The status quo strikes back

Author: John Diaz
San Francisco Chronicle
September 19, 2010

No one ever thought the politicians in power would give up easily on one of their most cherished tools for assuring re-election: The ability to hand-select the voters they represent. Californians who thought the state was moving toward an independent redistricting process to state legislative races when they passed Proposition 11 in 2008 should be forewarned. Politicians in Sacramento and Washington are digging deep into their campaign treasuries to roll back the clock on reform.

The two redistricting-related measures on the November ballot are Prop. 20, which would have an independent commission draw the boundaries for congressional districts, and Prop. 27, which would wipe out the commission that is now being selected to realign state Senate and Assembly seats. I call the latter the "Incumbent Protection Act."

Each side has a wealthy benefactor: Charles Munger Jr., investment manager and philanthropist, contributed more than $3 million to help qualify Prop. 20 for the November ballot. Entertainment mogul Haim Saban of the "Power Rangers" franchise gave a $2 million boost to the effort to repeal redistricting reform.

Democrats in Congress are working behind the scenes to keep redistricting in the hands of their elected friends in Sacramento. As Kathay Feng, executive director of California Common Cause put it, the anti-reform campaign treasury is "populated with contributions by members of Congress and wanna-be members of Congress."

Among House Democrats from California, newcomers have anted up big time: Judy Chu (elected in 2009) poured in $600,000; Mike Eng (elected 2008) $100,000; Karen Bass (running this year) $50,000. Bay Area Democrats contributing $10,000 include Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Reps. Jackie Speier, Anna Eshoo, Mike Honda and Zoe Lofgren.

Don't expect politicians to assume a high-profile role in the campaign. Their self-interest in the issue would be much too obvious. Instead, they can let their money do the talking, so far, through campaign tactics that Feng charitably calls "intellectually dishonest."

In their campaign literature, and in a piece published in Insight last week, opponents of Prop. 20 isolate two of the multi-pronged criteria for defining "communities of interest" to suggest that consideration of residents' living standards and wealth would somehow lead to "Jim Crow" districts for "poor people only." In the Insight piece, Prop. 27 opponent Daniel Lowenstein wrote, "Californians understand these code words."

The "Jim Crow" argument is beyond outrageous. The definition of "communities of interest" was drawn from the guidelines used after the 1990 census, when the Legislature and governor were deadlocked on a redistricting plan, and the California Supreme Court appointed three special masters to draw the lines. That redistricting plan contributed to a record number of minorities - particularly Latinos - reaching the Senate and Assembly. Ten years later, the politicians again were drawing the lines, with one of the incumbent-friendly results being a tortured effort to buffer Rep. Howard Berman from the prospect of a Latino Democratic challenger in the demographically changing San Fernando Valley.

I had a chance to ask Lowenstein, a UCLA law professor, about his "Jim Crow" line - which is echoed in the campaign press packet - when he visited The Chronicle last week. He conceded that it might have been a poor choice of words.

"I was using 'Jim Crow' as a metaphor," he said.

"Jim Crow" is not a metaphor. It is a word loaded with a history of racist laws in the South that formed the framework of a segregated society. Its use as a scare tactic in against Prop. 20 is reckless and reprehensible.

Go forward or backward? What Propositions 20 and 27 would do Proposition 20