Advanced Floterial Districts
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jimrtex
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« on: November 07, 2011, 10:24:30 PM »
« edited: November 12, 2011, 04:56:11 PM by jimrtex »

A floterial district is one that overlays one or more smaller districts and is designed to apportion representation while avoiding splitting counties or other political units.

Imagine we had County A that was entitled to 4.4 representatives, and its neighbor County B which was entitled to 0.6 representatives.   Collectively they are entitled to 5 representatives.  But rather than creating a single 5-member district, or having single member districts that cross the county line (4 districts in A, and one district including about 1/11 of A and all of B), we can use a floterial district that covers A and B.

So we would have 4 representatives from A (elected at large from the county, or elected from 4 districts that covered the entire county) and one representative from A and B together.  The problem with this approach is that while County A supplies 40% of the population, it supplies 88% of the vote.   Because of this, floterial districts are usually considered to violate the equal protect clause.  An exception would be if the two areas contributed equally to the floterial district.  For example, if two counties were each apportioned 1.5 representatives, they could each elect one representative and elect a 3rd together.

In an advanced floterial district, the votes from the contributing areas are weighted so that the weighted from each is proportional to their contribution to the apportionment population.  So in our original example, the votes from County A would be weighted by 0.4/4.4 or (0.091) and those from County B by 0.6/0.6 (or 1.000).

County B is simple.  We simply count the votes.  But County A is a little more complex.  3 possible approaches:

(A) Allocate the voters.  Before the election, 1/11 of the County A voters are randomly assigned to the Floterial district.  This is somewhat like a traditional districting scheme - but rather than assigning 1/11 of the population from a single geographical area, we assign 1/11 of the voters, selected randomly throughout the county.

(B) Allocate the votes.  Voters in County A vote for a representative from their county, and for a representative for the floterial district.  1 in 11 ballots are randomly selected in the floterial race, and 10/11 count in the County A races.  From a statistical point of view we could could all the ballots from County A, but this could be seen as giving those voters whose ballot counted in both races more voting power, even though they wouldn't necessarily know where their vote was counted.

(C) Weight the votes.  Voters in County A vote for a representative from their county, and for a representative for the floterial district.   Votes for the floterial district are weighted by 1/11 (in effect, every 11 voters in County A have the same influence as one voter in County B; but since there are so many more voters in County A, the overall influence is 40% of the total weighted vote).

Methods (B) and (C) are somewhat akin to the methods used for transferring surpluses in an STV election.  County A has a full quotas of population, and a surplus of 0.4 quotas.  Random selection of ballots that are counted at full value is similar to the system used in the Republic of Ireland and Cambridge, Massachusetts.  Weighted transfer of ballots is more like that used in Northern Ireland and Scotland (local elections).

A Practical Application

Texas has 32 congressional districts that don't have equal populations.  Texas is apportioned 36 representatives, and a map passed by the legislature and signed by the governor, but this has yet to be precleared by the District of Columbia federal district court.   Filing starts real soon.

Rather than drawing a new 36-district map, 4 floterial districts could be drawn.  Districts that have a large surplus over the ideal population would have a larger weight (TX-10 running from Houston to Austin has a 40.5% surplus, so its votes would be weighted by 0.288, or 28.8% of votes or voters "transferred" to the floterial count.

TX-20 in San Antonio has a surplus of 1.9%, so its votes would be weighted by 0.018.

A complicated factor in Texas is that four districts have less than 1/36 of the state population.  These are TX-13 and TX-19 in West Texas, TX-29 in Houston, and TX-32 in Dallas.  We could assign negative weighting to votes from these districts, which would mathematically correct.  But this would likely result in insincere voting, once voters realize that their vote would reduce the total of their chosen candidate.  So we must first top off these 4 districts with votes from other nearby districts, in a form of floterial districts.

And to ensure that the 4 floterial districts have equal (weighted) populations, votes in some areas will be split between two floterial districts.
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« Reply #1 on: November 07, 2011, 11:31:31 PM »

Can't happen unless Congress acts.  U.S. law requires single-member districts.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #2 on: November 08, 2011, 08:02:06 AM »

Can't happen unless Congress acts.  U.S. law requires single-member districts.
Each district elects a single member.

