Jan
16
Written by:
Joe Stanley
1/16/2009 8:25 PM
This Monday at 7am, three efforts to increase voter turnout in the Commonwealth will almost assuredly meet its death in the House of Delegates.
Three major categories of bills are being considered by two subcommittees (Constitutional and Elections) that were only scheduled today by the Privileges and Elections committee. These bills are efforts to:
1) Restore the right for ex-felons to vote.
2) Expand the allowable reasons for citizens to vote absentee.
3) Establish bi-partisan redistricting commissions.
Despite a host of good government efforts the House Republican Leadership have been putting forward this session, it is clear that they intend to continue their practice of depressing voter participation in our electoral system. While Ryan Rinn will be discussing the restoration of voting rights, I'd like to take a moment today and write about redistricting, an issue that has been dear to me for some time now.
I first became interested in politics my senior year of high school, an awakening I attribute to my government teacher Matthew McGuire. However, despite our discussion on a number of controversial issues, it wasn't until I learned about gerrymandering that I ever became honestly upset.
In short, gerrymandering is where legislators use the redistricting system to determine who their voters are, instead of voters determining their legislators. The majority party creates maps that shove all of the likely minority (party, not race) voters together. They do this so that while the minority party has a small number of guaranteed seats, the majority party effectively gets the rest of Virginia, and control of the House of Delegates.
I won't get into details, because the impact of gerrymandering has been studied and written about numerous times. However, it is important to realize that this is one of the most fundamental dangers to our system of government. Just like with a rigged game, people grow cynical and refuse to vote in pointless races. Consequently, turnout becomes abysmal, and those playing the system have full reign to keep on gerrymandering. Perhaps if this was only a game, it would be acceptable; however, the stakes here are much, much higher.
When I graduated high school, I told myself that I would work to end gerrymandering in the Commonwealth. Everything I've done since has been an effort to work towards that goal, and I'm happy to say that these days, that's a big part of my job. It's not easy, to say the least. After all, how do you pass a bill that would benefit the citizens at the expense of the majority party? Especially when they can kill these bills at 7am on a holiday, the day before our presidential inauguration?
Let me tell you how: By not allowing them to win that easily. We'll be recording the event Monday morning, and we'll be knocking on thousands of doors all throughout the Commonwealth to inform voters about the partisan gerrymandering that is going on right under our noses. Only when we all begin to realize that these past years of partisan gridlock, worrying over social issues while our transportation infrastructure is ignored, and constant budget battles are all a result of gerrymandering, will we begin to fight back. Unfortunately, we don't have much time left. This fall is the last election before the General Assembly redraws the state electoral lines again in 2010.
Virginia is still a state where people come to work, live, and raise their families. I want to raise my own children here one day, but I fear what another decade of petty squabbling will do to the Commonwealth. Let's make sure we avoid that fate by ensuring the redistricting bills in the state Senate this year get through.
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