A Solution to Gerrymandering
When we don't have real Republican leaders, new and obvious solutions get squashed.
Conclusions
The public can easily grasp the concept of weighted voting and both the average everyday Joe Democrat and Republican love the idea. Passing such popular legislation would provide for an unbiased framework for setting the political boundaries for the Ohio House of Representatives and Ohio Senate during redistricting. While a small amount of political power would shift from the House to the Senate under this scenario - the balance of power would legitimately remain the same. This unbiased framework can help to eliminate unnecessary political division, strife, and turmoil by removing subjectivity from the reapportionment process.
Self-evident truths
Ohioans instinctively know the boundaries of their county before they know their Ohio House District or Ohio Senate District. They know these political boundaries best because the county legislative body is closer to them and affects them more directly on a daily basis.
Ohioans find redrawing political boundaries every ten years problematic and confusing.
Ohioans do not like gerrymandering unless it benefits them or their party. At any given point in time - someone can legitimately shout “unfair” that legislators are unethically using their position to concentrate political power by drawing strange and alien districts (gerrymandering).
Equal-population districting has led to the problem of political gerrymandering across the country. The boundaries of single-member, equal-population districts must be redrawn every ten years to maintain population equality. The redistricting process in Ohio is unpopular to say the least - among Republicans and Democrats.
There is a possible solution that Ohio Republicans could take the lead on to make the process more fair, consistent, and predictable.
The Weighted Voting Solution
Weighted voting controls the number of legislative votes each representative casts in proportion to the district's population. To illustrate, Ohio could designate each county in Ohio as a State House District. Each county district would elect a single representative with a one vote minimum and one vote for every 100,000 residents beyond the first 100,000 residents. For example, residents of a weighted county district with 200,000 residents would elect a single representative who would cast two votes in the legislature.
For Ohio’s Senate. Ohio could designate every two counties in Ohio to represent a Senate District. Each Senator, like our United States Senators, would get one vote each regardless of population. The Ohio House would represent the population and the Ohio Senate would represent land areas of the State.
House and Senate Districts, once they are determined would never change and be permanent. Only adjustments would be made to weighted voting for the Ohio House of Representatives as populations change.
The Advantages
No worry of gerrymandering, districts always remain the same.
Districts become relevant to the voter because the district is familiar and commonplace.
Predictability! Political parties and grassroots organizations can make plans on how to better campaign and make strategic decisions when district boundaries stay consistent.
In focus groups testing - the idea is very popular even among Democrats because it eliminates unfairness and keeps things consistent, simple, and intuitive.
Would this change Political Power between the Parties?
How would things most likely shake out politically with such a change? Currently, Republicans have a dominant lead in the Ohio House and Ohio Senate. The Republicans would continue to hold significant leads in both chambers. However, Republicans would most likely lose 11% in the House and gain 12% in the Senate. One could argue that this would force Republicans to change strategies to make more serious inroads within Ohio’s urban districts.
One could argue that Democrat mantras may change when representing a county that is somewhat equally divided politically.
Currently, Ohio has 99 State House Representatives and 33 Senators that combine to make 132 total officeholders. Under the new scenario there would only be 88 State House Representatives, but there would be 44 Senators which works out to be 132 total officeholders. The same amount of officeholders - just different amounts in each chamber.
There are only 15 of Ohio’s 88 counties that would get more than one vote per county. These 15 counties would cast a total of 68 votes. The remaining 73 counties would get 1 vote each. In total 141 votes would be cast.
The House of Representatives would get one vote each to move bills out of committee and would only use weighted voting to vote bills into law and to override a veto. The Senate would remain unchanged in that respect.
The Franklin County Representative would cast 13 votes, the Cuyahoga County Representative would cast 12 votes, the Hamilton County Representative would cast 8 votes, the Summit and Montgomery County Representatives would cast 5 votes each, the Lucas County Representative would cast 4 votes, the Butler/Stark/Lorain County Representatives would cast 3 votes each, the Warren/Lake/Mahoning/Delaware/Clermont/Trumbull Representatives would get 2 votes each.
Lucas (4), Cuyahoga(12), Summit (8), Franklin(13), Hamilton(8), Montgomery(8), Lorain (3), Mahoning (3), Athens (1), and Erie (1) would most likely go to Democrats. Democrats would likely get 61 votes out of a potential 141 votes. Republicans would likely get 80 votes which is a 57% to 43% advantage.
The Ohio House currently has 31 Democrats and 68 Republicans. What Republican margin is lost in the Ohio House under the new scenario they will gain in the new Ohio Senate. Democrats would win only 6 seats in the Senate (those districts that are paired with Lucas, Cuyahoga, Hamilton, Franklin, Montgomery, and Summit) and Republicans would win 38, a 13% to 87% difference. Currently the Senate has 8 Dems and 25 Republicans which is a 24% to 76% spread.
Is Weighted Voting Constitutional?
Ohio’s Constitution would need to be amended for weighted voting to be accepted at the State level. As far as how the United States Supreme Court might rule. Ashira Pelman Ostrow is a fairly notable law professor that has made the case that the US Supreme Court would find this to be legal - from challenges that were made in New York.
White papers on the legal rationale:
https://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=11305&context=ilj
ASHIRA PELMAN OSTROW 121 Hofstra University
Hempstead, NY 11549 ashira.ostrow@hofstra.edu (516) 463-7051
Would such an effort be challenged in the Courts?
The most likely answer is yes, it would be challenged. How vociferously it would be pursued is unknown. There is a lot for both sides of the political aisle to like.
There is no change in the balance of power.
Dems would pick up power in the house but lose in the Senate.
Dems would consolidate power into fewer representatives which helps their party with fewer campaigns to run - it would save a lot of time, money, and effort.
With more concentrated political power for the Dems they can affect change in a much different manner. They could make strategic decisions much more quickly and be much quicker to respond to new and emerging issues with fewer reps.
Both parties will find it easier to find candidates to run for office. More Countywide officials would likely run for office solely due to name recognition within the county. This is akin to baseball’s farm league teams.
It makes things easier for both parties by recognizing only whole counties for state legislature political boundaries as major and minor parties in Ohio tend to be organized at the county level and so do many grassroots groups.
Because of the simplicity, ease of the general voter to comprehend, and the popularity among the population on both sides of the fence - it is doubtful that the effort could be significantly demonized. There will be Democrats that will believe that this is a good deal and a compromise that should be taken.