Also 2 USC 2a(c) provides for the at large election of newly apportioned representatives until the legislature provides a new plan following apportionment.
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« Reply #3 on: November 08, 2011, 10:54:37 PM »

2 USC 2c trumps 2 USC 2a(c) since it was passed later.  Multi member at-large districts are verbotten now.

Overlapping districts are not directly addressed, but it clear that the Federal law did not envisage the possibility of an intermediate position between all single-member non-overlapping districts and statewide at-large representation.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #4 on: November 09, 2011, 05:16:03 AM »

2 USC 2c trumps 2 USC 2a(c) since it was passed later.  Multi member at-large districts are verbotten now.

The US Supreme Court (6-3) has ruled differently  Branch v Smith
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jimrtex
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« Reply #5 on: November 12, 2011, 12:11:16 AM »



This shows the four floterial districts for Texas.  The 3 west Texas districts (TX-11, TX-13, TX-19) are nominally part of the central Texas district, but since they have a collective deficit, they don't actually contribute to the vote.  In fact, the reason that they are assigned to the central area is that TX-12 is used to eliminate the collective deficit.

Similarly TX-29 and TX-32 are underpopulated, and have their deficit made up from the surrounding districts in Harris and Dallas counties, so that voters in TX-29 and TX-32 actually do not vote in the floterial districts.

There are also balancing transfers from TX-6 to the central floterial district, from TX-10 to the Houston floterial, and from TX-25 to the south floterial district.  Thus voter in TX-6 would vote for a TX-6 candidate, a north floterial candidate, and a central floterial candidate.



This is a detail of the northern floterial district.  For each of the contributing districts, two numbers are shown.  The first number is the population in 1000s that would be transferred to the floterial district.  The second number is the relative share of the electorate that would be transferred to the floterial district.

So for example, if we transferred voters, 17.5% of voters in TX-4 would vote in the floterial district.  If we transferred votes, then voters in TX-4 would cast a vote for the TX-4 representative and the floterial district.  We would only count 17.5% of the floterial votes, and 82.5% of the TX-4 votes (this would have practically zero impact on the TX-4 result, it is equivalent to taking a random sample of 165,000 votes from a electorate of 200,000.

17.5% of TX-4 voters, is far less than 148,000; but represents the share of the population of the district, under the fiction of one man, one vote.

The percentages shown for TX-3, TX-5, and TX-24 is somewhat misleading.  The Dallas County portions of these districts all relieve the deficit of TX-32.  Overall, voters in the 3 districts have fractions of external votes of 0.171, 0.037, 0.118, respectively.  But in Dallas County, 0.085, 0.019, 0.059 is applied to the TX-32.  The fractions shown on the map are the weighted fractions for the entire district.

For example, the Collin portion of TX-3 would have a fraction of 0.171 applied to the floterial district while the Dallas portion would have 0.086 applied to the floterial district and 0.085 applied to TX-32.  The fraction shown on the map 0.146 is the weighted fraction.  The almost 50-50 split of the Dallas external votes is coincidental.  The TX-32 deficit is 49.9% of the surplus attributable to the Dallas portion of the other 4 districts.

A small portion of the TX-6 vote is toward the central floterial.  So voters would cast a full vote in TX-6, a 0.117 vote in the northern floterial, and a 0.020 vote in the southern floterial.

Arguably TX-6 and TX-12 could be swapped.  I think I put TX-6 in the DFW floterial because the majority of the district is in Tarrant County, but this is true of TX-12 as well, and more of Tarrant County is in TX-12 than TX-6.  TX-12 also contributes to the TX-13 deficit, so I think of it being slightly a West Texas district.  TX-12 has a greater population than TX-6, so it would create a greater imbalance between the DFW and central floterial, if TX-12 were part of the DFW floterial.

