Gerrymandering Pros And Cons

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Janaya Colbert Gerrymandering This article is from a law journal that discusses the 15th amendment and the types of gerrymandering. Gerrymandering is the drawing of electoral districts to benefit or disadvantage a particular group,according to the article. While there are two types of gerrymandering, only racial gerrymander violates the 15th Amendment. The 15th amendment originated by the Republican party, because they felt giving blacks suffrage meant they would likely vote Republican, it out weighed them losing white voters since there were more blacks in the population. Gerrymandering was first identified in southern states. Racial gerrymandering is very important to understand because it can prohibit proper representation in Congress …show more content…
These are the Voting Rights Act in 1982 and the Equal Protection Clause. This helped Congress come up with a three pronged test to see whether a state was violating the amendment. They gave these guidelines to measure: (1) the minority group must be large enough and compact enough to constitute a majority in a single-member district, (2) the minority group must be politically cohesive, and (3) the white majority must vote sufficiently as a bloc to usually be able to defeat the minority candidate.

There are several cases that were brought to court that were thought to be illegal according to the 15th Amendment. The article covers the first case US v. Reese that lead up to the Shaw v. Reno case in 1993 Gerrymandering has been going on for a long time and hasn’t gone away. Now, technology plays a part in aiding gerrymandering by using data from the Census Bureau to draw electoral districts based on the voters they want to add or keep out of their districts. The easiest way to usually tell this are by the odd boundaries that make up a voting district. As this Amendment still struggles to be enforced, it makes voting today even more important so that Americans can elect officials that truly are looking out for their best interests. If this amendment didn't exist, the freedoms that were fought and won for in the Civil War wouldn't be recognized by African Americans
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