Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, July 6, 1990 TAG: 9007060635
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Once the 1990 Census figures are available, state lawmakers must re-draw the lines for Virginia's legislative and congressional districts so that all areas are represented in accord with the principle of one man, one vote.
Single-member districts in the House of Delegates are a done deal: They were forced on the House in 1981 by a Republican governor, the American Civil Liberties Union and the federal courts.
Thus, the 1991 reapportionment ought to be a comparatively simple "by the numbers" exercise. The public ought to be spared the expense of the protracted assembly sessions, a special election and the court fights that made the '81 redistricting a fiasco.
But don't count on it. Redistricting is more than mathematical exactitude. It sets lines of demarcation for political battles. Even now the generals in the state's Democratic and Republican parties are in their war rooms looking over maps and plotting how to make the most of a political terrain that has been dramatically altered in the past 10 years.
In 1981, Virginia Democrats controlled both houses of the assembly as they always had. But they had not won a race for governor, the U.S. Senate or the statewide vote for president in 15 years. The Virginia GOP controlled the governor's office, the attorney general's office and nine of 10 congressional seats. It was seen as the more united, better-organized, better managed and more technically advanced party.
Now the situation is reversed. Republicans have not won a statewide race for governor, lieutenant governor or attorney general in 12 years. Democrats hold one of the state's two U. S. Senate seats and five of 10 House seats, and still control the state legislature. And it's the Democratic Party that's seen as more united, better-organized, better-managed and more technically advanced, while the GOP appears in disarray.
On the other hand, Republicans now hold 39 seats in the House of Delegates and 10 in the state Senate - a significant increase from the 24 and nine they held in the House and Senate respectively a decade ago.
The 1981 redistricting was, in large measure, an incumbent-protection act. The assembly's Democratic leaders seemed more than willing to accommodate Republican colleagues, who were too few in number to cause them much trouble. But having heard the footsteps of Republicans beginning to catch up since '81, the Democratic majority this time round will want to gerrymander as many districts as they can to keep the GOP's upward creep from becoming a stampede.
The Republican minority - lacking the gubernatorial protection they've had in the past two reapportionments - may feel compelled to try staving off a Democratic gerrymander via the U. S. Justice Department and the federal courts. If so, the GOP may find itself aligned with such erstwhile adversaries as the ACLU, the NAACP and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
Those groups are expected to push the assembly to create the state's first black-majority congressional district and more black-majority legislative districts. For the first time since 1950, population growth is expected to give Virginia an added congressional seat. If a contiguous black-majority district can be drawn, the federal Voting Rights Act may mandate that it be done.
Such a district would almost have to be in the Hampton Roads-to-Petersburg region now represented by two Democrats, Owen Pickett and Norman Sisisky. That could pit the interests of the Democratic Party against the interests of blacks - who have long been the party's most loyal constituency.
Virginia has not had a black congressman in this century. Civil-rights groups argue that, even if not legally required, the legislature has a moral duty to create a district that will improve the possibility of a black's being elected to Congress. The state GOP supports that contention - no doubt in part because the side effect of a black majority district is a largely white district next door, which Republicans would have a good chance of winning away from the Democrats.
The upshot of all this is that the state could see a political melee like it hasn't seen since - well, 1981. If statesmanship is too much to ask, at least let the legislators go into a rubber room to wield their long knives - where they can't hurt anyone but themselves.
by CNB