If instead of a floterial, a new district were created in northern Collin and Denton County, then TX-3, TX-4, TX-24, and TX-26 could directly contribute to it, and provide about 80% of the needed population.  If TX-12 were part of the DFW region, then Wise County and portions of Tarrant or Parker county could be added.  Most of the rest of the population could then come from minor adjustments elsewhere.  TX-5 and TX-30 for example could contribute more to the TX-32 deficit, which would let TX-3 transfer more to the new district in Collin County.

If one did not like floterial districts, or believed them to not be legal, a non-contiguous district could be constructed from portions of the other districts.  While much of the district could be contiguous, there would be some relatively small areas that were not.  This has the advantage of not requiring adjustments between existing districts.

Or one could distribute the fractional vote in each district.  And then migrate that to central location.  An area in Sabine County with 1000 persons would have 35 persons attributable to the new district.  This population of 35 persons would be shifted northwestward, and 35 persons attributed to TX-1 would be shifted southeastward, so that now the area with 1000 persons would be 100% TX-1 voters.  When this shift crossed a current district boundary, the district boundary would also shift so that TX-5 would shift slightly eastward.  Eventually the new district would coalesce.  This has an advantage of possibly being automated.  However, it might end up on top of an existing district, rather than in between districts.



This is the distribution of votes to eliminate the TX-32 deficit.  Only areas in Dallas County are used, so portions of TX-3, TX-5, and TX-24 contribute.  TX-26 is left out, since its population in Dallas County is so small (121).
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jimrtex
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« Reply #6 on: November 12, 2011, 04:55:02 PM »



The central floterial district is concentrated in the Austin area, but has significant population from the Houston and DFW areas.  A small part of the vote comes from TX-6.  TX-10 voters would also vote in the Houston floterial, TX-25 voters in the southern floterial; and TX-12 in making up the deficit of TX-13.

The placement of the labels on TX-10 may be misleading.  Voters throughout the district would vote in central floterial and the Houston trivial.  Though Michael McCaul is from Austin, a larger share of the district is in Harris County than Travis County, and it is population growth in the Harris county area, the last undeveloped part of the county that is fueling much of the surplus.

If this map were used as a guide for drawing a new district, it would make sense to swap TX-6 and TX-12, with a total of 135,000 persons being shifted from TX-6 to building a new district.  This would be from the southern part of TX-6 shifted into TX-17, permitting more of TX-17 to be shifted into TX-31 or the new district.  This would keep Parker county in a DFW district, and TX-6 would contract northward (to around Corsicana) with Arlington the dominant city (Arlington has a greater population than New Orleans, Pittsburgh, St.Louis, Cincinnati, or Buffalo, and nearly as much as Tulsa, Colorado Springs or Mesa).

Placement of a new district is problematic, as the logical core would be Williamson and Travis Counties, where districts with 70% of the surplus needed for the district meet.  This would end up pairing John Carter and Michael McCaul.  If you too the areas that the incumbents would be lost likely to consider as surplus it would be the northern part of TX-31 and the eastern part of TX-10 which aren't readily combined into a new district.

So the best solution would be to treat TX-10 as a Houston-based district, and create the new district beginning in Travis County.  Williamson and Bell have slightly more than enough for a district, so the new district would wrap around to the east through Milam, Falls, McLennan up into the northern parts of TX-31 and TX-17.   The above map shows that TX-6, 12, 17, and 31 have a combined surplus of 400,000 placed with the Travis County part of TX-10 is more than sufficient.  TX-10 would then extend from Harris County towards Austin but end up short of it.

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jimrtex
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« Reply #7 on: November 12, 2011, 06:31:20 PM »



The three west Texas districts have an collective deficit of just 13,863, with most of this attributable to TX-19, the northernmost district.  TX-11 has a surplus of over 12,000 from an oil boomlet in the latter part of the decade leading to growth in Midland-Odessa and retirees moving to the Hill Country.  TX-13 has a tiny deficit of 351, and TX-19 one of 25,700.

