Today's Election and A Primer on Gerrymandering

Today, August 5th is primary election day. In Ann Arbor, that means voters will be deciding the probable winners for the mayoral race as well as for City Council. There has been a lot of talk over the past decade (at least) about how America has become a nation of like-minded enclaves and clone communiities, where people hold the same political views and come from the same socioeconomic class.

Several years ago, I remember reading a piece by Clinton Administration Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich, called "The Secession of the Rich." In part, the article argued (take note--this is from memory) that the rich residents of a community were beginning to have more in common with rich residents of other communities, and thus one of the dilemmas facing local governments (and ultimately the federal government, because of globalization) was that a person of unlimited wealth could privatize all necessary services, such as garbage collection, road repairs, schools and social clubs, and therefore could easily 'secede' from everyone else in the community without the means to privatize such services, and who had to rely on public services and institutions. My own conclusion from this article was that people who all agreed in the complete privatization of all services would only rub shoulders with other complete pro-privatizers.

Has this come to pass in Ann Arbor? I don't think so. Instead, our secession has been of a different kind, and our clustering more one of likemindedness about political convictions. So, let me ask a naive question: why is it that in the August 5th primary, voters were choosing between two Democrats and that as far as I know, there were not going to be any contested elections in at least 3 of our ward districts for City Council?

To be sure, I know that there are other parties who may offer candidates for these important local positions: the Greens, the Liberarians and the Natural Law Party come to mind. And I will listen to their ideas before the general election on November 4th.

But, this poses a question that is an ethical one. Primaries only attract a minimal number of voters. There will be more voters in the upcoming November election, especially in a Presidential election year. So, is it fair for a minority to vote in a candidate? Single issue groups can be especially powerful in such elections.

Equally important, what are the ethical consequences for citizens when their communities have been redistricted? From what I gather, citizens don't really care about where their district lines are; in fact, I know that sometimes when I vote, I am surprised. I thought that I lived in one district, but instead live in another given the ballot. This is my fault for not knowing, and I take responsibility for it. But what about the politics of redistricting? There is a great term for it. It is called gerrymandering. According to the word's history, it is named after Eldridge Gerry, a Massachusetts governor (and signer of the Declaration of Independence), who wanted to ensure that he won his 1812 reelection. So, he determined to redraw the voting districts. Evidently, he was not a very good artist. One district resembled a salamander. What does it mean then?

According to Webster's dictionary then, gerrymandering is: "to divide (a voting area)so as to give one political party a majority in as many districts as possible... To manipulate unfairly so as to gain advantage..."

And as you can imagine, since Gerry's time, and because of computer software's precision, there have emerged new subcategories of gerrymandering. I will leave you to find out what packing, cracking and kidnapping in the context of redistricting means.

So, I am left with this issue today, after going to vote at my polling place, how should we try to get citizens interested in the potential ethical issues posed by gerrymandering and its variants? Should we, for example, make it something to make fun of in order to get people's attention? So, what if in Michigan, we were able to choose and vote on the form of our voting districts, using our favorite characters from popular culture? Would there be voting districts shaped like Sparty, the Michigan State mascot? The Batman and Spider Man? I would vote for a district shaped like "Hello Kitty."