Reynolds v. Sims
Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 562 1964 was a Supreme Court case that ruled that state legislature districts had to be roughly equal in population.
Having already undertaken what was previously felt to be a purely political question regarding redistricting in 1962 in Baker v. Carr, the Court decided to go farther in order to correct what seemed to it to be egregious examples of malapportionment which were serious enough to undermine the premises underlying representative democracy. Before Reynolds, disparities existed between state senates far greater than disparities in the US Senate. Urban counties were often drastically underrepresented.
Here are a few pre-Reynolds disparities compiled by then- Arizona Representative Morris K. Udall:
- In Connecticut one House district had 191 people; another, 81,000.
- In New Hampshire one township with 3 (three!) people had a state assemblyman; this is the same representation given another district with 3,244. The vote of a resident of the first town was 108,000 percent more powerful at the Capitol.
- In Utah the smallest district had 164 people, the largest 32,280 (28 times the population of the other). But each had one vote in the House.
- In Vermont the smallest district had 36 people, the largest 35,000 a ratio of almost 1,000 to 1."
- In California the 14,000 people of one small county had one State senator to speak for them; so did the 6 million people of Los Angeles County. It took 430 Los Angelenos to muster the same influence on a State senator that one person wields in the smaller district.
- In Idaho the smallest Senate district had 951 people; the largest, 93,400.
- Nevada's 17 State senators represented as many as 127,000 or as few as 568 people -- a ratio of 224 to 1.
The eight justices who struck down state senate inequality based their decision on the principle of "one man, one vote." In his majority decision, Chief Justice Earl Warren said "Legislators represent people, not trees or acres. Legislators are elected by voters, not farms or cities or economic interests."
Reynolds v. Sims set off a legislative firestorm in the country. Sen.Everett Dirksen of Illinois led a fight to pass a Constitutional amendment allowing unequal legislative districts. Dirksen warned that if
- ". . .the forces of our national life are not brought to bear on public questions solely in proportion to the weight of numbers. If they were, the 6 million citizens of the Chicago area would hold sway in the Illinois Legislature without consideration of the problems of their 4 million fellows who are scattered in 100 other counties. Under the Court's new decree, California could be dominated by Los Angeles and San Francisco; Michigan by Detroit.."
In 1989, the court cited Reynolds v. Sims as a precedent when it declared New York City's Board of Estimate unconstitutional; the decision strengthened the desire of many residents of Staten Island, the city's smallest borough, to contemplate secession from the city - a movement which remained prominent until Rudolph Giuliani was elected mayor of the city in 1993.
Despite the bluster of people who feared tyranny of cities, the court's decision was implemented.
External Link
http://dizzy.library.arizona.edu/branches/spc/udall/congrept/88th/641014.html