Texas grew about 10% faster than the country, but because of a favorable rounding received 4 additional representatives or a 12.5% gain.  As a consequence, Texas congressional districts only had to increase by 7.5%.  Were it not for this favorable rounding, the deficit for the west Texas districts would have been about 50,000 greater.

Based on the floterial model of shifting votes, rather than boundaries.  TX-11 takes care of the tiny deficit of TX-13.  If we shift a share of the votes, 1 in 2026 voters (or votes) would be moved.  On a turnout of 200,000, this would mean an extra 100 votes.

TX-11 also shifts the equivalent of 12,000 persons or about 1.7% of the population/voters/votes to TX-19.  This of course would not be possible if boundaries being moved.  And to completely eliminate the deficit in TX-19, 14,000 person or 1.7% of TX-12 are moved to TX-13.

If boundaries were being moved, I would shift the Cooke County portion of TX-26 to TX-19 which would erase the deficit of the latter.  This would simplify moving the northern portion of Denton County to the new Frisco-centered district.  This would mean that the TX-11 surplus would have to go east (Comanche has the right magnitude).

If this were truly an interim plan, we would leave the TX-11 districts just as they are.  Even naking Nolan County whole is an adjustment 6 times as necessary.  But we could get by with shifting Archer, Crosby, Jones, and Deaf Smith, plus whatever other balancing was necessary.  This would make the immediate areas around Wichita Falls, Abilene, and Lubbock within the same congressional district, and get all of the Panhandle into TX-19.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #8 on: November 14, 2011, 07:40:32 PM »



The surplus population in the Houston floterial district is more distributed than in the central or DFW floterials.  This is because growth in the Houston area is more balanced with growth to the north, west, and south, vs the high northward concentration in the Dallas area, and because many of the districts include higher growth suburban areas and more rural or inner city areas.

The map may give an impression that Houston needs some population from the Austin area to create a new district.  But in reality, TX-10 is a majority Houston district, that is included in the central floterial, with less of its population needed in Houston.  The transfer is from west to east, just as the transfer from TX-12 or TX-6 is towards Austin.

Because TX-10 is part of the central floterial, it would be difficult to create a new district based on the larger surpluses from TX-8, TX-10, and TX-22.  Instead, TX-10 would become a more Houston-oriented district, and another district created east of Houston, using areas that are not core parts of TX-8, TX-2, and TX-14.

The surplus from TX-8 is roughly equivalent to Orange and Hardin counties.  The collective surplus from TX-2, TX-18, TX-7, and TX-10, plus some around 55,000 of TX-22 is equivalent to Jefferson and the TX-2 portion of Liberty County.  TX-2 would take in new areas from northern Harris and be fully within the county.  Areas around La Porte and Deer Park would also be added from TX-22,

Chambers and Galveston Island would account for the surplus from TX-14.  But there is still a large surplus from TX-22 plus TX-9 to move to the new district.  You could move an area of southeast Harris County from TX-22 directly into the new district, but that depends on a water connection across upper Galveston Bay.   So it would be better to move a large portion of Galveston County to TX-14, and transfer part of TX-22 and TX-9 to TX-14.  This could start with Richmond and Rosenberg, and the TX-22 portion of Galveston County and whatever other adjustments are needed elsewhere.



The fractions for TX-2, TX-9, and TX-22 contributions to the floterial district are weighted averages based on the Harris and non-Harris parts of the source districts.  The Harris portion of these districts, as well as TX-7 and TX-18 contribute to eliminated the deficit of TX-29.

The overall fraction for TX-2 is 0.107.  In Harris County the split is 0.098 to the floterial and 0.009 to TX-29; the weighted contribution to the floterial district is 0.103.

The overall fraction for TX-9 is 0.048.  In Harris County the split is 0.044 to the floterial and 0.004 to TX-29; the weighted contribution to the floterial district is 0.045.

The overall fraction for TX-22 is 0.233.  In Harris County the split is 0.214 to the floterial and 0.019 to TX-29; the weighted contribution to the floterial district is 0.228.



