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from the non-voting-person-OR-non-person-voter dept.
The LA Times and just about every news outlet has a story about a Supreme Court case which could change how election districts are drawn up.
At issue before the court was the basic question of who gets counted when election districts are drawn: Is it all people, including children, prisoners and immigrants who are not eligible to vote? Or is it only adult citizens who are eligible voters?
The case centers around districts with heavy concentrations of people not eligible to vote (generally illegal aliens). These are counted by the census, and that district gets legislative representation based on their presence, even when there are fewer actual voters in those districts. The plaintiffs claim this give more weight to voters in such district, over an equal number of voters in other districts.
The challengers cited the example of two Texas state Senate districts, both of which have about 800,000 residents. One rural district in east Texas, where plaintiff Sue Evenwel resides, had about 574,000 citizens who are eligible to vote; the other district in the Rio Grande valley had only 372,000 people who are eligible to vote. The lawsuit in Evenwel vs. Abbott argues this is unconstitutional.
Do Soylentils see the allocation of election districts as a process to distribute legislative seats equally over the number of voters, or equally over the number of people (regardless of whether those people can vote or not)? (Or is this where we launch off on the usual discussions of a total redesign of the US Voting system to some totally different mathematical model?)
(Score: 3, Interesting) by q.kontinuum on Thursday December 10 2015, @12:48PM
Interesting. In case of children, I'd argue it is fair because the voters will likely vote in the best interest of the children. In case of illegal immigrants or prisoners I could imagine that voters might have some resentment and vote against the best interest of the non-voters. Should those two situations be considered separately?
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Ethanol-fueled on Thursday December 10 2015, @01:14PM
Did you know your head from your ass when you were a kid?
Of course you didn't, nobody does, and kids are generally more stupid now than when you and I were. If anything, I think the voting age should be raised to 25.
Or would you rather have a huge voting bloc vote for whomever promised them more candy-stores on every street corner, a constitutional right to fast internet and video games, and free tickets to see whatever whiny effeminate crypto-Christian crap kids call "music" nowadays?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 10 2015, @01:28PM
Your post has exactly zero relation to the post you "replied" to.
(Score: 2) by scruffybeard on Thursday December 10 2015, @02:31PM
I think there is a difference between giving children the right to vote, vs. the right to be represented. Should a child have the right to walk into a congressman's office, and ask to be heard on an issue? I would say yes, and the congressman can use his judgment to decide if their candy store concerns should be addressed or not, just like they do for every other issue that comes before them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 10 2015, @03:31PM
"like they do for every other issue that comes before them with a nice "campaign contribution" attached.
FTFY
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Thursday December 10 2015, @03:53PM
Where did I ask for a right for kids to vote?!? Of course not! But while adult voters are likely to represent the interests of their kids, and therefore the kids should weigh in on their votes, the voters might be less likely to represent the best interests of the illegal immigrants.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 3, Funny) by DeathMonkey on Thursday December 10 2015, @06:39PM
I plant on voting for whoever promises to fix that damn Turkey Farm gate!
They seem to keep escaping.