# How did all this "gerrymandering" happen to us? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 3, 2017, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-all-this-gerrymandering-happen-to-us/778879 "2017-02-03T03:26:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Kevbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e47774/32.png) [@Kevbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kevbo)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2017, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-all-this-gerrymandering-happen-to-us/778879/61 "2017-02-13T20:08:29Z")
Starting in the Clinton years, republicans made big efforts to take over local and state governments from the ground up. Once they have control of the state houses, they can then be in charge of redistricting in census years, and thence the U.S. House of Representatives. Occasionally an outsider will burst onto the scene, but most politicians start small, on school boards, utility commissions, etc. The more of these low-level folks a party has, the more chance they have to push their brand, and they have a bigger pool from which to find the stars…the ones the voters and donors really like. Democrats have been slow to catch on, but it is starting. Dog catcher is not an elected position where I live, but I was part of getting the most progressive (and pro-science) candidate elected to the district slot on the school board a few days ago. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2017, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-all-this-gerrymandering-happen-to-us/778879/62 "2017-02-13T21:25:02Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Yes it’s interesting how the City of Baltimore is carved up. I’m a resident of district 2, but nearly surrounded by district 3. Utah is a lot of fun to live in… if you’re a Republican. The state is divided into thirds, like a pie, with the center of the pie being Salt Lake City- so all those Republican rural voters outnumber the big city liberals. There’s one other district- right in the center of the valley, which occasionally goes blue. The other districts? Not a chance that they’ll ever go anything other than red. It’s a pretty textbook example of gerrymandering to ensure Republican votes. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2017, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-all-this-gerrymandering-happen-to-us/778879/63 "2017-02-14T02:42:27Z")
> [@Lightnin](#): > > Utah is a lot of fun to live in… if you’re a Republican. > > The state is divided into thirds, like a pie, with the center of the pie being Salt Lake City- so all those Republican rural voters outnumber the big city liberals. There’s one other district- right in the center of the valley, which occasionally goes blue. The other districts? Not a chance that they’ll ever go anything other than red. It’s a pretty textbook example of gerrymandering to ensure Republican votes. For being a textbook example, we Republicans sure managed to screw it up: Matheson managed to win in 2012 (by a few hundred votes). Furthermore, Mia Love only managed a narrow win over Doug Owens in 2014. She did a bit better in 2016 (fun random fact: I know Collin Simonsen, the Constitution party candidate, personally), but if Utah Republicans were any good at gerrymandering, they’d have shaved off a few tens of thousands of Republican voters from the other three districts where they win by an average of 100,000+ and made the UT-4 district safe Republican territory. ---
**Author:** ![igor\_frankensteen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/839c29/32.png) [@igor\_frankensteen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/igor_frankensteen)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2017, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-all-this-gerrymandering-happen-to-us/778879/64 "2017-02-15T00:57:38Z")
The fact that cheating occasionally fails, doesn’t mean it isn’t cheating. ---
**Author:** ![JXJohns](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jxjohns/32/469_2.png) [@JXJohns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JXJohns)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2017, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-all-this-gerrymandering-happen-to-us/778879/65 "2017-02-15T01:19:38Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > An independent system sounds good on paper, but how does it work in practice? If the legislature or the governor set the districts, it’s obviously going to be political. If some appointed officials like judges or some special committee pick the boundaries, then the appointments will be political. If the boundaries are set by a popular election, that’s political. > > Do you just select a random group of people like a jury? Or have a computer draw lines on a map? > > Besides this, a lot of people disagree on what an impartial result would look like. Suppose you have a state which has 60% Republicans and 40% Democrats with ten congressional districts. Should there be six Republican districts and four Democratic districts? Or ten districts each with 60% Republicans and 40% Democrats (which effectively means ten Republican districts)? My state keeps it pretty fair: [Iowa](http://www.timesunion.com/opinion/article/Gerrymandering-Not-in-Iowa-1336319.php) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-all-this-gerrymandering-happen-to-us/778879.md?page=3)