TX-29 has a relatively small deficit (21 thousand), and the other Harris County districts have a fairly large surplus, so that fairly tiny shares of the vote are transferred.

If we were adjusting boundaries we can choose whether transfers are to the new district or to TX-29.  The entire TX-29 deficit might be made up from TX-22 in the Pasadena area, which would reduce the amount that would have to be transferred to the new district.
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« Reply #9 on: March 28, 2012, 08:46:22 PM »

2 USC 2c trumps 2 USC 2a(c) since it was passed later.  Multi member at-large districts are verbotten now.

The US Supreme Court (6-3) has ruled differently  Branch v Smith

You didn't think so back in 2008.  https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=76144.15

I know I'm bumping an old thread here, but I'm interested if something has changed here.
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« Reply #10 on: March 29, 2012, 05:15:07 PM »

2 USC 2c trumps 2 USC 2a(c) since it was passed later.  Multi member at-large districts are verbotten now.

The US Supreme Court (6-3) has ruled differently  Branch v Smith

You didn't think so back in 2008.  https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=76144.15

I know I'm bumping an old thread here, but I'm interested if something has changed here.

Likely that he came across Branch v Smith.  But even so, 2 USC 2a(c) only allows for statewide at-large districts in the event that no redistricting plan is passed,

Also I'm going to have to reverse myself because I've now seen Wood v. Broom, 287 U.S. 1 (1932).  I had said that:

Overlapping districts are not directly addressed, but it clear that the Federal law did not envisage the possibility of an intermediate position between all single-member non-overlapping districts and statewide at-large representation.

but the legislative history makes it clear that the requirement for compact districts of roughly equal population was deliberately allowed to lapse, so there's no legislative bar to floterial districts.  Still rather unwieldy things that only a mapmaker or a gerrymanderer could love.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #11 on: March 29, 2012, 06:15:26 PM »

2 USC 2c trumps 2 USC 2a(c) since it was passed later.  Multi member at-large districts are verbotten now.

The US Supreme Court (6-3) has ruled differently  Branch v Smith

You didn't think so back in 2008.  https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=76144.15

I know I'm bumping an old thread here, but I'm interested if something has changed here.

I wasn't aware of Branch v Smith at the time.  It was actually a sort of sidelight secondary issue - and the Supreme Court ducked on the real issue.

Note that arguably my proposal for Advanced Floterial Districts does not contradict 2 USC 2c.

"... there shall be established by law a number of districts equal to the number of Representatives to which such State is so entitled, and Representatives shall be elected only
from districts so established, no district to elect more than one Representative ..."

Under my proposal, Texas would have 36 districts, 32 regular and 4 floterial.  The representatives would be elected from the districts so established, and no district would elect more than one representative.  It is consistent with the constitutional requirement  that representatives be chosen by the voters of a state, and complies with equal protection principles.

Even if it not legal, it is a good idea.  And even if it is not a good idea, it is an interesting idea.

Back to Branch v Smith.   After the 2000 Census, Mississippi lost one of its 5 representatives.  They couldn't get rid of the black Delta district, and it was difficult to change Gene Taylor's panhandle district (and until last year, the Mississippi legislature still had a Democratic majority).  The legislature couldn't decide whose district to carve up.

There is no provision in the Mississippi statute or constitution to deal with failure to perform congressional redistricting.  So the Branch party filed a civil suit in chancery court.  As far as I can make out, a chancery court is a pretty low level court, but they decided to take jurisdiction.  Branch was the head of the Mississippi NAACP.

The chancery court drew a map and it was submitted for Section 5 preclearance.  The USDOJ then decided that not only did the map need to be precleared, but the process by which the chancery court drew the map (ie this was a change from the benchmark procedure by which the legislature drew the congressional districts).  This got bogged down, and even though the Mississippi Supreme Court indicated that it was OK under the Mississippi Constitution for the chancery court to act, they never issued a formal opinion.

Meanwhile, the Smith plaintiffs filed in federal court.  They appear to be representing Republicans.  The US Supreme Court has told federal courts to be extremely deferential to States and state courts in redistricting matters.  You could see it in the Maine case, where the district court was very careful to limit their involvement and give the legislature and Maine courts plenty of time to redistrict.

