Since the beginning of the republic, redistricting has been used as a tool for political advantage. However, we are in the midst of a particularly intense spasm of partisan-fueled gerrymandering.
State after state has redrawn its congressional districts to maximize partisan advantage for one side or the other. It is possible that this will never stop; every time a political party gains control of a state’s legislature and governorship, that party will create a gerrymandered map to maximize its electoral advantage. I hope that people’s better angels will prevail, and this cycle of partisan gamesmanship will soon come to an end.
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There really are only two ways to approach redistricting.
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The first is the principled approach that does not concern itself with outcomes or partisan advantage. Under this approach, mapmakers try to make districts as compact, uniform, and contiguous as possible, while keeping together as much as possible relevant communities. Iowa’s districts may be the ideal expression of this approach. Its legislative districts are, consistent with the principled approach, relatively uniform in size and shape, reasonably compact, and contiguous. This may be easier for Iowa because of its geography; its 99 counties are all basically squares, and it does not have any large mountains, lakes, or rivers that would create natural boundaries, making uniformity and compactness more of a challenge. But Iowa used this to its advantage and made districts that are (basically) immune to allegations of partisan gerrymandering.
The second way is for the majority to maximize partisan advantage. Under this approach, the mapmakers use all of the data available to them — including past political behavior and demographics — to engineer a map as friendly to the majority party as possible. This is accomplished primarily by “packing,” which is stuffing as many of the minority party’s voters into the fewest number of districts possible, and “cracking,” which is splitting the minority party’s voters across different districts to dilute their voting strength. This approach has a long and storied history in this country. In fact, the term “gerrymander” was coined to describe a district drawn in 1812 to benefit the Democratic-Republican party in state legislative races.
Political gerrymandering is becoming something of an art form in modern America. Armed with terabytes of data and sophisticated software programs, mapmakers today can engineer districts down to the individual house level to maximize advantage. And while this is a bipartisan effort across the country, the recent map put forward by Democrats in Virginia (narrowly approved by voters but overturned by Virginia courts on procedural grounds) is an almost perfect example. In an effort to turn a 6-5 Democratic advantage into one that is instead 10-1, the Virginia legislature proposed districts that ran hundreds of miles through the state, had five separate districts touch Fairfax County in some way, and another three touch Arlington County, in an effort to distribute the Democrat-rich areas across as many districts as possible.
I believe that the principled approach is the better one. The people should choose their representatives, not the other way around. And a principled approach to redistricting that focuses on compactness, uniformity, and contiguity seems the fairest since it is not designed to favor one group over another. But I can see the argument on the other side. I can understand the argument that drawing legislative boundaries is an inherently political activity, and it is perfectly legitimate for political actors to seek political advantage when undertaking political activities. And state legislatures and representatives can run explicitly on how they will maximize partisan advantage in the redistricting process. If the people are upset with what was done in redistricting, they can vote their representatives out of office.
What I cannot understand is the hypocrisy. Many who claimed to be advocates of the principled approach abandoned their so-called principles once the prospect of political advantage became too much to ignore. California created an independent commission to set legislative boundaries. But in 2025, it bypassed the commission to approve a highly gerrymandered map that maximized the Democrats’ partisan advantage. A similar story played out in Virginia, where the legislature tried to pass a highly gerrymandered map instead of following a commission-led redistricting process. Partisans in those states claimed that they needed to abandon their commitment to principle because legislatures in other states were engaged in highly partisan gerrymandering.
But that’s just an excuse. In reality, leaders in California and Virginia were showing that their attachment to principle was weak at best and nonexistent at worst. Your principles are your principles, not because it is easy to stick to them, but because it is hard. Leaders in Virginia and California showed that any prior claimed adherence to principle and neutrality in redistricting was highly conditional. Is it any wonder that American voters have become cynical and untrusting of politicians?
A milder form of hypocrisy comes from those who endorse one form of gerrymandering but not others. Many people of good faith sincerely believe that following the principled approach, or having redistricting done by independent actors who are not directly affected by it, but at the same time fervently believe that it is necessary to engage in racial gerrymandering in order for minority groups to “elect representatives of their choice.”
As an initial matter, this is bad policy because minority groups are not a monolithic bloc — I doubt that Thomas Sowell and Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) prefer the same political candidates, despite the fact that both are black. But more importantly, it undermines the basis of the principled approach. Once you’ve advocated some gerrymandering, it is difficult to provide a principled opposition to other forms of gerrymandering. Fortunately, the Supreme Court recently affirmed that states cannot consider race in the redistricting process, and we can get back to fighting for a principled approach everywhere without worrying about this or that exception to the rule.
OPINION: RECALIBRATION OR THEFT? THE CASE FOR REDISTRICTING DONE RIGHT
The redistricting fights unfolding across the country are part of a broader trend where there is a lack of trust by each party to believe the other will act fairly when power changes hands.
Leaving aside whether this lack of trust is warranted and where it came from, I still have faith that the American people will go back to acting on principle and recognize that it is OK to share power with people who might disagree with you on certain things. I just hope that faith is not misplaced.