Mark Paul of the Scramento Bee has an interesting column up about how to reduce gerrymanders. His solution: "mixed-member proportional representation", a parliamentary-style system where a unicameral legislature is elected half from districts and half from party lists. Voters vote twice, once for a local rep and once for party. The proportional seats come from the party list in proportion to the party vote.
I think this is too radical, as it 1) unicameral, and 2) very party-oriented. Many people in CA would object to being forced to choose a party. Here are two alternatives that are less radical:
Multiple-member/single-ballot districts: Halve the number of Senate districts, and then elect two Senators and four Assemblypeople from each district, with each voter getting one Senate and one Assembly choice. This makes gerrymanders ineffective, and allows sizable minorities within a district to elect a representive. It doesn't solve the prolem of monolithic districts (e.g. San Francisco or South-Central LA), but those aren't "solvable" anyway -- that's just the way they vote. It will, however, prevent all the legislators from such districts being off-scale partisans.
Mixed at-large-list/multiple-member/single-ballot districts: Halve the number of Senate districts, then elect one Senator and 2 Assemblypeople from each district. Elect the other half of the Senate and Assembly from separate state-wide at-large lists, with each voter getting one district choice and one state-wide at-large choice for each house. Top however-many win. This also makes gerrymanders difficult for several reasons and allows independants (e.g. good-government types), advocacy groups (Sierra Club, NRA, Teacher's Union) and minor parties (Greens, Libertarians) the ability to cleanly compete for seats. Given the recall election candidate list, one would want to have a largish signature requirement (maybe 5,000) to get on this portion of the ballot.
Both of these systems also solve the "minority-majority" districting problem, which is the flip side of gerrymandering, and allow all minorities a fair shot at organizing and electing members.
I just posted on another proposed initiative that addresses some of this. Check out www.cfrl.org - I'm curious what you think. Their intitiative would bring about a unicameral system, but with the seats still filled by district and with a commission deciding the districts. It's the most viable I've seen so far.
Posted by: Kurt at December 18, 2003 02:04 PMKurt--
The intiative you link to has got big problems. Not that I disagree with any of it (although I'd quibble with the form of the redisticting commission), but there are provisions in the state constitution requlating initiatives that this will run afoul of.
In particular, this initiative is quite clearly a "Constitutional Revision" which is impermissable. It does far too much. A simpler attempt along the same lines, Prop 24, was killed by the CA Supremes in 2000 -- and it did far less. There is a "single-subject" rule that they are (selectively) enforcing.
This initiaive does the following separate things:
1. It changes the structure of the Legislature to unicameral, with 100 seats, with associated changes.
2. It changes the legislature to part-time (Jan-June).
3. It changes the method of redistricting, creates a commission to deal with it, and requires an immediate reapportionment.
4. It caps the salaries and benefits of legislators to lower amounts than now paid.
It may also do other things -- hard to tell as the strikeouts and new language aren't laid out well.
Note that Prop 24 tried to do items 3 & 4, and that was one item too many for the CA Supremes. I'd be shocked if they let this one fly, as is.
Posted by: Kevin Murphy at December 18, 2003 02:53 PMThanks Kevin - I knew the breadth of the initiative but wasn't aware of the single subject limitation. The guys fronting this are pretty savvy from what I’ve heard, so it will be interesting to see how they propose to work around that.
Posted by: Kurt at December 18, 2003 03:03 PMThe actual precedent is murky, as the CA Supremes have allowed other initiatives that seem to violate the same rule go forward. Notably the Reiner "Cigarette Tax/Children's Programs" Initiative of 1998. Appellate Docket #D037599.
When the Tobacconist Assn sued, claiming that funding children's programs with a tobacco tax violated the two subject rule (and in particular appealed to two separate sets of voters, which the two subject rule was created to avoid) the Appellate Court said that the two parts of the initiative were connected in that reducing tobacco use was "good for children." The Supemes declined to review.
Yet an initiative relating to legislative salaries and reapportionment was "too unconnected."
Go figure, as these two cases are totally unreconcilable.
Posted by: Kevin Murphy at December 18, 2003 03:19 PM