10 OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2017 THE NEW YORK CONSTITUTION NYPEOPLESCONVENTION.ORG
How a Convention Can Make Elections Fairer
- Shirley Chisholm
#YESWE
CONCON
Vote YES on Question 1 to
Revise the NYS Constitution
www.forwardmarchny.org
BY EVAN A. DAVIS
Gerrymandering is the enemy of accountable
government and breeds
division rather than consensus. It
is, together with corruption, the major
force leading to government dysfunction.
Gerrymandering is the drawing of
voting districts to serve a political agenda.
Th ey can be drawn to favor the election of
cand idates of a particular party. Th ey can
also be drawn to include voters likely to
support a particular candidate.
In all cases these districts are anticompetitive,
and reduced competition reduces
accountability. Increasing the number of
safe voting districts for one party or the
other mitigates the competition between
parties that is a major source of accountability
in our political system. Making
a voting district safe for a particular
incumbent even more directly eliminates
accountability.
Gerrymandering is also a key cause of
divisiveness. When political parties compete,
they are competing for the votes in
the center of the entire political spectrum.
However, when safe districts are created,
the focus of competition shift s to primary
races. Th is creates two problems. First,
independent voters in New York have no
voice in primary races: only party members
can vote. Th e moderating infl uence of
the independent voter disappears.
Second, in a primary, the competition
is for likely primary voters. In this group
of voters, activists at both ends of the
political spectrum are overrepresented.
Polarization results, and polarization is
a key cause of government dysfunction.
Th is tendency toward dysfunction is
heightened in New York because of our
tradition that each house of the Legislature
gets to draw its own lines, combined
with the fact that a bill must be passed in
both houses to become a law.
While racial gerrymandering is subject
to judicial review, so far partisan gerrymandering
has not been. Th is has been
because of the absence of rules that distinguish
partisan gerrymandering from
the drawing of district lines to include
communities with common interests
and needs.
In New York the drawing of voting
district lines is highly partisan and used
to advance political agendas. A good example
is New York’s 34th Senate District.
Th at District is held by Jeff Klein, the
leader of the Independent Democratic
Conference and co-leader of the coalition
between that conference and the Senate
Republicans. In order to secure this coalition,
the Senate “majority” has given
Senator Klein a highly gerrymandered
safe district in the Bronx that unites likely
Klein voters on both sides of the county
with a few in Westchester.
Because gerrymandering is such
an obvious disgrace in New York, the
Legislature felt compelled to propose a
redistricting amendment to the people in
2014. Th at amendment fails, however, to
provide for independent redistricting. As
a result, the Court required that the word
“independent” be struck form the ballot
question presented to the voters.
Th e Legislature’s redistricting amendment
is 4,296 words long and creates
a convoluted redistricting system controlled
by the political parties where the
Legislature has the fi nal say.
By contrast, the 1967 Convention
proposed a 258-word redistricting provision
that took the power to draw voting
district lines away from the Legislature
and gave it to a fi ve-member independent
body empowered to act by majority vote,
where the majority and minority leaders
in each house of the Legislature appointed
one member and the Chief Judge of the
Court of Appeals appointed the Chair.
Th e constitutional changes proposed by
the 1967 Convention went down to defeat
due to a mistake of presenting them on an
all-or-nothing basis—a mistake that won’t
be repeated. Th at defeat has absolutely
nothing to do with any popular objection
to the redistricting proposal.
Because gerrymandering is hard to
eliminate with specifi c rules, it is very
important who draws the lines. The
1967 Convention took exactly the right
approach by giving that power to a truly
independent body.
We can resurrect that 1967 proposed
amendment only by holding a Constitutional
Convention. It is crystal clear that
there is no chance that the Legislature is
open to any change in their 2014 partisan
handiwork, and without a Convention the
State Constitution can only be changed with
Legislative approval.
Let’s seize the opportunity and not wait
another 20 years. Th ings will only get
worse.
Evan A. Davis was counsel to Governor
Mario Cuomo and is manager of the Committee
for a Constitutional Convention.