September news: Remap explained (visually)

September news on electoral reform in the Midwest

The Midwest Democracy Center is a non-profit, membership advocacy 
group that works to make our governments more democratic and 
representative. Our main goal is to revive cumulative voting for the 
Illinois House of Representatives (used from 1870 ? 1980) so that 
political minorities will have some representation. Other goals 
include using instant runoff voting for single-winner elections (like 
governor) to end spoiler candidacies and ensure the majority gets to 
pick the winner as well as same-day voter registration. Our website 
is www.midwestdemocracy.org and our telephone number is 312.587.7060. 
We encourage your participation!

The next meeting at the Midwest Democracy Center (325 West Huron #304 
in Chicago) is Tuesday, October 2nd at 7:00 pm. All are welcome.

Winner-take-all districts to blame for coin-flip politics
by Dan Johnson-Weinberger

We play a terrible game in Illinois. The game is that we pick which 
political party gets to control state government by chance. The 
winning party gets to run the government for ten years, and then we 
play the game again. The game is called redistricting with winner-
take-all elections and the Democrats just won the 2001 coin flip. 

How can this be? Simple. Every ten years, the state must redraw all 
political districts. If the political parties don't compromise, then 
sole control of the map-drawing process is given to one of the 
parties by flipping a coin. That's in the state constitution. The 
party that wins the coin flip then draws all the political districts, 
which determines which party will win the elections for the next ten 
years and control state government ? without a single vote cast. 

Look at the state senate. In 1981, Democrats won the coin flip. They 
drew the map that year, and they were awarded control of the senate 
at the 1982 elections. That lasted until 1991 when Republicans won 
the coin flip, and in the 1992 elections, DuPage Republican Pate 
Philip was elected Senate President, a post he holds to this day. The 
Democrats won the coin flip this month, and because of that luck, 
will run the Senate after the 2002 elections. 

To understand how a coin flip is more important than ten years' worth 
of elections with millions of voters, blame our winner-take-all 
voting system. We only elect one person from a district to serve in 
the senate and the house, and the people who vote for the losing 
candidate don't get any representation. Thus, exactly how the state's 
11 million people are divided up into districts becomes tremendously 
important, as the political minority in each district won't get any 
voice at all. 

To make the point clear, let's create an Illinois with 30 precincts, 
half of them Democratic (D) and half of them Republican (R). We'll 
elect six people to the senate from six separate districts, each with 
five precincts. Here's what the hypothetical state looks like (feel 
free to set up your own hypothetical state for your own example):

D  R  D  R  R  R
D  D  R  R  D  R
D  R  R  D  D  R
D  R  D  D  R  R
D  R  D  D  D  R

A fair voting system would result in 3 Democrats and 3 Republicans 
elected, since the state has 15 Democrats and 15 Republicans. We 
don't use a fair voting system, through, because we only elect one 
person from a district, and with a winner-take-all voting system, 
it's remarkably easy to manipulate the results.

Assume the Republicans draw the map. They can draw this map any way 
they want. All they have to do is divide up the 30 people into 6 
districts, each one with 5 precincts. Let's say that the Republicans 
draw one vertical district down the left column and five horizontal 
districts in each row, excluding the left column. They could have 
done it hundreds of different ways, but let's see what happens with 
this particular map.

________________
|D |_R_D_R_R_R_|  --> elects an R
|D |_D_R_R_D_R_|  --> elects an R
|D |_R_R_D_D_R_|  --> elects an R
|D |_R_D_D_R_R_|  --> elects an R
|D |_R_D_D_D_R_|  --> elects a D

^
^
elects
a D

The vertical district is unanimously Democratic with five D 
precincts, and the bottom district has three D precincts to two R 
precincts, so the Democrats elect a senator from those two districts. 
The other four districts each have three R's and two D's, so a 
Republican is elected from each of those horizontal districts. That's 
a grand total of four elected Republicans and two elected Democrats, 
giving Republicans control of the senate. 

Now we'll turn it around. We'll take the exact same voters and draw 
some districts to create a Democratic majority. There are, again, 
hundreds of different ways to divide up these 30 precincts into six 
districts of five precincts each, but we'll just pick one. Make the 
right-most column a vertical district, and draw five horizontal 
districts excluding the right-most column, for six districts of five 
precincts each.

                         ------------------------
elects an R -->   |_D_R_D_R_R_|R|
elects a D  -->   |_D_D_R_R_D_|R|
elects a D  -->   |_D_R_R_D_D_|R|
elects a D  -->   |_D_R_D_D_R_|R|
elects a D  -->   |_D_R_D_D_D_|R|

                                                  ^
                                                  ^
                                               elects
                                               an R
 
The vertical district elects a Republican, as does the top district 
with three R's beating 2 D's. The other four rows each have more 
Democratic voters than Republican voters, so a Democratic senator 
will win the election in each of the four rows, giving the Democrats 
control. 

