Even though there’s plenty of speculation, no one can predict how Mississippi’s five congressional districts will be divided into four, political pundits say.
Seeing the Delta split as it once was appears to be a common sentiment. Many feel that the Delta should should have at least two representatives in Congress.
Guessing how the congressional lines would be redrawn has led to initial speculation that the 3rd and 4th Congressional Districts would be combined, with the fringe population split between the 2nd and 5th Congressional Districts.
Dr. Robert Albritton, professor of political science at the University of Mississippi says there’s reason to consider a shift in the 2nd Congressional District.
“It’s going to be very difficult to keep the 2nd Congressional District majority black,” he says. “As you go east anywhere from the Mississippi River, it gets whiter, so you have to go south and pick up areas of the 4th District. A lot of people think that means that (4th Congressional District Rep. Ronnie) Shows will have to run against (3rd Congressional District Rep. Chip) Pickering, but if (5th Congressional District Rep. Gene) Taylor’s district is coming north, well, it’s too early to tell.”
It’s highly speculative to predict what the state legislature will do, says Rep. Chip Pickering.
“They will also have to redraw their own districts too, so it is unclear at this time where the new lines will be drawn,” he says.
Some observers have says it’s not a sure thing that the state’s 2nd Congressional District, which covers most of the Delta, won’t shift north considerably, taking in DeSoto County, which has a primarily white population. Democrat Bennie Thompson, a former Bolton councilman and mayor and former Hinds County District Two Supervisor, represents the 2nd Congressional District. His support has been primarily from the black community.
Prior to Thompson, Democrat Mike Espy of Yazoo City, who gave up the seat when President Bill Clinton appointed him Secretary of Agriculture in 1992, and whose support crossed racial boundaries, represented the 2nd Congressional District.
“I think there’s a feeling in the legislature not to redraw the 1st and 2nd districts too much, both of which touch the Delta,” one Delta jounalist says. “The legislature is going to be fair in the drawing of the new districts. They’ll try to hold down the strife among incumbents. Every district is going to have 200,000 more people and that’s going to cause great dislocation of the personal interests of people and business.”
Dr. Marty Wiseman, director of the Stennis Institute at Mississippi State University, says legislators would have to “preserve the African-American majority in the 2nd Congressional District because, even though the law has changed a little on that, we can’t go backwards.”
Technology has made it possible for anyone with computer access and a software program to plug in numbers and shift districts all over the place, Wiseman says.
“Any group, whether it’s the Sierra Club, the NAACP, or the Conservative Caucus can sit there and give you a redistricting plan and, with their own agenda; ask legislators to explain why their version won’t work, especially if it’s balanced and meets Justice Department guidelines,” he says. “There will be more eyes and hands on the process.”
Data from the 2000 Census showed that Mississippi had a population of 2.85 million people, a 10.5% increase over 1990. But the growth rate wasn’t fast enough to keep up with other states, and the state lost a congressional seat for the first time since the mid-1800s.
Dr. Elen Singh, professor of political science at Mississippi Valley State University, says she’s concerned about the process because most people “aren’t aware of redrawing the lines until they happen every 10 years.”
“Elected officials and the governor should explain that this is a process we should expect on a regular basis and that there needs to be more effort to draw the lines in a fair way,” Singh says.
Information from the Census Bureau, including population totals by race, Hispanic origin, and voting age, accompanied with maps of blocks, census tracks, counties, towns, cities, county subdivisions, and voting districts will be sent to Governor Ronnie Musgrove and legislative leaders in the spring.
“Redrawing the congressional lines probably won’t happen until the summer because the redistricting committee will not have Census figures until April,” says Rep. Charlie Capps of Cleveland, chairman of the appropriations committee. “We’ll be gone by then, and I think we’ll do the redistricting in a special session this summer.”
The drawing of districts will be very political – to a point, Wiseman says.
“The only constraint is that it can’t be racially biased,” he says. “Once that criteria is met, gerrymandering for political purposes is not prohibited by the constitution or anything else. I would suspect that with a Democratic governor and a Democratic legislature, the lines would favor losing a Republican representative.”
Another interesting observation that makes redistricting different than in the past, Wiseman says, is that the state didn’t have a viable Republican party in 1990.
“There was basically just the Democratic Party in the state and it was a matter of who’s in and who’s out, and when lines were redrawn, it was kept in the family,” Wiseman says. “But as we saw in the governor’s race, there’s a 50-50 proposition, just like the presidential race, and this will be the first time we’ve had a full blown two-party competition for seats in the redistricting process. That should up the ante.”
Albritton says warring factions based on party labels haven’t been reached – yet.
“We’ve never gone at this before with Democrats and Republicans being able to fully weigh in on the process,” he says. “We’ve had a non-partisan approach to the legislature back to when Governor Ronnie Musgrove was Lt. Governor, and now we even have some Republicans who chair committees. But I can see this as being the situation that sets division in place. I can see this as being a catalyst for a full blown majority-minority, two-party legislature.” DBJ