Judicial heroes of democracy defeat gerrymandered maps
“Gerrymandering is the antithetical perversion of representative democracy,” say the 4 Ohio Supreme Court Justices who defeated both of the highly partisan congressional and state legislative maps. Justices Jennifer Brunner, Michael Donnelly, Melody Stewart and Maureen O’Connor honored the new rules against gerrymandering by striking down the unconstitutional maps. They are true heroes of our democracy.
Page Contents
Congressional map
Justice Donnelly wrote the majority opinion invalidating the congressional districts, saying: “the evidence in these cases makes clear beyond all doubt that the General Assembly did not heed the clarion call sent by Ohio voters to stop political gerrymandering.”
“We hold that the congressional-district plan is invalid in its entirety because it unduly favors the Republican Party and disfavors the Democratic Party in violation of Article XIX, Section 1(C)(3)(a). We also hold that the plan unduly splits Hamilton, Cuyahoga, and Summit Counties in violation of Section 1(C)(3)(b). We order the General Assembly to adopt a new congressional-district plan that complies in full with Article XIX of the Ohio Constitution.”
Chief Justice O’Connor called the map “a gross departure from proportionality”, saying:
“No magician’s trick can hide what the evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates: the map statistically presents such a partisan advantage that it unduly favors the Republican Party.”
Check out my thorough review of the battle over Ohio’s congressional map for more details.
State legislative maps
Justice Stewart wrote for the majority striking down state senate and house district maps:
“We hold that the plan is invalid because the commission did not attempt to draw a plan that meets the proportionality standard in Article XI, Section 6(B). We also conclude that the commission did not attempt to draw a plan that meets the standard in Section 6(A)—that no plan shall be drawn primarily to favor a political party.”
Article XI, Section 6 says the redistricting commission must try to make maps that don’t favor or disfavor a party, that correspond closely to the proportion of statewide votes for each party and that are compact. The ruling says this is “not merely aspirational,” that “if it is possible for a district plan to comply with Section 6 and Sections 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7, the commission must adopt a plan that does so.” In other words, mapmakers must give the minority party about 46% of the districts to match Ohio’s voting trends, or else demonstrate clearly which constitutional provisions or demographic realities prevent them from doing so.
Chief Justice O’Connor agreed, adding that voters “have the power to again amend the Ohio Constitution to ensure that partisan politics is removed from the drawing of Ohio Senate and House districts,” encouraging us to consider replacing the commission of partisan lawmakers with an independent commission.
Justice Brunner concurred, and found that the maps also violated Article I, Section 2. That section states simply:
“All political power is inherent in the people. Government is instituted for their equal protection and benefit, and they have the right to alter, reform, or abolish the same, whenever they may deem it necessary; and no special privileges or immunities shall ever be granted, that may not be altered, revoked, or repealed by the general assembly.”
Brunner argues that “gerrymandering at its core prevents voters from voting on equal terms to alter or reform their government” and that these maps’ violation of equal protection is “so significant that it clearly meets the standard for the remedy.”
For more information, see my detailed analysis of Ohio’s state legislative redistricting, from proposals to court challenges.
Revised Statehouse maps struck down again
On 2/7, a 4-3 decision also struck down the revised State legislative maps, with the majority opinion written by Justice O’Connor.
They found that Republican mapmakers excluded involvement of Democratic commission members again, and faulted them for revising the invalidated map rather than making an entirely new map as ordered.
“The commission’s choice to nevertheless start with that [invalidated] plan and change it as little as possible is tantamount to an intent to preserve as much partisan favoritism as could be salvaged from the invalidated plan. It is also clear that the commission rejected, without explanation, easy and obvious changes that would have made the revised map more proportional.”
They cite a simple district swap suggested by Democrats that could have easily made a more proportional Senate map, and that Republican mapmakers refused the idea: “The commission’s choice to avoid a more proportional plan for no explicable reason points unavoidably toward an intent to favor the Republican Party.”
Citing this chart by Dr. Imai, the court ruled that mapmakers “failed to achieve proportionality when they made ‘Democratic-leaning’ districts that were actually toss-ups just slightly over 50%.” They rightly specify that “competitive districts . . . must either be excluded from the proportionality assessment or be allocated to each party in close proportion to its statewide vote share.”
“In a plan in which every toss-up district is a ‘Democratic district,’ the commission has not applied the term ‘favor’ as used in Section 6(B) equally to the two parties. […] The revised plan’s structure guarantees that the 58 percent seat share for Republicans is a floor whereas the 42 percent seat share for Democrats is a ceiling.”
The majority also shuts down false characterizations of their rulings:
“We reject the suggestion that our order constitutes a mandate to gerrymander to create Democratic-leaning districts. This suggestion implies that neither the September 2021 plan nor the revised plan were Republican-favoring gerrymanders. The evidence demonstrates otherwise. Throughout the process, the Republican map drawers refused to expressly work toward a 54 to 46 percent partisan share. Yet that is not a “superficial ratio,” a “Democratic ratio,” or an “arbitrary percentage,” as one commissioner cavalierly dismissed it. . . . It is a foundational ratio created not by this court or by any particular political party but instead etched by the voters of Ohio into our Constitution.”
In a rebuke of the Republican mapmaker’s judgement, the court said “we do not view [DiRossi’s opinion] as an objective measure of the validity or constitutionality of the various plans.” They also blamed the commission for creating its own time crunch by doing nothing for 6 days before starting on the maps.
A precedent for more fair district maps
With these opinions, there is now a precedent that all district mapmaking going forward must be done more proportionally, which is a major win for truly representing the voices of Ohioans in our elections.
Thank you Justices O’Connor, Donnelly, Stewart and Brunner for being heroes of our democracy.
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About The Author
Optimist from Ohio
I've been interested in philosophy and science since I was young, and community service and civic engagement have became a passion since college. I was born in Ohio and have lived in different parts of the state most of my life. I'm optimistic about the potential for humanity to live in peace with one another, but only if we work to better understand our world and each other with reason, patience and compassion.
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