In This Episode: Colorado, having seen constant partisan manipulations of redistricting in the past — Gerrymandering — actually did something about it, and did something radical in the process: they exercised Uncommon Sense.

064: The Line in the Sand
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Show Notes

* To help support Uncommon Sense, see the Patron’s Page, or the form in the sidebar.
* The cartoon and photo of Bernie Buescher are included in the transcript below. See also the first comment.
* For full details and language about Colorado’s Constitutional Amendments see Colorado Amendment Y, Independent Commission for Congressional Redistricting Amendment, and Colorado Amendment Z, Independent Commission for State Legislative Redistricting Amendment, on Ballotpedia.
* The Amendments’ supporting web site is no longer online, but the Internet Archive has it. This link takes you to the last snapshot of the site before the election.
* TEDx is the local, independently licensed version of the main TED Conferences. Grand Junction, Colorado’s, run yearly. Details here.

Transcript
It’s Census time in the United States, and one of the most important uses of the resulting count is to determine our representation in Congress — you and me. The people of the state of Colorado, having seen constant partisan manipulations of redistricting in the past — Gerrymandering — were fed up enough to actually do something about it, and they did something radical in the process: they exercised Uncommon Sense.
Welcome to Uncommon Sense, I’m Randy Cassingham.
Gerrymandering goes way back, but not enough of us really understand what it means, and hardly anyone knows where the word comes from. In 1812, the governor of Massachusetts signed a law to redistrict the state to benefit his own party. The political cartoonist at the Boston Gazette newspaper looked at the resulting map and added a head and wings to the northern district, making it look like a giant salamander wrapped around the state, which the newspaper published on March 26, 1812. They named the newly mythical beast after the governor, Elbridge Gerry, spelled g-e-r-r-y. The result: the Gerry-Mander, which we now pronounce “jerry-mander”. I’ll include the cartoon on the Show Page.