Republicans should drop efforts to change Idaho’s Redistricting Commission

There is considerable talk among some members of the Idaho Legislature that we “need” to change the composition of the Redistricting Commission. They contend that a commission with an equal number of Republicans and Democrats leads to unnecessary conflict and inefficiencies. Their proposal is to have three statewide officials (all of whom happen to be Republicans) choose an additional member. Let’s be clear about the reason for this alleged “reform”: It is to create a partisan advantage in the redistricting process.

But why? The Republicans already control 80 percent of the legislative seats. Eighty percent — despite the fact that the statewide vote in Idaho averages about 60-62 percent Republican. In other words, the GOP already has an advantage in the proportion of legislative seats that far outweighs its proportion of votes statewide.

The argument that we need to fix a “broken” system is incorrect. Perhaps we should recall why the independent, bipartisan commission was created in the first place.

Beginning in 1964, the Idaho Legislature managed to have its redistricting plans struck down at least five times (twice by federal courts, three times by the Idaho State Supreme Court). Legislators were frustrated by the political bickering (including an actual fistfight between two Republican state senators in the stairwell) and by the convoluted system imposed by the Idaho State Supreme Court after the legislative redistricting debacle of the 1980s. Consequently, the Legislature itself chose to amend the state constitution to create a truly bipartisan, independent redistricting commission. Over two-thirds of the legislators in each chamber approved the new commission. More impressively, 64% of the public voted for the amendment in the 1994 election.

At least 14 states have independent redistricting commissions, almost all of which are bipartisan or nonpartisan. Another four states are considering creating such commissions. Significantly, no state with a nonpartisan or bipartisan commission has ever reverted to a partisan system. One tried last year, when the majority party Democrats in New Jersey moved to change the rules to give themselves a greater advantage in the redistricting process. But the citizens of New Jersey reacted so negatively and so swiftly that the Democrats withdrew the plan. Now, in Idaho, some Republican legislators are planning the same thing.

In more than 40 years of observing state legislatures around the country, I have rarely seen a legislature take such a beating in terms of public opinion as the first session of the 65th Idaho Legislature did last year. Their ill-advised efforts to dramatically alter the initiative process, their obvious disdain for proposition 2 and its supporters, and the late-session maneuvering and gamesmanship between the chambers over other issues left many citizens disappointed and disdainful. And now, some legislators want to start a fight to change the redistricting commission for purely partisan reasons. Given that the possible advantage to be gained is so small, and the negative consequences to the reputation of the legislature are so great, why would they want to risk this strategy again?