David Niven, a political science professor at the University of Cincinnati, describes gerrymandering as a process that “makes a party more powerful than it is popular.”
Here are some explanations for what that means and how it works.
What is gerrymandering?
Gerrymandering is the practice of drawing political district boundaries in ways that benefit one party over another within a state or in the U.S. House of Representatives.
State legislatures, and the U.S. House, are organized by districts. Every 10 years, states use Census data to change district sizes and boundaries according to population shifts. This is required by the Constitution. Gerrymandering is when the people in charge of redistricting draw the boundaries in ways that ensure their party holds a large majority of seats in a legislature even when statewide, voters are close to 50-50 Republican-Democrat.
“Done right, redistricting is a chance to create maps that, in the words of John Adams, are an ‘exact portrait, a miniature’ of the people as a whole,” according to the Brennan Center, a nonpartisan law and policy institute. “But sometimes the process is used to draw maps that put a thumb on the scale to manufacture election outcomes that are detached from the preferences of voters. Rather than voters choosing their representatives, gerrymandering empowers politicians to choose their voters.”
Gerrymandering often leads to districts that take on odd shapes as they’re stretched over large areas to take in sufficient numbers of voters from one party and exclude voters from the other. And that’s what inspired the word. In the early 1800s, a lesser-known Founding Father, Elbridge Gerry, a governor of Massachusetts, signed a bill that created a district that critics said was shaped like a salamander.
Is Ohio gerrymandered?
Yes. It’s practically a tradition in the Buckeye state.
“Throughout Ohio history, the majority party in the state legislature has rigged elections by gerrymandering districts,” wrote Mike Curtin, a journalist and one-time state legislator, in a recent guest opinion for the Columbus Dispatch.
In recent years, Republicans have been the ones to benefit in the General Assembly, the state’s legislature. Currently there are 26 Republicans and seven Democrats in the Ohio Senate. In the Ohio House of Representatives, there are 67 Republicans and 32 Democrats. With those majorities, Republicans have enough votes to override vetoes by the governor (meaning they can pass a law even if the governor refuses to sign it).
At first glance, these majorities might suggest that Ohio is around 70% Republican. But in statewide elections, the outcome is often much closer. For example, look at the most recent U.S. Senate races. In 2022, the Republican candidate, J.D. Vance, won with 53% of the vote. In 2018, the Democrat, Sherrod Brown, won with almost exactly the same percentage.
Donald Trump won Ohio twice, by 53.3% in 2020 and 51.8% in 2016. In those elections, voters of both parties turned out in high numbers.
Recent ballot initiatives are even more instructive. The ballot initiative process allows citizens to bypass the legislature and propose and pass laws or amend the state constitution. In 2023, Republican leaders and affiliated organizations strongly opposed a constitutional amendment ensuring reproductive rights, including abortion, and a law legalizing recreational marijuana use. Voters passed them anyway by wide margins.
Didn’t Ohio voters end gerrymandering?
Well, they tried. In 2015, more than 70% of voters approved an amendment to the state constitution that changed the way state legislative district boundaries are determined. This created the Ohio Redistricting Commission, made up of people appointed by Republican and Democratic leaders in the General Assembly, plus the governor, state auditor and secretary of state.
But that led to a body made up mostly of Republican appointees, and the outcome has been, well …
“Unfortunately, the promise of reform proved to be a bait-and-switch,” writes Curtin in the same opinion piece mentioned above. “In 2022, Statehouse leaders in charge of the new Ohio Redistricting Commission ignored repeated Ohio Supreme Court rulings invalidating both congressional and state legislative maps.”
The legal battles over redistricting in Ohio are a whole other story. Statehouse News Bureau produced a timeline leading up to the 2022 midterm elections. In November 2023, the Ohio Supreme Court rejected yet another challenge to the existing maps, leaving them in place for this year’s primary and general elections.
What’s the solution?
Are you ready for another state constitutional amendment? You may have a chance to vote on one in November, if supporters gather enough signatures to get it on the ballot.
The Citizens Not Politicians amendment would:
• Create the 15-member Ohio Citizens Redistricting Commission made up of Democratic, Republican, and Independent citizens who broadly represent the different geographic areas and demographics of the state.
• Ban current or former politicians, political party officials and lobbyists from sitting on the Commission.
• Require fair and impartial districts by making it unconstitutional to draw voting districts that discriminate against or favor any political party or individual politician.
• Require the commission to operate under an open and independent process.
The signature drive is already under way.
Do you have more questions about gerrymandering? Send them to Frank W. Lewis at frank@signalcleveland.org.