US House Redistricting: Mississippi

[jimrtex]

Looks about right. Just take the 2 counties with the most blacks and throw them in the black district, and population balance.

I doubt this will be hard.

You're talking of the rl map? Yeah, to be more precise you take Natchez and most of Panola County.

From the existing map, Adams, Wilkinson, and Panola counties go in CD-2. Then you just need to shift about 22k people between the 3 GOP districts.

FWIW, the current representatives are from:

MS-1 Nunnelee, Tupelo
MS-2 Thompson, Bolton (Hinds County)
MS-3 Harper, Pearl (Rankin County)
MS-4 Palazzo, Gulfport

Is it possible to put all of Madison County in MS-2?

I kind of like going for the Mississippi is just like Iowa solution.

[jimrtex]

FWIW, the current representatives are from:

MS-1 Nunnelee, Tupelo
MS-2 Thompson, Bolton (Hinds County)
MS-3 Harper, Pearl (Rankin County)
MS-4 Palazzo, Gulfport

Is it possible to put all of Madison County in MS-2?

I kind of like going for the Mississippi is just like Iowa solution.

You can, if you really want to, but its split right now along those exact lines. So I left them there.

I'm not sure that it is even particularly that White.  I think it could be a case similar to DeKalb Georgia, where you have white suburbanites followed soon by black suburbanites.

Between 2000 and 2010, White population increased 18%, Black population by 29%.

[jimrtex]

I'm not sure that it is even particularly that White.  I think it could be a case similar to DeKalb Georgia, where you have white suburbanites followed soon by black suburbanites.

Between 2000 and 2010, White population increased 18%, Black population by 29%.

The southern part of Madison County is nothing like DeKalb, Georgia.  Its approximately 60,000 residents are 68.5% white, 70.2% by VAP.  If you add the fast-growing Gluckstadt precinct currently in MS-2, the population goes up to approximately 70,500 and the white percentage to 70.3%/71.7%.   Most of the black residents live immediately adjacent to the county line or in the northern part of the county.

Nixon in 1968 had a majority in DeKalb county in a 3-way race.

In 1980, it was Reagan's 28th strongest county, with Carter only carrying the county by 5%.  In 1988, it was Dukakis's 23rd strongest county, and along with Fulton, the only two counties outside the Black Belt carried by Dukakis.
In 2000, it was Gore's 2nd strongest county, putting up a 44% plurality.

Or going further south, Clayton has gone from 35% for Dukakis in 1988 to 83% for Obama in 2008.

Madison historically had a substantial black population, which then had some suburban growth from folks leaving Jackson.  But if they could afford it, white folk would probably prefer Rankin to Madison.  Moreover, the blacker part of Jackson is the north side.  So whites can also go south and west in Hinds County and keep in whiter areas.  But it is likely that Madison will become the preferred area for suburban-seeking blacks.

Were you to add the missing Madison and Hinds pieces to MS-2, you can draw a very good map that generally respects county lines except to balance population, without the need for MS-2 to drag all the way down to the Louisiana border.  Every district on this map has a deviation +/-10 from the ideal CD population.  MS-2 happens to be exactly correct:

MS-01 (blue) is 71.5% VAP white and has 9 more residents than ideal;
MS-02 (green) is 58.8% VAP black and is ideal;
MS-03 (purple) is 61.3% VAP white and has 2 more residents than ideal;
MS-04 (red) is 72.9% VAP white and has 10 residents fewer than ideal.

Unfortunately, the Columbus/West Point/Starkville Golden Triangle area ends up split up, as in the current map.  Columbus is in MS-01; West Point Starkville and some southern Columbus suburbs are in MS-03.  As does Rankin County from the rest of the Jackson metro - but that was a conscious decision made in the past for racial reasons.  In a color-blind world, the three major counties of the Jackson metro would be kept together, which would allow the Golden Triangle to stay together in the same CD.

If you follow county boundaries you don't have to have a perfect ideal population 1% may be close enough.  How far off is MS-4 if you leave out the piece of Jefferson Davis.

What if all of Lowndes is all in MS-3, and Webster and/or Clay are put into MS-1.  Or maybe add Grenada to MS-2 and put all of Attala in in MS-3.

[jimrtex]

No doubt I could balance population within 1% without crossing county lines if I had to.  Muon2 already did.  I'm not convinced that's where the legislature is headed, though.

It sounds like they are going to crash and burn on legislative redistricting, and will put off congressional redistricting.

[jimrtex]

I think you mean 1991 and 1992.  The first Mississippi guburnatorial election (when the Legislature would normally be elected) of the 2000s was in 2003.  I doubt Mississippi would have been required to hold a special election in 2002 to just move the effectiveness of redistricting one year earlier, as some states have four-year terms where some legislators would have last been elected in 2000 and would serve until 2004.

The Mississippi Constitution requires redistricting every 10 years, in the year ending in 2, and permits redistricting at other times.  A federal district court ruled last year that was valid, and so the 2001 elections could use the existing districts.  The court said that if the legislature drew districts this year, they would then consider whether special elections should be held.

[jimrtex]

As expected, the House approves the new map.  And here is the PDF version of the map.  

Does anyone think the Justice Department will let this map stand and focus instead on voter ID laws and other measures?

It increases the number of black majority districts.  On what ground would they object?

It will be interesting to see whether there is an effort to require new elections or not.  Otherwise, these districts won't be used until 2015.

[jimrtex]

They will be used this November.

Mississippi ordinarily doesn't hold legislative elections in even-numbered years.  Actually they are every 4th year, since both house and senate members.

The constitution itself calls for apportionment every year ending in "2", plus whenever the legislature feels like it.   Last year the legislature tried to reapportion in time for the 2011 elections, but failed to do so.

The NAACP sued in federal district court, but they ruled that it was not a violation of the US Constitution to have reapportionment only once every 10 years.   This decision was affirmed by the US Supreme Court.

Reading the court's order, they retained jurisdiction; and said that if the legislature passed redistricting this year (2012) and this was approved by the USDOJ under Section 5 of the VRA, they would entertain claims that they should order special elections.

IOW, it is OK to reapportion every 10 years; but it might not be OK to not use new district boundaries until another 3 years pass.

And if there are not lawful districts (*passed by the legislature; signed by the governor; and precleared by the USDOJ) the federal court could act to draw its own districts.

* Mississippi has its own backup commission consisting of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, the AG, the SOS, House speaker, and Senate president pro tempore in case the legislature doesn't finish its action.

[jimrtex]

And the Mississippi Senate follows through in approving its map:



And if you want a larger image, click here. 

Aren't the maps approving with time?   Give a few more decades and Mississippi will be yanked into the 20th Century.