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Redistricting in the United States is the process of drawing electoral district boundaries. [1] For the United States House of Representatives, and state legislatures, redistricting occurs after each ten-year census. [2] The U.S. Constitution in Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3 provides for proportional representation in the
Article One, Section 2, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution initially provided: . Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians ...
In 1982, U.S. District Court in Boyer v.Gardner upheld New Hampshire's reapportionment of the 400-person House of Representatives using floterial districts. The plaintiffs had taken issue with the "aggregate method," which compares the relative voting power of the group of districts with both floterial and dedicated representatives, and had asked the court to consider the "component method."
[clarification needed] The government (or an independent body) does not organize the perfect number of voters into an election district, but a roughly appropriate number of voting places. The basis for apportionment may be out of date. For example, in the United States, apportionment follows the decennial census. The states conducted the 2010 ...
The Reapportionment Act of 1929 (ch. 28, 46 Stat. 21, 2 U.S.C. § 2a), also known as the Permanent Apportionment Act of 1929, is a combined census and apportionment bill enacted on June 18, 1929, that establishes a permanent method for apportioning a constant 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives according to each census.
In many states, districts are drawn with the intent to benefit certain political groups, including one of the two major political parties, in a practice known as gerrymandering. Most states draw new lines by passing a law the same way any other law is passed, but some states have special procedures. [ 11 ]
Carr, 369 U.S. 186 (1962), the Court ruled to correct what it considered egregious examples of malapportionment; these were serious enough to undermine the premises underlying republican government. Before Reynolds , urban counties nationwide often had total representations similar to rural counties, and in Florida , there was a limit to three ...
The redistricting process begins with each decennial census, when the U.S. government provides detailed census tract data to the states, usually by March 1 of the first year of the decade. The Texas Legislative Council provides this census data to legislators, who then draw district boundaries in a computer program using this information.