It Probably Isn’t Fair, but It’s Reasonable : Redistricting tilts toward GOP, but Democrats asked for it

The special reapportionment panel appointed by the California Supreme Court has come up with what looks like a partisan plan. And the unrestrained glee of many Republicans makes it clear that the GOP came out better than the Democrats in what was supposed to be a nonpartisan effort to redraw political districts. But, given what the panel had to work with, and the history of reapportionments, the plan is, if not utterly fair, at least reasonable.

District lines for 52 seats in Congress and 120 in the Legislature are redrawn every 10 years, on the basis of population changes since the last census. Sometimes, reapportionment determines who makes political decisions for a decade. So the hard truth is that reapportionment is inherently political.

Now, if the many political incumbents who are so unhappy about the court’s action want to, they can try to work out a compromise with Gov. Pete Wilson. The court has given both sides until next month to suggest modifications. But there’s no incentive for Wilson to compromise--he’s reportedly pleased with the plan.

When the lines were drawn in 1981 the Democrats were in the driver’s seat. They controlled the Legislature and had an outgoing governor, Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr., who was willing to sign a reapportionment plan that was slanted in their favor. A key reason the current plan tilts toward the GOP is that it was almost impossible to balance what the Democrats did in the last go-round without leaning heavily to the other side.

This year, with a Republican as governor, the GOP opted to reject the Democrats’ remapping plan and send it to the courts, where the GOP figured to come out better. That’s because since the last census two GOP governors have filled the Supreme Court with Republican appointees, and those judges chose the panel of three retired jurists who eventually drafted the plan. But that does not mean the court’s plan is without merit: Judges, although not necessarily untouched by human bias, are trained in the law, and it appears that in drawing the map the panel put key considerations above partisanship.

It kept minority communities intact, as required by the federal Voting Rights Act. That could well mean an increase in the number of Latinos elected to public office, given the state’s changing ethnic makeup.

The panel also kept many cities and communities intact and returned to the old practice of having two Assembly districts within each state Senate district. That makes for more compact districts in which officials can more easily stay in touch with constituents.

What the panel clearly did not take much account of was the convenience of incumbents. In dozens of instances, incumbents were put into the same district with colleagues from the same party. They must either run against each other, move or change jobs. Given the anti-incumbent mood of the electorate these days, that’s likely to be cheered in many quarters. For that--like this issue winding up in court--incumbents have only themselves to blame.