Gerrymandering Should Be Eliminated

Gerrymandering allows officials to more effectively represent the interests of their constituency. "It is best with bipartisan packing because citizens will be happier with their individual representatives overall. " This statement is still true, and that means we would have the best representatives for the largest percent of the population. This can be seen with the number of safe seats in elections were the citizens will elect the same person because they still think they are the best for the job. This brings me to the point if people have a right to be represented. Which they don't because this would violate the central principle in democracy, majority rule. If citizens were guaranteed a right to be represented then there would be no point of voting for local representatives because that would violate the losing parties sides right to representation. This is why people's rights are not violated. Second, it even questionable if there is a right to vote. "the Constitution never explicitly ensures the right to vote, as it does the right to speech, for example" [1]. Voting like marriage has been up to the states to determine who can vote/marry. This is why we had to have amendments for race/sex/age discrimination because there was no universal right to vote to begin with. If there is no right to vote there is certainly no right to representation. As stated this is a problem of majority rule not gerrymandering. "In sheer democracy where all votes are equal". In that case no matter how districts are drawn it is inherently unequal votes, because some districts have more people than others. This is includes inside of states and between states as shown earlier "Ohio's population in 2013 of 11,570,808 and divided it by the 16 districts it is about 750,000 per district; however, in Montana which as one district then each district has about a million in that district. " This is inherent to local representatives, and state divisions not gerrymandering, so unless this is changed to eliminated a full local representative legislature, or allow districts to go over state lines then this problem is not going away. The original point of more effective representation still stands.2. Gerrymandering will allow the legislature to be more accurate of how the citizens feel. In bi-partisan redistricting they both agree meaning it will affect them equally because they both packed districts creating safe seats. We can rule out cracking in bi-partisan redistricting because no one would consent to having their supporters split up. Minorities do have protections under the voting rights act this gives them a fair and equal voice; however, political preference isn't considered a minority status because as mentioned there is no rights. That is the point of democracy majority rule with minority protections. This brings me to the next point of if elections are appeals to popularity. If a representative is suppose to be the best person for the job then yes, it would be a logical fallacy because just because a majority support them doesn't mean they are better than the other person. However, if representatives are suppose to be what the citizens believe then no, because the people said this person matches my views the closest which isn't done because of popularity. However, even if it was a logical fallacy it would be a problem about democracy not gerrymandering. The problem with Eric holder's comment is that he assumes that a neutral redistricting will give the best representation; however, as shown with California earlier this is not always true. As I have argued in this debate the best representation is done by gerrymandering. In the cases of Reynolds v. Sims & Wesberry v. Sanders they were about an imbalance of population. In Reynolds v. Sims was about "one representative per county and creating as many senatorial districts as there were senators, regardless of population variances" [2], and Wesberry v. Sanders was about "a single congressman had to represent two to three times as many people as were represented by congressmen in other districts" [3]. Although, this may be some form of gerrymandering we can both agree this should not happen, but remember the debate is about "Gerrymandering Should Be Eliminated" this would include all types of gerrymandering not just disproportionate population gerrymandering. The original point of more accurate representation still stands.3. Gerrymandering Increases Party PolarizationA quick note that people select a party because they think it is the best for the nation, these are not exclusive. Compromise is not necessary, it may be useful but not necessary. 4. Gerrymandering Is IllegalBased on the fact that partisan gerrymandering has not been ruled illegal, I would argue that this point is invalid because it has not been proved. Finally, political preference is not as bad a race discrimination. Under the equal protections clause the court has three levels of scrutiny, how laws must be treated because who they discriminate against. The top level includes race, religion, national origin, etc. The second level includes gender, and the third level is any thing else. The higher level of scrutiny the more the state must have a legitimate interest. Based on this race and political preference are on two different levels meaning they don't have the same protections under the law. Sources[1] . http://www.usconstitution.net...[2] . http://www.oyez.org...[3] . http://www.oyez.org...