Reflecting on the 2020 Redistricting Cycle: A Proposal for Interstate Redistricting Agreements

Abstract

Reversing historical trends, 2020 congressional redistricting produced national partisan parity, with each party’s share of House seats roughly mirroring their share of the vote nationwide. However, this Article argues, all is not well. With partisan gerrymandering now a bipartisan affair, electoral competition has diminished. Federal reform efforts have stalled. The Supreme Court declared partisan gerrymandering nonjusticiable. And future redistricting cycles or state-law litigation could re-bias the national House map.
This Article analyzes the pitfalls of recent political and legal developments in redistricting and proposes a solution: interstate redistricting agreements (IRAs). Through IRAs, sets of states with offsetting partisan gerrymanders could agree to standardize redistricting in procedure, substance, or both. These agreements could deescalate “redistricting warfare,” bolster electoral competition, and increase state legislators’ own electoral opportunities without ceding partisan advantage. This Article addresses policy design questions and IRAs’ constitutionality under the Compact Clause.

Keywords: Redistricting, gerrymandering, Rucho, Compact Clause, interstate compacts, election law