Districting

Perhaps that’s exactly the reason districting isn’t pursued!

But in the 2013 decision of Shelby County v. Holder, Roberts struck down the section of the Voting Rights Act that required Justice Department pre-clearance of districting changes in places with histories of racial voting discrimination.

Instead of putting the issue before voters, the city council decided the idea needed further study, and floated the idea for a task force that would look at districting and at any other proposal that might improve diversity.

The state court imposed a new map, prepared with the help of Nathaniel Persily, a Stanford law professor and an expert in legislative districting.

Hart, p. 3:458 Although Gerry was unhappy about the highly partisan districting (according to his son-in-law, he thought it "highly disagreeable"), he signed the legislation.

In subsequent years, Congress expanded on the requirements, successively adding contiguity, compactness, and substantial equality of population to the districting requirements.

Use of databases and computer technology seeAlso The introduction of modern computers alongside the development of elaborate voter databases and special districting software has made gerrymandering a far more precise science.

When the party controlling the districting process has a statewide majority, packing is usually not necessary to attain partisan advantage; the minority party can generally be "cracked" everywhere.