Will Republicans in New York lose their State Senate majority

[Brittain33]

Republicans aren't likely to have a chance to draw their own gerrymander, I thought.

[Brittain33]

Cuomo can and should veto any mutual gerrymanders because it would have the double benefit of yielding a Democratic Senate more representative of the state's electorate AND undermining Sheldon Silver's power in the Assembly without jeapordizing the majority.

[Brittain33]

How exactly can the Massachusetts Democrats screw over the GOP? I suppose they could make the current MA-10 (new MA-9) more unwinnable but that's not exactly an epic screw. And even if they can squeeze out an additional legislative seat or two, what's the point?

State legislature. Pubbies are almost extinct in the senate but they picked up about 20 house seats last time and a malicious redistricting could carve up all their districts out of spite. The leadership's done that in the past to Dems and Pubbies it didn't like but it is not a foregone conclusion that they'd do it this time, considering how few Pubbies there are.

[Brittain33]

If the court drawn map were to be for the decade you would have a point. But thats not whats on table. Or more accurately, its not acceptable to Silver and the Assembly Democrats for exactly the reasons you stated.

What they are supposedly willing to do(the assembly leadership at least), is run under a court drawn map in 2012.

But if two incumbents are drawn together in 2012, isn't that a pretty impactful event, even if the lines are redrawn in 2013?

The question then becomes, would Silver care if some of his caucus members in more marginal parts of the state lose, if he gets to preserve his power in the long run and maybe get some pliant freshmen in their place in 2014 if they don't run again?

[Brittain33]

The problem is that Assembly Democrats would likely lose seats in a court-drawn map, too. 

They would go from an enormous veto-proof majority to an enormous non-veto-proof majority, which doesn't matter because they have a Dem governor and a closely tied Senate, with the promise of restoring gerrymandering after 2012.

Republicans just aren't in control on this one.

[Brittain33]

The problem is that Assembly Democrats would likely lose seats in a court-drawn map, too. 

They would go from an enormous veto-proof majority to an enormous non-veto-proof majority, which doesn't matter because they have a Dem governor and a closely tied Senate, with the promise of restoring gerrymandering after 2012.

Republicans just aren't in control on this one.

It does matter for the Democrats who have an increased chance of losing. It's in the caucus' narrow self-interest to preserve the gerrymander.

I'm still not getting this one. New York is a majority Democratic state. A non-gerrymandered map still produces a large Democratic majority in the Assembly, especially when elected in a Presidential year. The speaker of the Assembly will still be speaker. And they get to gerrymander away any Pubbies who sneak into office in a court-drawn map for 2014. More to the point, there's only one vote in the Assembly that matters, and it's not that of a Dem in a marginal district that is threatened by a court-drawn map.

I agree with Lunar that they may not calculate their long-term political interest this way, but it is how the incentives align.

[Brittain33]

As I read the Constitution, Democrats or Republicans might be able to delay the adoption of a plan until 2016, but can't adopt a new plan once one has been adopted.  That is, of course, if the feds don't force the state to adopt a plan before the 2012 election on one-person-one-vote principles anyway.

Also, it's not clear that if a map is drawn by a court and not enacted into law by the legislature that it is governed by the restriction. Although perhaps there's a court case binding on it--I doubt it, because how often would NY have done a Delay-mander after a court redistricting since the early 1930s?