US with Canadian parties

[Хahar 🤔]

Coming soon

[Хahar 🤔]

All right, let's start.

California

The inland far north would be pretty solidly Conservative, while the coast north of Sonoma County would be generally Liberal, although the NDP would have strength in places like Arcata and Mendocino. Further south, the Bay Area would lean NDP. Rich suburbs like in Marin and the South Bay would usually vote Liberal, but those would fall to the NDP in 2011. San Francisco would be safe NDP, falling only in 1993. Oakland would stay NDP even in that election. There might be areas that were once pockets of PC strength, but those would be gone after Diefenbaker. Santa Cruz would be NDP, while Monterey and Salinas would swing between the NDP and the Liberals. In the Central Valley, Sacramento, Stockton and Fresno would be Liberal, although the NDP would pose a major threat in 2011. With increasing suburbanization coupled with existing political trends, the Sierra foothills (El Dorado and Placer counties in particular) would have gone from solidly Liberal in 1993 to very safe Conservative in 2011.

In the southern San Joaquin Valley, Bakersfield and Kern County would be very Conservative; Reform would have won here handily. San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara would lean Liberal, but in 2011 the Grits would lose all but the major coastal cities of the area. The Southern California metropolitan area would be the Liberal heartland; aside from a few NDP areas in inner Los Angeles and scattered Tory strength in parts of Orange County and San Diego, it would be a sea of red. The real Liberal problem in 2011 would be the loss of this area; much like in Toronto, the Grits would be squeezed on two sides, with the NDP making huge gains in Los Angeles County and the Tories picking up seats in San Diego, Orange County, the Inland Empire (heretofore comfortably Liberal), and the San Gabriel foothills. To the east, Imperial County would be won by the Liberals every time.

Provincially, politics would be based on geography as much as ideology. There would be a prominent sectional divide in politics thanks to issues like water. In Northern California, the NDP would win almost everywhere, and the NDP leadership would be composed almost exclusively of northerners. The center-right Liberal party would be predominant in Southern California (although not to the extent that the NDP would hold sway in the north). A rump PC party would hold a handful of rural inland seats, but would be a non-factor most everywhere else.

[Хahar 🤔]

So, California = BC?

In a lot of ways, yeah. The biggest difference might be that California has two major metropolitan areas and British Columbia only has one. There's some Ontario involved, too; Los Angeles in particular I treated a lot like Toronto.

I like how you've followed the Canadian provincial tradition of giving California's "provincial" parties different strengths. I wonder if any states will have parties like the Saskatchewan Party. Maybe in the south?

One of the most interesting things about Canada is that there's a multi-party system federally but almost every province has a two-party system. It's fun to try to translate that to a different context.

The Saskatchewan Party is basically Tories with a funny name; while it's conceivable that something like that could happen in the United States, I'm not sure it's feasible to prognosticate where it would occur. We'll see if it comes up.

[Хahar 🤔]

There was also a very right-wing Tory from Quebec back in the '80s; his name escapes me now.

EDIT: Ricardo Lopez

[Хahar 🤔]

So will the South, with its insistence on states' rights, have a separatist party like Quebec, or more "the South wants in", like Reform out West?

The latter, I would say. There's no place in America as different as Quebec, and the South's grievances have a lot in common with Western Canada's, although the Western United States is that way as well. I think you would see Texas as the heart of the Reform Party base, being both Southern and Western. Dallas would be similar to Calgary in terms of importance to the conservative movement.

[Хahar 🤔]

So will the South, with its insistence on states' rights, have a separatist party like Quebec, or more "the South wants in", like Reform out West?

The latter, I would say. There's no place in America as different as Quebec, and the South's grievances have a lot in common with Western Canada's, although the Western United States is that way as well. I think you would see Texas as the heart of the Reform Party base, being both Southern and Western. Dallas would be similar to Calgary in terms of importance to the conservative movement.

I can see Texas, with oil and cattle, as being similar to Alberta, although the Hispanic border area is probably unparalleled in Canadian politics?

Certainly it's not an exact comparison; Texas is bigger than Alberta, and it has things that Alberta doesn't (the sizable Hispanic population being most important). But that's what makes this exercise fun, doesn't it?

[Хahar 🤔]

I apportioned seats the Canadian way, with each state getting no fewer members than Senators and no fewer members than it had in 1984. Would anyone be interested in drawing constituencies and looking at how they might vote?

[Хahar 🤔]

That would be excellent. I started with Utah, the smallest state that I can say I'm familiar with:



The red riding, Salt Lake, is about ten percent larger than ideal, covering all of Salt Lake County. A large portion of Utah's non-Mormon population lives in this riding, which also contains the University of Utah, and so it would be able to elect a Liberal in a good year; it would have voted Liberal in 1993 and 1997 and perhaps 2000, but now it would be Conservative, although not by so large a margin as to deny the Liberals hope of retaking it. The green riding, Ogden—Logan, would be comfortably Conservative, and the blue riding, Provo—St. George, would be among the safest Conservative seats in the country.

