Marc Cooper hits the right notes in urging a Yes vote on one of the Schwarzenegger initiatives: Proposition 77, which will transfer the power to draw legislative and Congressional districts from the State Legislature to a panel of retired judges. It is a flawed plan: retired judges tend to skew conservative in California, which has mainly had Republican governors for the past twenty years; and the suggested guidelines under the proposed law could make it easier to limit the influence of urban residents by squeezing them into "compact" districts.

But it beats the status quo. The current lines were redrawn in 2001 with the intention of protecting incumbents of both parties (the large Democratic majorities in both houses of the State Legislature and in the Congressional delegation were inherited from the previous lines, which were also drawn by a judicial panel), with two underlying goals: defend the seat held by Democrat Gary Condit (remember him?); and save Representative Howard Berman from a primary challenge by a Latino opponent. The net result was a one-seat pick-up for the party in 2002, while the partisan margin in both state houses was essentially unchanged.

Berman has been a terrific Congressman, and I certainly do not wish him any misfortune in his future political career, but the result has been a disaster for the Party. In the 2004 election, Barbara Boxer, arguably the most liberal member of the Senate, won reelection by 20 percentage points, over a moderate-conservative Republican who had won several previous statewide elections. In terms of vote count, it may well have been the largest margin of victory in any contested Federal statewide election in American history. And as I've mentioned before, she lost by very small margins in the districts of two Republican congressmen of note, Duke Cunningham and Christopher Cox. John Kerry, of course, kicked the President's ass here as well, winning by ten points.

Any fairly-drawn set of districts that are designed to produce competitive races should be able to give Democrats at least 3-4 more Representatives. Of course, in a year when the Republican tide is running strong in this state, it will also benefit that party as well. Those should be the breaks in a democracy.

UPDATE [9/7]: Kash (of Angry Bear) and Kos also support 77, while Prof. Kleiman is an emphatic no. Kevin Drum is also opposed, but is not unsympathetic to the reformist argument. Of all the reasons to vote against Prop. 77, the possibility that it will create "compact" districts that will favor Republicans (besides being untrue in California, which has become a decidedly lopsided Blue State in the past fifteen years) is the least persuasive. Partisan gerrymandering should be no more acceptable if it's done to benefit Democrats then when it's done in states like Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas to benefit the GOP. And personally, I don't give a flying santorum if California's Democratic incumbents actually have to campaign in competitive districts in 2006, or even have to figure how to appeal to suburban and exurban voters in the O.C. and San Berdoo to win a swing district. This is a democracy, not the freaking Politburo.