Gerrymandering Ourselves to Partisanship

In a previous post,  "The (Root) Causes Of Our Dissatisfaction" I contended that one of the most important underlying causes of the extreme partisanship in Washington --and by extension, our failure to substantively address issues such as joblessness -- is the method of drawing up congressional districts known as gerrymandering.

A Brief Explanation: The 435 seats in the House of Representatives are allocated to the states pro-rata by their population. The decennial census is the basis for changing this allocation; it reflects relative changes in the states' population. 

In most states, the redistricting required when the state's number of seats in the House changes (plus or minus) is done by the state legislature. This places a premium on control of the legislature, because the controlling party can draw the districts in almost any way they choose. Where control is mixed, huge partisan fights can occur, and in states losing seat(s), part of the calculus involves which unfortunate congressperson will see their district combined with another's and have to fight an incumbent for re-election.

The word gerrymander is a combination of Massachusetts Governor Elbridge Gerry, who in 1812 directed a redistricting that resulted in one district that wags said resembled a salamander.

The Effects: When districts are drawn as to practically guarantee that one party will win, the real contest is  the primary of the party likely to win; the general election, is a foregone conclusion. This in turn means that the Republican primary candidates in Republican districts try to "out-Republican" each other; the same in reverse is true in Democratic districts. The effect is to drive Republicans to the right and Democrats to the left; thus these congresspeople arrive in Washington already poles apart, and in no need to compromise; in fact, compromise in Washington can "compromise" the representative's ability to win re-election, for fear of being primaried from the right (for the GOP) or the left (for the Democrats).

Thus, there is no mood to compromise, no need to compromise... and the media supporting the respective parties makes this even worse. 

Some Hope:  In a few states, notably California, the practice of having the legislatures do the redistricting has been ended and replaced by citizens' commissions or other more objective bodies, with good effect. But the majority of states still invest their legislatures with the power of redistricting, to the nation's great disfortune.