Who has done better with Commissions and Court Maps?

[Skill and Chance]

Let's look at the states that have them and what would have happened if the politicians elected in 2010 were drawing the lines, or in the case of a court map, which party did better than they would have in a legislative compromise.


AZ:  The commission map is what a Democratic trifecta would have draw and it was passed in a GOP trifecta state  The anger on the right seems quite justified here as this is either 5D-4R or 5R-4D for the decade, when the legislature would have drawn a safe 7R-2D.

CA: The commission map is marginally more favorable to Democrats than the status quo, probably giving them 2 additional seats for 36D-17R in a neutral year.  However, Democrats would have been drawing the lines without the commission, and they could have easily done something like 40D-13R.  Much better for the Republicans if you assume the Democrats would have severely gerrymandered, or marginally better for the Democrats if you assume the legislature would have done an incumbent protection map.

CO: The court picked a map that gives the Democrats a 50/50 chance at a seat that would not have been in play in an incumbent protection map.

CT:  The court seems poised to draw something favorable to the Democrats by preserving the current map.  A 2/3rds majority requirement saves the Republicans here from 5 61% Obama districts.

FL: Still in progress, but the amendments will probably give the Democrats one additional seat outright and make them competitive in 1 or 2 others.  It's a Democratic win relative to the status quo but the size of the win remains to be seen.

IA: Very fair, every district becomes more swingy, and the two incumbents are merged in the closest district of them all.  Without the commission, it would have probably gone to court with similar results.

ID: The map made minimal changes and did not favor either party.  If the Repubicans were drawing the lines, they would also have little need to change things.

ME: Settled legislatively, but worth noting that a 2/3rds requirement (which has the effect of a bipartisan commission in many ways) saved the Democrats here from an R+2 district.

NJ: The commission tiebreaker picks a favorable map for Republicans.  Without a commission, it would have gone to court with Governor Christie vetoing the Democratic legislature's proposal.  The districts that lost the most population were held by Democrats, so a fair court would still have drawn two Democrats together in the north, but a special master definitely would not have made every GOP incumbent safer, so this is a marginal win for the GOP.

NM: The court picks a least change map.  The GOP Governor and Dem legislature could have agreed to the same, with no partisan effect.

NV: The court draws a fair map.  Both parties could have made a district safer for them in negotiations but chose not to.

WA: The commission passes a map that is marginally better for Republicans than the status quo at 5D-4R-1S.  If the Democratic trifecta had been drawing the lines, it would be at best 7D-3R, so this is a marginal win for the GOP relative to the status quo and a huge win relative to what could have been.
 
So to sum up, we have AZ, CO, and FL breaking for the Dems and NJ and WA breaking for the Republicans.  Who wins overall comes down to just how much you think the Democrats would have done in California if they had full control.   

[minionofmidas]

Technically, Rhode Island also has a Commission, though it replaces the two chambers' redistricting committees and its plans need to be approved by the legislature and Governor (besides, its composition is unabashedly partisan. It's an attempt at having your cake and eating it.)
All the safe 7-2 maps of Arizona rely on the VRA districts retrogressing out of the near western suburbs of Phoenix - the very part of these districts (along with Yuma) where block voting and turnout issues are most apparent, in order to swallow the white liberals in Tucson and east central Phoenix. I wouldn't have upheld any of them as a judge. 6-2-1 is very easy, though.

[Skill and Chance]

So to summarize:

vs. Status Quo

AZ: D+2 R-2

CA: D+2  R-2

CO: D+0.5  R-0.5

NJ: D-1

WA: D+0.5 R+0.5

vs. Very Partisan Map

AZ: D+2  R-2

CA: D-6?  R+6?

CO: D+0.5  R-0.5

NJ: No Change

WA: D-2.5  R+2.5

[Skill and Chance]

Updates for Court Maps and Commission Results:

Strong GOP win
NJ (-1 D, all GOP seats now safe)

Mild GOP win
NM (preserved favorable status quo)

Neutral
IA
ID
MS
NV
WA (some are calling this an R win, but the "toss-up" WA-01 district is D+3, the same as Larsen's current seat.  It's as if Larsen and Inslee traded PVIs.  The new seat is D+5, so I don't know what Dems are complaining about here.)

Mild Dem Win
CA
CT (preserved favorable status quo)

Strong Dem Win
AZ (probably +2 D in 2012)
CO (The new toss-up district moved 3 points to the left from 2004 to 2008, should be lean D by mid decade.)

Pending
FL
KY (a status quo map would favor the GOP here, right?)
MN
VA (Dems trying to send it to court)
WV

[minionofmidas]

Updates for Court Maps and Commission Results:

Strong GOP win
NJ (-1 D, all GOP seats now safe)

That's an overstatement. Win sounds right, though.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Is it? Compared to the "sanest" possible map, the status quo is actually somewhat favorable to Dems in the Albuquerque seat, and the strange details about the other two don't really matter as long as the broad outline is reasonable, unless odd swings happen (as they can in Little Texas, and did with Teague's election. It's country that hasn't quite given up on Democrats yet even though it usually votes Republican, sort of like many parts of the rural South.)

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Interpretable as (stronger words would be wrong) a mild GOP win, I think.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Uh... wot?

[Skill and Chance]

Updates for Court Maps and Commission Results:

Strong GOP win
NJ (-1 D, all GOP seats now safe)

That's an overstatement. Win sounds right, though.

Merging a Democrat into a 52% McCain seat while helping every Republican incumbent on the map is a big win.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Is it? Compared to the "sanest" possible map, the status quo is actually somewhat favorable to Dems in the Albuquerque seat, and the strange details about the other two don't really matter as long as the broad outline is reasonable, unless odd swings happen (as they can in Little Texas, and did with Teague's election. It's country that hasn't quite given up on Democrats yet even though it usually votes Republican, sort of like many parts of the rural South.)

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Interpretable as (stronger words would be wrong) a mild GOP win, I think.

You're worried about Loebsack?  But King also has more to worry about than he ever did before, so I think it evens out.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Uh... wot?

Yes, look it up on Cook.  The new WA-01 is a Kerry district that moved farther left for Obama in 2008.  It is D+3.  The new WA-10 is D+5

[minionofmidas]

Of course, the third (a 2010 R pickup and an Obama district) and the eightth (a perennial supermarginal R district) move all the way to safe R (objectively, according to Washington's small swings). And the 1st (and no, I'm pretty sure it's more Republican than the old 2nd even though that was technically swingy and occasionally contested, nevermind open) is the most Republican district that can be drawn up there, unless you cross pathless mountains or carve yet another ugly spike into the 8th that changes the numbers there.
There was no theoretically possible better outcome for Republicans here.

[they don't love you like i love you]

Hawaii actually has a commission too, though no one cares because there's really not any other way its districts could've been drawn, nor any way to draw a map that could deny the Democrats either of the seats in a one on one election.