[Хahar 🤔]

BTW Xahar, which formula did you use to apportion seats ? Initially I thought you were just keeping the same numbers and adding seats based on the two "clauses", but then I noticed California and Florida have less seats than IRL...

I divided each state's population by 435 to get an ideal constituency size, and then I divided each population by that ideal constituency size and rounded down to get the baseline number of seats. After that, I added seats based on the various clauses.

We could use DRA for doing this, you know. I'd do a few if I hadn't gotten 600 things on my plate.

I did use DRA, actually, but I made a map myself once I realized that I was making seats out of whole counties.

[Хahar 🤔]

Earl's two maps:

[Хahar 🤔]

Interesting. My uninformed perception of Massachusetts is that it would be more strongly Liberal, what with the association of Catholics with the Liberal Party. The Berkshires would be an especially interesting case; offhand I would expect them to be traditionally Liberal, but they might also be NDP.

[Хahar 🤔]

What would be the EQ for New York state? And how many people live east of NYC? Could you fit a full district in there? If someone can work that out for me, I could begin on NYC myself.

Nassau County and Suffolk County together fill almost exactly five ridings.

[Хahar 🤔]

Just for fun, I did an Idaho map with 14 Canada-sized constituencies.



Coeur d'Alene (dark salmon): 62.5% McCain
Bonner—Shoshone (olive): 62.3% McCain
Lewiston—Moscow (cornflower blue): 59.2% McCain
Caldwell (chartreuse): 68.9% McCain
Nampa (deep pink): 68.5% McCain
Boise West (cyan): 66.0% McCain
Boise—Cloverdale (slate blue): 58.3% McCain
Boise Center (dark gray): 62.3% Obama
Sawtooth—Salmon River (teal): 52.8% McCain
Owyhee—Twin Falls (gold): 69.5% McCain
Snake Valley (red): 77.8% McCain
Pocatello (dark magenta): 60.8% McCain
Blackfoot—Rexburg (red): 80.6% McCain
Idaho Falls (blue): 69.7% McCain

[Хahar 🤔]

If it were at all possible, I wouldn't split Pocatello and Idaho Falls; an east-west split would make most sense, given religious demographics.

[Хahar 🤔]

If it were at all possible, I wouldn't split Pocatello and Idaho Falls; an east-west split would make most sense, given religious demographics.

I know nothing about intra-state demographics of, well, pretty much any part of the US, so I'm not trying to sound obnoxious here (and also a reason why I'm not drawing any boundaries myself). I think Idaho currently has two Congressional Districts arranged east-west, though, doesn't it? Is this the reason?

Incidentally, Earl, I like your style of uploading the maps, with the clear markings of the counties, it makes it far easier when I'm trying to mark them on the map I've been using.

This map demonstrates pretty well the cultural split in Idaho:

[Хahar 🤔]

Ideally, the entire Boise metropolitan area would be in one district. That should be possible. I would make my own map, but I'm occupied at the moment.

[Хahar 🤔]

For cities, it would be "Center" instead of "Central", I would think.

Ideally, the entire Boise metropolitan area would be in one district. That should be possible. I would make my own map, but I'm occupied at the moment.

You mean put the panhandle in with the Mormon areas? That wouldn't be very compact looking.

Would that be necessary? The Boise metro area is less than 40% of the state's population.

[Хahar 🤔]

Staten Island certainly ought to be its own district; its population is 80% of ideal, but logical boundaries are more important than exact equality.

Center ought to be used for riding names, because this is America.

The Nevada map looks good, but I would change the names. The city of Las Vegas's boundaries don't really correspond to anything (the Strip, for instance, isn't in Las Vegas proper), so I would call those two ridings Las Vegas North and Las Vegas South. The other district's name is rather long; if we take the example of Churchill in Manitoba and name it after the largest river in the riding, we get the name Humboldt. I like that.

[Хahar 🤔]

The name Deseret is always associated with Mormonism. That wouldn't work. Would Great Basin be too vague?

[Хahar 🤔]

If there were one state that might vote for a socialist party at that time, I would think that it would be Wisconsin. Perhaps the CCF would also do well in Montana and Nevada, although that would likely have peaked earlier than 1940. The old copper towns of Butte and Anaconda would have been socialist strongholds for the last century, I would imagine.

[Хahar 🤔]

Alabama looks fine, and Nathan's Mississippi map looks good; that the Delta is kept together is important, I think.

I must say, there are a lot of em dashes in all these names. It's like these are all Quebec ridings.

[Хahar 🤔]

There's no need to have a constituency encompassing the San Jose city limits; they're utterly meaningless, as you can see by the shape of the municipality.

[Хahar 🤔]

I feel like more can be done in Santa Clara County; I live there, so I'll take a look sometime and see what I can do.

[Хahar 🤔]

Until Norm Mineta was elected Mayor, the objective of the government of San Jose was to annex as much land as possible. Other jurisdictions were forced to incorporate to avoid annexation, while San Jose gobbled up everything that it could, thus yielding the strange shapes.