But the federal district court ruled that they had to act, because the chancery court plan had never been precleared, so that Mississippi had no legal state-produced plan; but also ruled that only the Mississippi legislature had the authority to draw a map under the elections clause of the US Constitution ("the ... manner of holding elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof").

The Smith plaintiffs appealed, arguing that 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c) still applied, and that Mississippi should have elected 4 representatives at large.  I don't know whether this was because they didn't like the map drawn by the court; or they wanted to force the legislature to act.  The Branch plaintiffs also appealed, so the case was actually State-court plaintiffs vs Federal-court plaintiffs.

The Branch plaintiffs argued that the chancery court map had been implicitly precleared because the USDOJ had never objected, even though they didn't bother because noone was actively seeking preclearance (and only the State can do this - maybe, see Kinston, NC).

The US Supreme Court ruled that the Branch plaintiffs were wrong, and since the State had never produced a pre-cleared plan, that the federal district court was correct in acting.   They then said that the constitutional issue did not have to considered under the doctrine of not addressing issues that you can avoid.   They basically claim the district court said that the constitutional issue was backup in case the Section 5 interpretation failed.  If you read the district court opinion it essentially says, "That's nonsense - I'm basing my intervention on the basis of the legislature not prescribing the congressional districts.  Section 5 is a backup."

The US Supreme Court then addresses the issue whether 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c) still applied and a split opinion ruled that it did, but it is unclear in what circumstances it would.   If a federal district court can draw 4 districts because a legislature failed to, how could 4 representatives be elected at large.

After the OMOV decisions, several federal district courts were threatening to impose at-large elections for the entire congressional delegations (Texas was included so it would have elected 23 representatives at large).  Congress reacted by proposing explicit repeal of  2 U.S.C. § 2a(c), and replacing it with 2 USC 2c.   They were also including other provisions such as how much population variation would be allowed and some other provisions.  Congress being Congress, this got bogged down.

So in desperation 2 USC 2c was added,  It was added in the middle of a bill dealing with the immigration status of a private individual that was passed without any record votes, so it is sometime alleged that the districting provision was a stealth law to preserve single-member districts, to keep the communists and libertarians from gaining representation under a proportional representation.

A reasonable case can be made that 2 USC 2c implicitly repealed 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c).  2 U.S.C. § 2a(c) are transitional provisions following reapportionment - and 2 USC 2c has its own transitional provisions - these allowed New Mexico and Hawaii to elect all their representatives at large for one more election.  New Mexico went ahead and districted anyway, while Hawaii held one last at-large election for two representatives in 1968.

Most of the transitional arrangements under 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c)  are unconstitutional under OMOV.  So for example, 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c)(1) would not have applied to Maine, since even though it continued to have 2 representatives, the districts were no longer of equal population.  So actually only 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c)(5) is constitutional - though it could apply to any state that loses representatives.

And finally, after Congress did pass 2 USC 2c, the federal district courts that had been thinking about ordering at large elections did not.

BTW, oral arguments in Branch v Smith are available at the Oyez project.  They're kind of interesting.   For one, the Smith lawyer said that the federal court could have ordered at large elections with cumulative voting, which would address VRA concerns.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
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« Reply #12 on: March 29, 2012, 11:15:01 PM »

Note that arguably my proposal for Advanced Floterial Districts does not contradict 2 USC 2c.

"... there shall be established by law a number of districts equal to the number of Representatives to which such State is so entitled, and Representatives shall be elected only
from districts so established, no district to elect more than one Representative ..."

Just want to reiterate that if 2 USC 3 were still in effect, your floterial district proposal would be a non-starter.

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« Reply #13 on: March 30, 2012, 12:08:04 AM »

Note that arguably my proposal for Advanced Floterial Districts does not contradict 2 USC 2c.

"... there shall be established by law a number of districts equal to the number of Representatives to which such State is so entitled, and Representatives shall be elected only
from districts so established, no district to elect more than one Representative ..."

