Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Supreme Court to states: Just make stuff up
In what I think has to be one of the more ridiculous rulings in its history, the Supreme Court has accepted the Texas redistricting ordered by Tom DeLay after he illegally used corporate money to seize control of the legislature-- or so his indictment alleges.
This opens the doors for congressional redistricting to be done every two years. The result could be chaos. In our entire national history, I seem to recall that the Texas case is only the second time redistricting has been done off of the decennial cycle.
The problem, you see, is that Census does proper demographic mapping only once every 10 years. In between times, estimates are performed, but they're just estimates. I don't see that the legislatures would be bound by them, and could just make it up.
Fortunately, there is a remedy. The Congress can and--when in Democratic hands-- should "re-district" the Supreme Court to remove every justice who voted for this contemptible result.
In the meantime, states should pass Constitutional amendments declaring that redistricting can only be done on the basis of real data.
More blogs about politics.
