Hawthorn Hill Journal by Richard deRosa
On Redistricting, Gerrymandering and the Rule of Law
The current redistricting mania now the rage, despite the moral and legal questions it raises, has given me some ideas. I have wondered in what ways such behavior might be extrapolated into other exigencies of everyday life. None of this egregious behavior should surprise anyone. After all, politics is all about winning, whatever the costs—to reputation, decency, rule of law, etc. I have written about the pitfalls of numeric supremacy before. Governing all the people fairly and with some sense of communal obligation seems to have gone by the wayside. And with it, a shared moral compass.
Quite a few years ago I listened to a discussion between a local commentator and a leading Democratic member of the state senate. They were discussing the relative merits of gerrymandering. The commentator suggested that partisan gerrymandering should not be allowed. The majority leader’s response has stuck with me. It is especially relevant now. No, he opined, let’s leave it alone because when we hold power we want to do the same thing. Nice to know that such virtue-based thinking still primes the minds of far too many politicians. My dream of the demise of politicians will not be realized in my lifetime. I have from time to time been drawn to Plato’s idea of having philosopher kings rule the roost. But we know where that leads. Several of our founding fathers were rightly worried about a leader acting in a monarch-like fashion. After much debate, they decided that having a mere president might be a better fit for a democracy. Some of the titles suggested smelled of royalty. As we have seen of late, the will to kingliness is just too much of a temptation to resist, especially if sycophantic courtiers aplenty are at your beck and call.
What all this amounts to is changing the rules in mid-game. Ostensibly, we do live in a rule-bound society. Theoretically, it is what binds us. It is the glue that makes the system work, however imperfectly. In a perfect world, our shared belief in the virtue and necessity of lawfulness would act as sufficient guardrails against tyrannical behavior. Those traditional safeguards have come under fire as they never have before. Just imagine if rule-changing in mid-game became the core principle in our relations with one another. Actually, not much imagination is required with respect to redistricting, but also so many other facets of our communal and political lives.
Predictability is essential to a modicum of stability. I need to know that when I get up in the morning certain things will function in their customary way. Not only in my personal life, but life in general. Which includes the expectation that others will act according to shared values and principles. It has become too much to ask of too many of us. Imagine if this penchant for mid-game rule bucking were to become the norm. How could we depend upon one another even for the most basic courtesies and necessities? In our relations with one another, whether at home or in the workplace, we have expectations as to how we might be treated. And we are expected to treat others according to the same norms or conventions. Without these common expectations of one another to rely on, we would be in a hell of a mess.
I am a sports fan. Imagine playing any game without boundaries, without a clear notion of what is acceptable and what is not. Without enforceable rules any game would, well, not really be a game. It would be a free-for-all. Sound familiar? The same thing applies to rules of governance. In many ways government is no different. States have constitutions that specify the rules of the game. The same is true of the U.S. Constitution. It is the primary source of our rule-bound system. The danger we face almost every day now is that too many of us believe that the rules only apply when and where they are of personal benefit. Clearly no way to run a country. Every game needs refs. It needs people who know the rules and apply them fairly and consistently. The problem is that we are playing a game wherein the head refs are consistently turning a blind eye to the rules. And to the constituents they serve. They seem to be in the thrall of a president for whom laws and rules are irksome inconveniences. Shared norms of civility and kindness are requisite to the survival of any system as diverse and vital as ours. A bit of integrity at the helm would be a most welcome balm.
Dick deRosa’s Hawthorn Hill essays have appeared in “The Freeman’s Journal” since 1998. A collection, “Hawthorn Hill Journal: Selected Essays,” was published in 2012. He is a retired English teacher.