In this hypothetical example, the exact same voters are easily 
manipulated by different maps to elect either a Republican majority 
or a Democratic majority. Let me repeat this: the way that the map is 
drawn determines who wins and who loses ? not the voters. This is 
wrong. And this is exactly what is going on all over the country 
right now as politicians redraw the district lines.

Illinois Democrats unveiled the new map for state legislators last 
week. Many incumbent Republicans who currently represent areas that 
are now slightly Republican (like the middle rows) find themselves in 
slightly Democratic districts under the new map. If they don't 
retire, they will lose in 2002. The Democrats will control the senate 
starting in 2003 because they drew the map; the reason why the 
Democrats get to draw the map and win control of the senate is 
because they won the coin flip. 

There is a way out of this dysfunctional cycle of flipping coins for 
political control. We can use a voting system that represents both 
the majority and the minority in a district, so that the map will not 
determine who wins. That voting system is something Illinois has used 
for more than a century: cumulative voting in three-person districts.

Elect three senators from a district instead of just one. Instead of 
tripling the number of legislators, use two big districts of 15 
precincts. If a party has two-thirds of the vote, they'll get two of 
the three senators; one-third will get one of the three senators.

-----------------------
| D  R  D | R  R  R |
| D  D  R | R  D  R |
| D  R  R | D  D  R |
| D  R  D | D  R  R |
| D  R  D | D  D  R |
-----------------------

The left district has nine D's and six R's, so it will elect two 
Democratic senators and one Republican senator. The right district 
has nine R's and 6 D's; it will elect two Republicans and one 
Democrat, for a total of three Democratic and three Republican 
senators. That's fair.

No one likes the coin-flip system of deciding which party will run 
Springfield. The only way to get rid of manipulation from map-makers 
is to get rid of winner-take-all elections where only one person gets 
elected from a district. 

For more information on redistricting all over the country, check out 
www.fairvote.org

DuPage County opportunity for activism

If you live in the western suburbs, we'll have a table at the 
Suburban Civic Fair in Palatine at Harper Community College October 
13th and we need volunteers to help staff the table and spread the 
word about two-party representation in DuPage County by electing more 
than one person from a district. Come on by. 

Cumulative voting license plate frames are in

Are you looking for an easy way to spread the word about cumulative 
voting to your friends and neighbors? Would you like to show your 
support for representation for everybody? We've got a great new way 
to do that: license plate frames!

These chrome beauties fit around your license plate and subtly spread 
the message to revive cumulative voting. They say (in all caps)
Revive Cumulative Voting (top)
To Represent Everyone (bottom)

These are $10 (our cost) and can be shipped anywhere in the state for 
an additional $3. You can order one right now on our website through 
paypal, send in a check to the Midwest Democracy Center or come by 
one of our meetings to pick one up then. 

Hey, your car is a great billboard. You've got a license plate now, 
and most people have a frame with the name of a car dealer on it. Put 
that car to work, and every time you're in a traffic jam, you can 
take a little solace that the person behind you is learning about 
cumulative voting. 

Instant runoff voting in Ann Arbor 

The September 19th electoral reform event in Ann Arbor went well; 
thanks to Juscha Vannier and Craig Harvey for organizing it. There is 
now a small group working to build support in the city council for 
bringing back instant runoff voting for the mayoral election (see 
www.instantrunoff.com for details on instant runoff voting), last 
used in 1975 in Ann Arbor. To get involved, email Craig Harvey at 
Harvey@ic.net

Discussion listservs

There are plenty of ways to get more information about cumulative 
voting and instant runoff voting in your state. Here are some 
relevant listservs to join. You can subscribe by either visiting the 
website or emailing the address listed below the website. 

Cumulative voting in Illinios (moderated to five messages per week)
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/drive2revive   
drive2revive-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

National list for proportional representation 
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/Voice4All
Voice4All-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

National instant runoff voting list (moderated to one message per day)
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/instantrunoff
instantrunoff-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Instant runoff voting in Illinois
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/instantrunoffIL
instantrunoffIL-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Instant runoff voting in Michigan
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/instantrunoffMI
instantrunoffMI-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Instant runoff voting in Wisconsin
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/instantrunoffWI
instantrunoffWI-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Instant runoff voting in Minnesota
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/instantrunoffMN
instantrunoffMN-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Instant runoff voting in Ohio
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/instantrunoffOH
instantrunoffOH-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Please forward this newsletter to lists and people you know that are 
interested in politics (and if you'd like to subscribe to this 
monthly update, please send an email to MDCmonthly-
subscribe@yahoogroups.com ) and thank you for reading.

Midwest Democracy Center
325 West Huron #304
Chicago, IL 60610
312.587.7060
www.midwestdemocracy.org