Redistricting will determine the future control of Congress.
—KEVIN MACK, DEMOCRATIC LEGISLATIVE CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE Redistricting is the window through which we may view something more profound and disturbing about our Winner Take All system. Much as a comet brings to scientists periodic information from the farflung reaches of the galaxy, the decennial line-drawings that occurred in 1991–1992 and 2001–2002 afforded us an opportunity to glimpse a rare insight into the workings of our clanking, antiquated, eighteenth-century democracy technology. Taken in its totality, the madcap mayhem known as redistricting raises even more general doubts about single-seat districts themselves, and about Winner Take All in general.
Virginia’s November 1999 state legislative elections may have given us a glimpse of our Winner Take All future, and it isn’t pretty. In those elections, Republicans pioneered a new tactic in carving up the political map that elevates redistricting gaming and brinkmanship to an audacious, even disturbing level: they purposefully withheld candidates from running in local races against popular Democratic incumbents, hoping to give Democratic voters in these regions fewer reasons to go to the polls. The goal was to depress Democratic voter turnout in specific geographic areas that overlapped closer state legislative races. What’s more, both Republicans and Democrats targeted a few pivotal races for lavish spending while withdrawing candidates from many other races where they didn’t stand a chance.
Consequently, an astounding three of five state legislative races in Virginia had no candidate from one of the two major parties. That’s 60 percent of districts where voters had no choice other than to ratify the lone major party candidate.1 Helped by this tactic of slicing and dicing the political map, Republicans were able to drive down Democratic voter participation and precisely target more money to the few close races. The result? The Republican Party won control of the state legislature for the first time in Virginia’s history, even though the statewide vote two years later elected a Democrat for governor. These trench warfare strategies were so successful in Virginia that gleeful Republican leaders exported them to other states in time for the 2000 elections.2
Following the Republican takeover of the statehouse, Virginia’s Democratic U.S.
Senator Chuck Robb lamented that the Republicans now would “determine who gets elected to Virginia’s General Assembly for the next 10 years,” a rather astonishing conclusion for a single election until you understand another little- known and quirky fact about our neofeudal single-seat district system. It is literally true that voters in 1998 and 2000 were determining representation for voters throughout the next decade—they had more impact on who will win state and congressional elections in the year 2004 than voters in 2004. That’s because whichever party completes the trifecta of winning control of the governor’s seat as well as the House and Senate of a particular state at the start of each decade wins the godlike power to redistrict their state’s legislative district lines, not only for all their state’s legislative seats but also for that state’s U.S. House seats.
By using techniques like “packing,” whereby the lines are drawn so that you pack as many as possible of your political opponents’ voters into a few districts, and
“cracking,” where you split your opponent’s supporters into two or more districts, those controlling the redistricting process can game the system, dramatically heightening their chances at winning the remaining districts. In Virginia, Republicans completed the trifecta and dominated redistricting in early 2001 (before the state elected a Democratic governor in late 2001); they were able to use these tactics to make their own congressional seats more safe and weaken one Democratic seat. In California, when Democrats regained control of the governor’s seat in 1998 and completed the trifecta, they gained monopoly control over redrawing California’s fifty-three U.S. House seats–12 percent of the national total
—and 120 state legislative seats. The tactics of packing and cracking are so effective that Democrats gave abrupt notice that certain Republican Congressman could start looking for new work. “If James Rogan and Steve Horn are still in office after 2002, they will be representing districts in the Pacific Ocean,” crowed one Democratic consultant (Rogan lost reelection in 2000, before his district was redrawn; Horn indeed was redistricted out of his seat, prompting his retirement from politics).3
Republican and Democratic analysts both say that control over the redistricting process gives a party such an advantage that the fifty state legislative and gubernatorial elections in 1998 and 2000—not the Congressional elections or the presidential election—determined who will hold a majority in the federal U.S.
