items, for local improvements and expenditures, again on the basis of political subservience rather than community need.

Once in place, speakers or majority leaders are extremely difficult to displace, and a failed attempt at a coup, which happened in the Assembly in 2000, can result in the political destruction of the plotters, and a period of exile for those aware of their intentions.

This political dance must be performed at the same time as the Legislature grapples with a $10 billion budget shortfall. The fact is that honest, impartial districting does not cost any more than gerrymandering, so the issues we discuss are not questions about money. They are, however, issues of power, and those are often more difficult to resolve than situations were people can simply be bought off, some quite cheaply as a matter of fact.




StarQuest #735 1.25.2011 884 words