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Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 13, 1997
issue of Workers World newspaper
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Editorial: Racist redistricting

When it comes time to correcting historic injustices, the government and courts always seem to find a reason not to do it. It's the reason Frederick Douglass noted that "without struggle, there is no progress."

Since the beginning of this country in 1776, Congressional districts have been drawn to satisfy political agendas. But only when districts were being redrawn in order to end racism in Congressional representation did the courts become active in deciding what is acceptable or unacceptable.

The fact is, not even the Civil War brought freedom and equality to this country. The civil-rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s brought great advances. But it was not able to win full equality. Racism continues to pervade government institutions as well as all business and industry.

The 1980s started an era of reaction that has not yet ended. And the Clinton administration has not only refused to oppose it; the Clinton White House has become an advocate for the right-wing agenda.

So it is not surprising that the courts are pushing forward with the effort to turn back gains made by the civil-rights movement. A federal court ruling in late February will eliminate the New York district of one of the handful of Latino/Latina representatives in Congress: Nydia Velasquez.

The biggest attacks on Congressional districts have come during the Clinton administration. Beginning in 1994, federal courts have ordered redistricting in Louisiana, Georgia, Texas and North Carolina. The districts in question were predominantly African American.

All the courts' legal arguments are nonsense. Every reactionary court ruling has always been made with "legal" arguments. Legal arguments over the last 200 years have said that Black people could only be slaves, that women had no rights. But no one would dare to argue that now.

The same is true with Congressional representation. An unjust court ruling that denies Black or Latino people their right to representation is an injustice no matter how lofty the legal phrases the judges use to explain their rotten rulings.

Affirmative action is meant to redress the existing racism. Drawing Congressional districts with majority Black or Latino voting populations is one method to apply affirmative action to Congress. It is a moderate method, for it does not guarantee representation.

It would be fair to argue that Black, Latino, Asian, Native and other people of color should be represented in Congress at least in proportion to their number in the population. In the former Soviet Union the different nationalities had such representation in one house of parliament. This was by far more democratic than the system in this country that denies minority nationalities any guarantee of representation.

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