House of Representatives right through 2010. Jim Nicholson, chairman of the Republican National Committee, stated before the 2000 elections, “The winners [of the state legislatures] are going to determine the political landscape in at least the first decade of the next millennium, because they are the people who are going to preside over the process of reapportionment and redistricting of their respective states as a result of the 2000 census.” In fact, numerous observers have stated that the outcome of the 1994 elections—when Republicans took control of Congress for the first time in forty years—was due in no small part to Republican gains made during the 1991–1992 redistricting. Morton Kondracke, writing for Roll Call, estimated that less than 12,000 voters nationwide—six-hundredths of 1 percent of the eligible voting population— swung the 1994 vote to the House Republicans.4
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So the battle to complete or prevent the trifecta is fierce, and that’s why, while the public’s attention was riveted on the face-off between Al Gore and George W.Bush, the low-intensity conflict for control of the nation’s statehouses was just as pivotal.5 Despite the fundamental importance of these state legislative races at the end of each decade, for the most part they fly under the public’s radar. But both parties were totally focused and engaged, committing unprecedented resources to end-of-the-decade legislative and gubernatorial races, targeting record-setting gobs of money to those few races where it would make a difference.6 The trench warfare was fought state by state, district by district, in a handful of close races, the
“Gettysburg” of our political landscape. In fact, the chance to draw districts that can screw your opponent is such a great prize that the Republicans and Democrats drove spending on state legislative elections past the billion-dollar mark for the first time in the 2000 elections.7
The numbers reflected the gravity of what was at stake: prior to the 2000 congressional elections, Democrats controlled both houses in nineteen state legislatures, Republicans in eighteen, and twelve were split (Nebraska’s unicameral legislature is officially nonpartisan but leans conservative). In perhaps fifteen states, including some of our most populous states, the political balance was close enough that both parties had a chance at taking a majority in the November 2000 elections.8 The races came down to raw numbers: thirty-three legislative chambers in twenty-three states; a crucial 250 or so legislative seats up for grabs out of over 7, 000–a measly 3 percent of all seats.9 At the time, given the wire-thin margin of the GOP’s House majority—222 to 211 with two independents, the narrowest preelection edge since 1954—even a small shift could have had big implications for national politics. Swing states like Michigan, where party control of the state house has switched back and forth for the past three elections, was once again in play, just like it was for the presidential race. Other big swing states, including Texas, Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, were battlegrounds in the winner-take-all-or- nothing game. Whichever party was ahead in the battle for state legislative seats at the end of the decade—not two years later in 2002, or two years earlier in 1998, but exactly following Election Day in November 2000—was going to win the grand prize.
What should be obvious from this reality of our political landscape is that, in a geographic-based system like Winner Take All, such gaming over the political map becomes an inevitable part of the strategic political tussle. The full force of this zero- sum dynamic is unleashed at the end of every decade when the incumbents and party leaders prepare to redraw their own district lines. The handful of competitive races become the contested terrain of partisan warfare, with much at stake because the “winner takes all,” including control of the state legislatures and the U.S.
House.
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The Hidden National Election
This is a life-and-death struggle for survival. It just gets ugly.
—KEN KHACHIGIAN, VETERAN GOP STRATEGIST IN CALIFORNIA We’re very opportunistic. You have to think of us as the great white shark.
—DARRY SRAGOW, POLITICAL CONSULTANT, STRATEGIST FOR DEMOCRATIC CAMPAIGNS IN CALIFORNIA Despite the high stakes, the role of the national parties in state legislative races goes largely unnoticed, deliberately hidden by the Washington, DC-based national party leaders’ eagerness to avoid accusations of meddling in local and state affairs. Tim Storey from the National Conference of State Legislatures said of the national-level influence: “It’s very, very difficult to get a handle on it. It’s way behind the scenes, and it’s hard to figure out what kind of money is being moved out to those [state legislative] campaigns. But it’s a very sophisticated operation.” Added Tom Hofeller, redistricting director for the Republican National Committee, “It’s the hidden national election of 2000.”10
The political skirmish of redistricting is often compared to Cold War espionage, in which the two “superpowers” are vying for tiny districts of strategic terrain, and half the game is trying to figure out what the other side is doing and where they are really putting their resources. The rest is trying to determine where the sneak attacks will be, with every move as much art as science, based more on instincts than information. And events large and small—like the impeachment gambit—can change everything.
