Date: Tue, 25 Jul 95 23:17:20 CST
From: "jim blair" <jeblair@facstaff.wisc.edu>
To: eflahert@garnet.acns.fsu.edu,
alt-politics-economics@cs.utexas.edu,
alt-politics-greens@cs.utexas.edu,alt-politics-usa-misc@cs.utexas.edu
Cc:
BCc:
Subject: Loony Lani and the Newt: Districts by Race
Loony Lani and the Newt: Districts by Race
Attached is a reissue of a previous post. Since it was issued, the
congressional maps in Louisiana and Georgia have been ruled
unconstitutional because they were drawn to create racially segregated
congressional districts.
"Liberals" have generally favored, (and "Conservatives" have opposed) such
segregated districts, since they insure the election of "minority"
congresspersons. These districts also turned out to have been a major
factor in the Republican Congress created in the last election. In fact,
the new Speaker of the House may owe his election to the race based
districts!
The shift in votes cast in the last election was very small: Republicans
had received a majority of the votes cast in contested Congressional
elections as far back as 1990. The big gains made by Republicans in the
House in 1994 are the result of the mechanism explained in the attached
post. Another example of Milton Friedman's "Invisible Hand" in politics:
both Left and Right advocate policies that harm their interests.
Date: Tue, 14 Feb 95 21:05:37 CST
From: "jim blair" <jeblair@facstaff.wisc.edu>
To: alt-politics-greens@cs.utexas.edu
Proportional Representation & was Lani Loony?
A recent exchange on alt.politics.economics (under the title: Was Lani
Loony?) may be of interest here: I have seen some discussion on the same
topic. It opened with Ed Flaherty (eflahert@garnet.acns.fsu.edu)
describing a paper by Dr. Tim Sass of FSU & Dr. Stephen Mehay.
Sass & Mehay collected data on city councils throughout the US for 1980 and
1990, and correlated it with fire and police dept data. They found that
minority (non-Anglo) representation came to fire & police AFTER it had come
to city councils. They (or Ed or someone) concluded that minorities need
political clout on councils to get city jobs. The conclusion: Lani Guinier
isn't loony.
(NOTE ASIDE: Anglo has a interesting history; it was originally used to
distinguish Anglos from Saxons in England, later English (who had become
Anglo-saxons in the meantime) from Germans, French, Dutch, and other
Europeans. Now it seems to mean ANY of the above-except Spanish)
Any way, here was my reply to Ed's post:
RE: Was Lani loony?
I share T. Scott Thompson's questions about this study. Just what CAN it
prove? Does the city council hire the police and firefighters in any city in the
US? Since they are career jobs there is a longer turnover time in them than on
a typical city council, which is re-elected each few years.
Imagine an old established city with police and a fire department.. There is an
influx ofimmigrants from X. They begin to apply for jobs in the city. Turnover
rates in the private sector may be rapid, but new hires in civil service is mostly to
replace those who die or retire. If the X people tend to cluster in a few of the city
wards (and even if they don't) some of them are likely to be elected to city council
where they will constitute a larger percent of the total council, before they will
represent that same percent of the police force. Doesn't the Sass and Mehay paper
just document this?
I agree that discrimination did limit access of minorities to civil service jobs in
many parts of the US during most of our history. Is any one seriously suggesting
that this is the case today?
Four more points of discussion: Gerrymandering, One man 10 votes, How to have
more minority representation in Congress, and in the White House!
GERRYMANDERING
Back to that old established city. It has 100,000 citizens and is
divided into 10 wards of 10,000 each. There are 51,000 who vote for party D and
49,000 who vote R. The districts each have 5100 D's and 4900 R's, so the city
council is 10 D to no R. But the R party discovers that they can control the
re-districting of the city wards through a friendly judge. They construct a set of
bazaar districts such that one district contains 10,000 D's and no R's. The other 9
each has 4900 R's and 4100D's. The R party now controls the city council 9 to 1.
They have invoked the well known political principle of the Gerrymander: to
REDUCE the influence of a group, create special districts where they are the
large majority. Then you can keep them out of power even when they are the
majority!
