Nashville's Voters Are Silenced, and a Good Public Servant Is Gone
Representative Jim Cooper won re-election again and again because he is a good politician and a good man. But he finally lost to Republican gerrymandering.
...Mr. Cooper's Fifth Congressional District currently consists of three tidy counties — all of Dickson and Davidson Counties, along with most of Cheatham — lined up in a row. Under gerrymandering, it will resemble spilled coffee on a crumpled map that someone tried to pour off before the stain set. The new district will meander east through parts of rural Wilson County and south through parts of wealthy Williamson County, then further south through Marshall and Maury Counties, before turning west to enfold Lewis County. Hohenwald, the Lewis County seat, is 83 miles and an entire world away from Nashville.
Representative Jim Cooper won re-election again and again because he is a good politician and a good man. But he finally lost to Republican gerrymandering.
...Mr. Cooper's Fifth Congressional District currently consists of three tidy counties — all of Dickson and Davidson Counties, along with most of Cheatham — lined up in a row. Under gerrymandering, it will resemble spilled coffee on a crumpled map that someone tried to pour off before the stain set. The new district will meander east through parts of rural Wilson County and south through parts of wealthy Williamson County, then further south through Marshall and Maury Counties, before turning west to enfold Lewis County. Hohenwald, the Lewis County seat, is 83 miles and an entire world away from Nashville.
It would be a ludicrous map by any definition. What makes it an outrageous map from a civil rights standpoint is that it exists solely to silence the voters in this city, one of the most racially and culturally diverse in Tennessee. Under the new redistricting plan, Republicans in the legislature kept intact the counties in virtually all other House districts, but they carved Metropolitan Davidson County into three districts. Each one begins in Nashville and extends far into the overwhelmingly white surrounding counties.
Clearly this is a matter of crucial importance to Nashville voters, but it's also a stark example of the unfairness inherent in gerrymandering itself, which is so widespread and so undemocratic as to be nothing less than a national tragedy. Gerrymandering allows elected officials to choose their own voters, instead of the other way around.
A corollary effect of this practice is to reinforce the political polarization that now makes it so difficult for elected officials from opposing parties to work together. And it's getting only worse... (Margaret Renl, continues)
Clearly this is a matter of crucial importance to Nashville voters, but it's also a stark example of the unfairness inherent in gerrymandering itself, which is so widespread and so undemocratic as to be nothing less than a national tragedy. Gerrymandering allows elected officials to choose their own voters, instead of the other way around.
A corollary effect of this practice is to reinforce the political polarization that now makes it so difficult for elected officials from opposing parties to work together. And it's getting only worse... (Margaret Renl, continues)
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