Gerrymandering is undoubtedly a blight on American democracy and a tool used by reactionary forces to thwart others’ aspirations for self-government. It is also beyond question that redistricting abuses have been committed more egregiously by Republicans than by Democrats, and nowhere is this more true than in our state of North Carolina. The state’s distorted legislative maps have warped state politics for a decade. Democrats are right to be outraged at gerrymandering in North Carolina and across the country.
The problem is that Democrats have begun to use gerrymandering as an excuse. Yes, Democrats were twice denied majorities in either the legislative or Congressional delegations by the rigged outlines that Republicans have imposed upon elections in the state. This happened in U.S. House races in 2012, and again in state-legislative elections in 2018. But the blunt fact is that those years were the only two times in the last decade that Democrats won the popular vote for those respective bodies.
When Democrats lament the 2010’s, they too often attribute the party’s failures to malfeasance in the redistricting process. This explanation is too easy–and too exculpatory. If Democrats truly had a majority of the state on their side, they would have won the popular vote for congressional or legislative races on a consistent basis, as, indeed, Republicans won the popular vote for state house numerous times in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. Unlike Republicans who were denied a majority by the legislative maps, North Carolina Democrats have consistently fallen short of 50% for a decade.
Again, none of this is to deny the genuine evils of gerrymandering. It is anti-democratic and racist. The decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to absolve itself of oversight over map making was an act of dereliction. But Democrats in North Carolina cannot claim their party’s struggles owe entirely to the practice; in reality, they have simply lost touch with a critical mass of voters outside the state’s urban cores.
As John Hood noted in a recent column, Donald Trump won North Carolina’s rural areas with 59% of the vote and took the critical suburbs by 60%-39%. Democrats dominated in the major cities and college towns, but in a state where the cities are generally on the smaller side that was not enough to overcome the red tide that swamped supermajorities of voters in non-urban North Carolina. Until Democrats improve their performance in rural areas and exurbs, they will not be able to win most statewide races, and their quest for a popular mandate, in spite of gerrymandering, will remain unfulfilled.
There are numerous ways to address this problem, and I do not claim to know which will work best. Clearly, Democrats need to close the turnout gap with Republicans by registering and mobilizing more Democratic-friendly voters. Happily, many such voters live in non-urban areas east of Raleigh. And Democrats should also invest in a vigorous outreach campaign to bring suburban and exurban voters into their camp. Redistricting reform, long delayed, can and must happen eventually. But in the meantime, Democrats need to stop lying to themselves that they have won over a majority of North Carolinians and are being denied the legislative majority they deserve entirely because of maps that Republicans have so ruthlessly drawn.
Alexander Jones is an original contributor to PoliticsNC.
In order for the Democratic Party to be more successful in North Carolina they must do a far better job of public relations. They need to counter the Republican propaganda. It is easy to disregard the ridiculous things Republicans say about Democrats, but too many people actually believe the ridiculous q-anon tales spun. They believe the preposterous pizza-gate story. They believe that Democrats are Marxists, that Democrats will end gun ownership, will jack taxes up astronomically, will censor speech, and all sorts of outrageous Republican claims. Figuring out how to educate those people about those lies should be a high priority for the Democratic Party.
I don’t disagree with much of this – “quit crying and win more elections” is rarely bad advice in politics.
But an inconvenient fact that you overlook here is that frequently, when Republicans did win majorities of votes pre-2010, they actually won legislative majorities too! Republicans held a sizable majority of the NC House between ’94-’98, and in ’02. And bears mentioning that Republicans also won their big legislative coup in 2010 with maps drawn by Democrats.
Democrats undeniably engaged in gerrymandering way back when – though we have to reach back 20 or 30 years ago now to find examples, which just feels very silly. All of those Democrats are now gone, however. These days, when Democrats win actual majorities – as in 2018 – not only do they not win commensurate legislative power, they don’t even come close. They broke the GOP supermajority in ’18 only by a single Senate seat, after winning 40,000 more votes.
So while I take your point, the GOP’s gerrymander has been far more aggressive, more pernicious, and more corrupt than any before, and it’s important we acknowledge that.
Nice piece. Yet I greatly beg to differ with this section.
“Yes, Democrats were twice denied majorities in either the legislative or Congressional delegations by the rigged outlines that Republicans have imposed upon elections in the state. This happened in U.S. House races in 2012, and again in state-legislative elections in 2018. But the blunt fact is that those years were the only two times in the last decade that Democrats won the popular vote for those respective bodies.”
It is highly unlikley democrats would have won majorites in those elections either time even if THEY drew the districts. The fact is democrats are so concentrated and their supporters so densely packed gaining a majority of legislatiive or congressional seats will be very difficult for a long time, as long as the whole county provision is valid in state legislative seats.
Even though democrats have plenty of voters to win on the state level