|
|
"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource."
|
(Pennsylvania) Redistricting: Home to Roost
|
|---|
| Parent(s) |
Container
|
| Contributor | Scott³ |
| Last Edited | Scott³ Mar 08, 2007 08:16pm |
| Logged |
4
[Older]
|
| Category | News |
| Media | Newspaper - Wall Street Journal |
| News Date | Saturday, November 11, 2006 02:00:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | "Philadelphia's urban voters were packed into Democratic seats, making them bluer than before. Since the state was losing two seats because of a population decline in the 2000 census, six incumbents were paired. That meant four Democrats were left to fight over two seats. And one Democrat was forced to run against an incumbent Republican in a district that favored the Republican.
Then, the legislators employed the supercomputers at Pittsburgh's Carnegie Mellon University to carve up the Philadelphia suburbs. The goal: make four Republican seats by cracking apart any Democratic strongholds left outside the city.
One of those districts, the sixth, starts at the city line and moves west to pick up several suburbs. Then it turns back east to capture conservative Chester County. And then it shoots north into the rolling farms of conservative Berks County where it splits four townships and ends in Reading. Reading itself was broken apart, precinct by precinct, to be shared by the sixth district's then-new congressman, Republican Rep. Jim Gerlach, and incumbent Republican Rep. Joe Pitts, of the 16th District."
"After the Pennsylvania redistricting, the partisan make-up of the state's House delegation shifted to 12 Republicans and seven Democrats from a pre-redistricting breakdown of 10 Democrats and 11 Republicans. That meant the balance of the state's delegation shifted from one that was split roughly evenly to one in which Republicans had a five-seat edge."
"On Tuesday, Mr. Fiztpatrick lost 50.3% to 49.7%. Ms. Hart lost 52% to 48%. Mr. Weldon, lost 57% to 43%. Mr. Gerlach, the last Republican standing whose district was custom-made for him, is ahead amid final vote counting, 50.5% to 49.5%
"If Republicans had been a little less aggressive, they could have won several of those seats. If they gave the Democrats one more seat, they could have shored up by several percentage points the other seats," says Nathaniel Persily, a political scientist at U. of Penn." |
| Share |
|
|
2¢
|
|
| Article | Read Full Article |
|
| Date |
Category |
Headline |
Article |
Contributor |
|
|
