Talk:Gerrymander

However, the United States Supreme Court, in the case of Easley v. Cromartie in April 2001[?], ruled that gerrymandering for the purpose of increasing or reducing the influence of political party is not illegal. Justice Stephen Breyer, in his majority opinion, stated: "[evidence] does not show that racial considerations predominated in the drawing of District 12's boundaries. That is because race closely correlates with political behavior." The opinion blurred the line between race-based redistricting and politics-based redistricting, saying that in this case, it was unclear that the first was the cause, rather than the latter.

Hunt v. Cromartie (not Easley v. Cromartie) was a case in which the Supreme Court ruled that a particular district was permissible because it was a political gerrymander and not a racial one. However, I think the principle itself was established in a much earlier case. Also if you read the decision is really didn't blur the distinction because it outlined a number of criteria for determining which is which. (Basically the criteria is that if you have a choice are you excluding black Republicans or including white Democrats, and NC was able to show that the new district included large numbers of white Democrats.)

This is a very strong oversimplication of a complex situation:

It was decisive in the elimination of multi-member districts[?] in the United States electoral system as candidates realized they could gain "safe" seats by controlling the boundaries to include supporters and exclude opponents. Simultaneously, minorities, especially African-Americans, realized that their strong constituency in cities was being politically diluted for lack of "safe" seats of their own in one inner city district.

The United States has traditionally not had multi-member districts, and there are a long and complicated set of court decisions as to when multi-member districts are permissible.