Just want to reiterate that if 2 USC 3 were still in effect, your floterial district proposal would be a non-starter.

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Under my proposal a person would in effect be an inhabitant of two different districts weighted such that the sum of the number of inhabitants would be equal as nearly as practicable.
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« Reply #14 on: March 30, 2012, 06:25:31 PM »

2 USC 3 made no provision for weighting.  Even if one were to accept that you could fractionate voters so as satisfy the equal population requirement, floterial districts definitely do not meet the compact territory requirement.

Incidentally, South Carolina has some experience with the concept of fractional votes, thanks to the chaos Reynolds v. Sims indirectly caused.  The legislative delegations for each county had also served double duty as the county council of each state.  It was over a decade before independent county councils were up and running, and in the interim, members of the General Assembly whose districts covered more than one county ended up serving on multiple county councils with a fraction of a vote in each council equal to the portion of their representation was located in that county.

It was not good.  We had a number of rural counties that had had 1 Representative and 1 Senator which therefore required them to agree to do anything when acting as 'county council'.  Until home rule was set up, many of those counties still had 1 of each, but the Representative since he wasn't spread as thin as the Senator was a 1 man majority who could do whatever he wanted. Hazard County should have been located in South Carolina, not Georgia.

That experience also points out why your floterial district idea would likely not pass constitutional muster.  It dilutes the political power of those with low fractional votes compared to those with higher fractional votes.

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jimrtex
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« Reply #15 on: March 30, 2012, 10:43:28 PM »

2 USC 3 made no provision for weighting.  Even if one were to accept that you could fractionate voters so as satisfy the equal population requirement, floterial districts definitely do not meet the compact territory requirement.
Is the Alaska AL district "compact"?  My floterial districts for Texas are arguably more compact than the underlying districts.  And it doesn't really matter since that section was not renewed 83 years ago.

Incidentally, South Carolina has some experience with the concept of fractional votes, thanks to the chaos Reynolds v. Sims indirectly caused.  The legislative delegations for each county had also served double duty as the county council of each state.  It was over a decade before independent county councils were up and running, and in the interim, members of the General Assembly whose districts covered more than one county ended up serving on multiple county councils with a fraction of a vote in each council equal to the portion of their representation was located in that county.

It was not good.  We had a number of rural counties that had had 1 Representative and 1 Senator which therefore required them to agree to do anything when acting as 'county council'.  Until home rule was set up, many of those counties still had 1 of each, but the Representative since he wasn't spread as thin as the Senator was a 1 man majority who could do whatever he wanted. Hazard County should have been located in South Carolina, not Georgia.

That experience also points out why your floterial district idea would likely not pass constitutional muster.  It dilutes the political power of those with low fractional votes compared to those with higher fractional votes.
I don't see how the law in SC really relates to my idea, even less for a fictional county.

A regular district of 700,000 persons would elect one representative and have no votes in the floterial district.

Residents of a regular district with 800,000 persons would elect one representative.  That is, there vote would be diluted relative to the persons in the district with 700,000 persons.  But that would be rectified by them having a vote in the floterial district.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
Ernest
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« Reply #16 on: March 31, 2012, 01:40:48 AM »

For simplicity sake, I'll use an arrangement of 4 original districts and 1 floterial that happens to have the same borders as the 4 original districts.

Ideal district size: 700,000

District 1: 750,000
District 2: 800,000
District 3: 850,000
District 4: 1,100,000

So in the floterial district,
voters in District 1 get 1/15 of a vote (50,000 overage / 750,000 total) each
voters in District 2 get 1/8 of a vote each,
voters in District 3 get 3/17 of a vote each, and
voters in District 4 get 4/11 of a vote each.

District 4 contains 4/7th of the votes in the whole floterial district, enough to elect a representative even if the other three districts don't want him.  Granted, block voting in each district is unlikely, but the floteral system has effectively granted District 4 two Representatives and the others only one, as the Floterial Representative cannot antagonize District 4 and win (re)election.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #17 on: March 31, 2012, 02:45:07 PM »

For simplicity sake, I'll use an arrangement of 4 original districts and 1 floterial that happens to have the same borders as the 4 original districts.