For instance, in 1990 members of Congress pioneered a new ploy in the constant drive for incumbent protection during redistricting—they quietly dumped millions of dollars into the coffers of state legislative leaders and legislators, not only out of loyalty to help their party in the battle for control of the state legislature but also with the intent to influence the way the state lawmakers drew their new congressional districts.11 It was raw Darwinian self-preservation, pure and simple.
Occasionally incumbents from the same party will get drawn into the same district and pitted against each other, as personal vendettas get carried out between and even within parties. Not surprisingly, members of Congress always have eyed the statehouse anxiously in the first year of a new decade. “It makes it very disconcerting for members of Congress that their future rests in the hands of 400 to 500 state legislators that they don’t know,” said Kevin Mack, who headed the 2000 Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee.12
So the 1990 election saw money flow from Washington to state capitals in creative, unprecedented, and often unseen ways. State laws made the task easier, permitting contributions under state law that would have been illegal under federal
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law. The most conspicuous source of money was congressional members’ own campaign committees. Some members of Congress formed their own state PACs, and other members became adept at “bundling” contributions from their own wealthy contributors and federal committees to state legislative candidates and state campaign committees—so contributors to federal congressional campaigns in effect became contributors to state legislative campaigns, whether they knew it or liked it or not. What set the 1990 effort apart from previous efforts was its breadth and sophistication, according to party operatives. It was a financial strategy borrowed from the Washington lobbyists’ handbook: give to get in the good graces of the decision makers—in this case, state legislators redrawing congressional districts. And make sure the important people know who is doing the giving.13
These tactics and manipulations were revived and refined for the 1998 and 2000 elections. For the 1998 election, the Republican National Committee and Democratic National Committee and other national committees of both parties transferred a combined $49 million in hard and soft dollars to the state parties and targeted state and local candidates. In 2000 they gave even more money.14 Every advantage was explored and exploited because there is so little wiggle room between success and failure. As natural partisan demographics and regional divisions have become more rigidified in Bushlandia and New Goreia, and as the redistricting computer technology becomes ever more effective at carving up the districts to precise partisan specifications, there simply aren’t that many competitive seats left up for grabs.
How important redistricting is to the national parties was demonstrated in Pennsylvania’s special election in June 2000 to fill a single vacant state house seat that was predicted to be a close race. With the Pennsylvania house tied at one hundred seats for each party (with three vacancies), and with the GOP already in control of the state senate and the governor’s mansion, Republicans were fighting to complete their trifecta and Democrats were fighting to prevent it. That lone seat in that special election very well might have determined the balance. The candidates spent millions of dollars, most of it raised from national campaign committees and outside sources. Vice President Gore campaigned in the district and President Clinton recorded radio spots for the Democratic candidate. GOP Governor Tom Ridge and national Republicans actively supported the Republican candidate.
Meanwhile, ninety-one of Pennsylvania’s house candidates (45 percent) faced no major party opponent in November 2000, as the two parties ignored districts they could not possibly hope to win.15
After the dust from the November 2000 election had settled all across the country, the Ds and Rs had dueled to a near-draw—the split in the U.S. House had crept a hair closer, 221–212, with two independents. The U.S. Senate was exactly split 50–50, and the presidential vote was a dead heat as well. At the sub-radar state legislative level, eighteen state legislatures stayed with the Republicans, and the Democrats lost control of three previously held, down to sixteen. The close breakdown reflected the nation’s delicate political balance.16
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“You’ve got two minority parties right now,” said Ron Faucheux, a former Louisiana legislator and editor-in-chief at Campaigns & Elections magazine. “Neither party has a majority of the national electorate on their side.”17 Political journalist Michael Barone agreed, writing “The prospect ahead is for close elections, closely divided Congresses, and bitterly fought battles over issues and nominations.”18 The balance and the stakes drove up the costs—and the acrimony—of these elections, particularly in the closest races and in the overall drive to win control of the state legislatures and the U.S. House.