ONE MAN 10 VOTES
If instead of 10 districts each with one locally elected representative, they
decided to have all 10 council members elected "at large". And to
give each voter 10 votes, which could be spread out or cast all for one candidate.
Election would be by total VOTES not by total voters. This way a relatively small
dedicated group of fanatics can get represented on the council. Lani assumes that
race is the most important factor in how people vote. But what if it turns out that
bigots or religious extremists exert even more influence over their supporters?
And the candidates who try to appeal to the broad general community interest get
only one or two votes of mild support from many, and so lose out to the most
extreme candidates each of which has 10 votes from a small following. Will that
improve government?
HOW TO GET MORE MINORITY REPRESENTATION IN CONGRESS
The Democratic Party has been working to create "minority" congressional districts,
and I wonder how much their success contributed to their loss of control in the last
election.(see GERRYMANDERING) Gary Frank is a Republican who was elected
and re-elected to congress from a New England district that is similar to the overall
nation in being about 10 % African-American. His campaign was not based on "vote
for me because of my race", " but vote for me because of my ideas of how to deal
with the nations' problems."
Some one out there in Oklahoma let me know the racial composition of the
congressional district that just elected J.C. Watts.
Because the other way to have more minority representatives in congress is to select
good "minority" canditates who have appeal to the majority of the voters. And to be
fair, it is not just Republicans who do this. Doug Wilder was elected governor of
Virginia and David Dinkins mayor of NYC as Democrats.
HOW TO ELECT MORE MINORITY PRESIDENTS
Nominate Colin Powell.
,,,,,,,
_________ooo__(_O O_)__ooo___________________________________
(_)
LATER:
My post gets some support from this essay:
End of the line for black Democrats?
By Faye Anderson
On Nov. 3, Americans will go to the polls to cast their votes in the last
national elections of the 20th century. The stakes are high: All 435
House seats and 34 Senate seats are up.
It's by now familiar that President Bill Clinton's fate hangs in the
balance, thanks to l'affaire Lewinsky. The stakes for black Americans
are also high. The election outcomes at the national and state levels will
set the stage for political empowerment for the first 10 years of the new
millennium.
The Democratic Party and the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC)
have seen the Clinton presidency take its toll on them. In 1993, there
were 259 Democrats in the House, including 38 blacks. CBC members
held the chairmanships of three House committees and 17
subcommittees. Less than six years after Clinton rode into town, the
Democratic caucus is down to 206 members. Reduced to a minority
within a minority, the CBC has little prospect of gaining influence over
domestic and foreign policy.
Thundering on the House floor about the perils of messing with Bill is
powerful theater. But when it comes to exercising real power, the CBC
comes close, but no cigar.
Most CBC members are ensconced in seats sheltered from the new
conservative landscape. Unwittingly, the civil rights leadership has, with
its goal of maximizing the number of majority-black districts, diluted the
black vote by isolating black politicians from the mainstream.
And packing black voters in electoral homelands has made the
mobilization of the Democratic base more challenging in these midterm
elections. With the outcome of the congressional races predetermined,
the public has little motivation to vote. That impacts the chances of
Democratic candidates in competitive races where an increase in black
voter turnout can determine outcome.
Here's the double whammy. While the personal political fortunes of the
black politicians are tied up in a party that's in decline, they must appeal
to a black electorate that is more conservative and disproportionately
young. Of the more than 14 million black registered voters,
approximately 5 million are between the ages of 18 and 34, the
"hip-hop generation." A survey by the Joint Center for Political and
Economic Studies shows only 58% of hip-hoppers identify with
Democrats; a mere 22% are "strong" Democrats.
Thus, efforts to boost black voter turnout based on Democratic Party
loyalty are likely to fail. On the eve of the 21st century, blacks should
declare their independence and vote for candidates who best address
their concerns. In politics, there are no permanent friends or permanent
enemies, just permanent interests.
Faye Anderson is president of the Douglass Policy Institute in
Washington, D.C.
From USA TODAY Friday October 16, 1998