Ideal district size: 700,000

District 1: 750,000
District 2: 800,000
District 3: 850,000
District 4: 1,100,000

So in the floterial district,
voters in District 1 get 1/15 of a vote (50,000 overage / 750,000 total) each
voters in District 2 get 1/8 of a vote each,
voters in District 3 get 3/17 of a vote each, and
voters in District 4 get 4/11 of a vote each.

District 4 contains 4/7th of the votes in the whole floterial district, enough to elect a representative even if the other three districts don't want him.  Granted, block voting in each district is unlikely, but the floteral system has effectively granted District 4 two Representatives and the others only one, as the Floterial Representative cannot antagonize District 4 and win (re)election.
The voting strength of an individual voter in District 4 is only 68% as effective as an individual voter in District 1 - based on the logic of Wesberry v Sanders.

A voter in the District 4 part of the floterial district, would have his vote count 5.45 times as much as an individual voter in the District 1 part ( 4/11 divided by 1/15), but that simply makes up for the disparity in the underlying district.

If a new district was created from parts of the underlying 4 districts, then 4/7 of the residents of the new district are going to come from District 4.   If your block voting theory is correct, they will control the new district as well.

One of my proposed mechanisms would have each voter voter for two representatives, one for his district and one for the floterial district.  Then a vote would be selected at random.

So a voter in

District 1 would have a 14/15 chance of counting for the district, and 1/15 for the floterial.
District 2 would have a 7/8 chance of counting for the district, and 1/8 for the floterial.
District 3 would have a 14/17 chance of counting for the district, and 3/17 for the floterial.
District 4 would have a 7/11 chance of counting for the district, and 4/11 for the floterial.

This is really no different than conventional redistricting, other than the voters in the floterial district are randomly chosen vs. spatially chosen.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
Ernest
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« Reply #18 on: April 01, 2012, 01:58:14 PM »

The random vote idea does not address the problems with fairness, tho to a limited extent it does make calculating the votes easier, at the cost of ensuring that the random disposition really is random.  (What we often call random numbers really aren't and I for one would definitely not be comfortable with the use of computer-generated pseudorandom numbers for that purpose.)

Floterial voting does not solve any real problem and they add additional ways to gerrymander.  About the only way they might make sense would if you want to have most representatives elected from primary districts that never change due to a new census, with the overages being used to select top-off representatives elect at-large, not from secondary districts.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #19 on: April 01, 2012, 05:48:54 PM »

The random vote idea does not address the problems with fairness, tho to a limited extent it does make calculating the votes easier, at the cost of ensuring that the random disposition really is random.  (What we often call random numbers really aren't and I for one would definitely not be comfortable with the use of computer-generated pseudorandom numbers for that purpose.)

Floterial voting does not solve any real problem and they add additional ways to gerrymander.  About the only way they might make sense would if you want to have most representatives elected from primary districts that never change due to a new census, with the overages being used to select top-off representatives elect at-large, not from secondary districts.
How does it not address the equal protection issue?   Remember that the scenario was that Texas had a 32-district plan which had not been pre-cleared and had the filing deadline coming up.

As we now know from Perez v Perrry the SA district court should have deferred to previous State policy.   Had they not gone off on their wild goose chase, and instead adopted an advanced floterial plan, the court could have said we are maintaining the status quo to the extent possible for 2012, while also not electing the 4 additional representatives at large.

How is selecting 4/11 of voters randomly different than selecting 4/11 of voters geographically - in terms of equal protection or fairness?

You could use Bresenham algorithm for assigning the ballots.  You would have to sequence the ballots in each polling place.  If they are paper ballots, assign them a sequential number as you pull them from the polling box, or as you feed them into reader.  If they are on a voting machine, they are automatically serialized.

Have a lottery drawing to determine the sequences of underlying districts, counties, and precinct numbers.
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