Climaxing a remarkable political decade for the GOP, for the first time since 1956 the GOP had won control of more state legislatures than the Democrats. After adjusting for seats added or subtracted to various states as a result of reapportionment, both Democrats and Republicans had complete control over redistricting one hundred U.S. House seats each.19 In those states they mercilessly tried to carve back their opponent’s share of congressional seats with the calculating nerve of cold-blooded executioners. In Michigan, a GOP trifecta created a congressional gerrymander that stuffed six Democratic incumbents into three seats;
in Georgia, the Democrats drew a congressional map that buried four GOP incumbents into two districts.20 Nevertheless, considering that the Republicans controlled the redrawing of only five seats following the 1990 census, the past decade marked a staggering reversal and a GOP ascension to power. Not since the 1920s have so many seats been under Republican control.21 The Republican takeover of Congress in 1994 and the subsequent GOP victories in the 1996 and 1998 congressional elections marked the first time since the 1920s that the Republicans had maintained control of both the U.S. House and the Senate for more than a single two-year term.22
Not long after the 2000 elections Tim Storey, policy analyst and redistricting expert with the National Conference of State Legislatures, commented, “Both parties can claim victories by virtue of holding on to the status quo in some critical states. The redistricting wars will now begin in earnest.”
The GOP Power Surge
This is all about the Republicans from affluent parts of the state— the suburbs around Pittsburgh and Philadelphia—controlling the General Assembly. What they want to do is eliminate a Philadelphia seat or a Pittsburgh seat in exchange for a new seat in the wealthy suburbs. It’s all about control
—ROBERT MELLOW, PENNSYLVANIA SENATE MINORITY LEADER, DEMOCRAT23 With the Democrats and Republicans so implacably close, naturally there has been much anxious speculation about how reapportionment and redistricting in 2001 ultimately will affect control of the U.S. House for the rest of the decade until
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2010, as well as the Electoral College vote for president (since each state is granted one electoral vote per House seat). Of particular note, those districts previously drawn for racial representation that likely helped the GOP win control of the U.S.
House in 1994 were unpacked to some degree in certain states during the 2001–
2002 redistricting, which may allow Democrats to pick up a few more seats. Longer term, six of the eight states gaining seats have rapidly expanding, Democratic- friendly Latino populations. With the two sides so closely matched—only a six-seat difference in the House—the math gets complicated and highly speculative when trying to predict our congressional future.24
But what is most interesting—and no doubt alarming, if you are from the Democratic or liberal side of the aisle—is that if you look merely at voting margins between Democrats and Republicans, while there is a dead heat nationally for president, U.S. Senate, U.S. House, control over state legislatures, even the number of congressional seats in trifecta states, nevertheless the Winner Take All system has translated this dead heat into a sweeping GOP triumph. In fact, one could argue that the Democrats still retain a popular voting majority: in the 371 U.S. House seats where both Democrats and Republicans fielded a candidate, the Democrats actually won more votes, yet the distortions of the Winner Take All districts allowed the GOP to win disproportionately more of those seats, 191 to 179 (with one independent).25 At any rate, the net result from Election 2000 was the first time since the 1920s that one party has held the presidency, the House of Representatives, the Senate (until moderate GOP Senator Jim Jeffords jumped to the independent ship), a functional majority on the Supreme Court, and a majority of both state houses and governors—even though both sides essentially were tied nationally in 2000, indeed for the last several election cycles. But the gaming and distortions of the Winner Take All system have allowed one side of the political divide to commandeer an astounding degree of power.
Moreover, when you add up all the gains and losses on both sides for the past two decades, perhaps the most startling fact is that the national vote differences between Republicans and Democrats changed relatively little throughout that era. From 1980 to 1992 Democrats won a nationwide average of 53 percent of aggregate votes for the U.S. House; from 1996 to 2000 the Democrats won an average of 48 percent (with the Republicans averaging also about 48 percent from 1996 to 2000)—a shift of only five percentage points. Nevertheless, due to the distortions and gaming of Winner Take All, that resulted in a huge swing in the Congress. Such are the roller- coaster vagaries of our geographic-based system, that a national swing of only five percentage points, spread out over the right districts and the right swing states with the legislative lines drawn just the right way, catapulted the opposition party into power, with dramatic impacts on national policy.
There is an arbitrariness to the swing of this pendulum that is rather unset tling.
Recall Chapter 1, where we saw the Representation Ripoff in various states—one side winning more than its fair share of representation at the expense of the other side. But this is more like a Political Power Ripoff, where one side has risen to enormous heights of power at state, federal, presidential, and judicial levels, even
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