Get ready for more congressional districts that resemble a dragon, a cow’s face, a dog, a pelvis, “a broken-winged pterodactyl” or “Goofy kicking Donald Duck.”
The United States Supreme Court said Thursday politically drawn districts were all well and good because federal courts don’t have the jurisdiction to rule on such questions.
“We conclude that partisan gerrymandering claims present political questions beyond the reach of the federal courts,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court in a 5-4 decision. “Federal judges have no license to reallocate political power between the two major political parties, with no plausible grant of authority in the Constitution, and no legal standards to limit and direct their decisions.”
The high court, in fact, has never moved previously to end gerrymandering, but it was thought the presence of one case from Maryland that showed blatant Democratic gerrymandering and one case from North Carolina that showed blatant Republican gerrymandering might entice the court to end its hands-off policy.
The term “gerrymandering” is named after Elbridge Gerry, a governor of Massachusetts who, in 1812, signed a bill that created a partisan district in the Boston area that many said resembled a mythological salamander.