On December 27, the plaintiffs in Citizens for Fair Representation v Padilla filed a notice of appeal to the Ninth Circuit. This is the case that argues the extreme size of California legislative districts violates the U.S. Constitution, by depriving ordinary Californians of an opportunity to influence their state legislators. The State Senate districts have almost 1,000,000 inhabitants; the Assembly districts almost 500,000.
Who ate the extraordinary Californians who are not injured by the current humongous districts?
What is the status of the review/appeal of the John Cox petition?
A court might reasonably take the position that the size of a legislature is a political issue, and thus non-judiciable. You might recall that a key issue in the OMOV decisions was that the legislative process could not remedy any perceived injury, since legislators from underpopulated areas, would not willingly give up their overrepresentation. In the New York sister case to /Reynolds/, the court noted that while New Yorkers had the periodic option to call a constitutional convention, that the delegates to such a convention would be chosen by from the malapportioned senate districts.
This is not the case in California because of the initiative process.
Serious PR supoorters might combine their efforts with the Cox proposal. If the current 40-member senate were elected by PR from 5-member districts, those districts would have 5-million persons. A serious campaign might have to spend in seven figure$.
Under the Cox proposal senators would be elected from 10,000-person single-member districts. San Francisco might elect 88 senators. With an average electorate of 3128 voters, it is within reach of an individual candidate knocking on doors. That is an important reason why Vermont and Maine elect so many independent and even 3rd-party legislators.
But what if there were 5-member districts, elected by PR. San Francisco would have 17 or 18 senatorial district (compared to only 11 supervisor distrcts). The supervisor districts are amenable to street-level campaigns, if not door knocking.
Statewide, districts could be divvied up by county and city, perhaps even by reservation. Districts might vary in size, to more closely align with cities and neighborhoods. For example a city of 60,000 (Santa Cruz) might elect 6 senators, while a city of 40,000 (La Puente) would elect 4 senators.
But true proportionality should reflect the voters, not denizens, prisoners, or children. So the number of senators would be based on the number of votes cast. Intead of 89 senators, San Francisco might have 119 senators (San Francisco has proprtionately more adults). But taking this further, we could weight the vote of elected senators.
If John Smith had the support of 4132 voters, and Smith Johns had the support of 3412 voters, then their voting strength would reflect that. None of this fudging by transfers to “equalize” support. STV could still be used to eliminate trailing candidates, and perhaps to distribute the support of extraordinarily popular candidates. A system of reversion could be used to eliminated “exhausted” ballots. Each candidate would rank all candidates. If a voter ranked 1. Washington, 2. Adams, 3. Jefferson, and all three were excluded, then that ballot would be tabulated based on Washington’s rankings. No ballot with at least one preference would be discarded.
Ballots would be simple with rankings using numerals. Ballots could be hand counted as in Northern Ireland and the Republican of Ireland, or machine counted as in Scotland (local elections). Ballots could be tabulated using the New Zealand method, which better preserves the value of higher rankings. If necessary, work visas could be provided to Irish to assist with vote counting, and Singaporeans to assist with numeral writing, and counting.
PR math — SAME in ALL regimes —
Party Members = Total Members x Party Votes / Total Votes
— Candidate rank order lists to move surplus votes down and loser votes up — pending Condorcet.
ZERO need for foreign and outer space folks.
@DR,
What would keep the party bosses from ordering the same list for all party candidates?
How many current gerrymander area incumbents are robot HACKS of the *party bosses* ???
— even picked by such PB in primaries.
— with the top PB HACKS picked by such incumbents — Speakers / *leaders* – circular EVIL.
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Candidate lists – pre-election day and PUBLIC.
— mainly for getting marginal party members — getting initial voter votes less than half a RATIO [Total Votes/ Total Members].
IF a candidate is a robot HACK of the *party bosses* regarding such lists, then the media and public will take note.
Both current main gangs will blow up — SANE groups vs obviously INSANE extremist groups.
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See MULTI-party legis bodies in foreign PR regimes — defective mainly due to *parliamentary* system machinations — Israel, Germany, etc. — LACK of TOTAL Separation of Powers.
Also – Candidate nominations via equal nominating petitions or filing fees.
NO primaries.
Some Party Boss TYRANT has total control over such nominating petitions or filing fees ???
http://redistricting.lls.edu/cases.php
Prof. Levitt has spent YEARS reporting on gerrymander cases
— esp. the machinations of the SCOTUS math morons
— NOT YET able to detect [due to too many math moron lawyers and judges to count]
— 1/2 or less votes x 1/2 rigged packed/cracked gerrymander areas = 1/4 or less CONTROL = OLIGARCHY
— with much, much worse primary math
— with nonstop movement to ABSOLUTE LAWLESS KILLER MONARCHS — Prezs, Guvs, Mayors, etc.
There were 231 Assembly candidates in California, running for 80 assembly seats.
If I unerstand your proposed system, there would be a single statewide ballot with 231 names on it, that says vote for one. Candidates would each fill out a preference list. Votes would be tabulated using STv and the candidate’s preference list. Is this correct?
JR —
http://ballot-access.org/2018/09/14/california-political-consultants-now-disfavor-top-two-system-somewhat/#comments
Demo Rep on September 16, 2018 at 3:17 pm
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PRE-election candidate rank order lists.
District ballots — circa 5-12 candidates in first PR election.
District Voters vote for ONE.
—
pending exact PR and Condorcet.
With PR – there will be a higher percent of members with REAL power —
example tax rates –
each member picks a rate [as percent of State GDP] — rate getting bare majority approval would be the rate.
Top Party Bosses may attempt to control the rate – and get major feedback / revolt —
same for all *number* laws.
@DR,
So in California you would have perhaps 10 to 12 assembly districts with between 2.5 million and 6 million persons each, nominally electing between 5 and 12 members.
There might be between 14 and 45 candidates in each district. The 231 individual candidates would rank all 231 candidates. Most would agree to rank based on the political bosses, because that would ensure the bosses ran TV ads for them.
The political parties would run celebrity candidates, and many candidates that would have local or ethnic appeal, because that would lock in votes to the party lists. You really don’t want candidates being elected on first preferences. Instead, you want independent voters to pick out a Bulgarian-surnamed candidate like themselves. Some voters vote on celebrity or personality, others on party, others on identity.
Campaigns will be expensive because of the huge electorates.
And the elected members will be even less accountable than they are. And this does not address the issue of the lawsuit.
The STUNT MORON lawsuit has ZERO legal merit.
NO limit on State pops in USA Const.
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PR — whatever the size of the regime —
Party Members = Total Members x Party Votes / Total Votes.
Multiple parties with Members.
Majority Rule — unlike the current 25 percent MINORITY rule in the CA Assembly of party hack robots.
Also —
getting a CA majority rule regime would cause major pressure to divide CA —
AND more pressure to abolish the minority rule USA Senate
AND more pressure to have PR in ALL regimes in USA, Canada, Uk, India, etc.
—
IE for the mindless —
to save Western Civilization from internal total collapse into a USA Prez computerized KILLER monarchy – to make the Stalin/Hitler regimes seem trivial.
What party bosses picked the most candidates for the CA legislature and USA Reps in the 2018 CA top 2 primary ???
Which PB ??? – how many gerrymander hacks of each legis. body ???
Conspiracies NOT beyond belief ???
IE what TYRANT/monarch controls CA ???
FACTS-
2019-2020 CA Assembly 80 members [state reps]
80 concentration camps
VOTES PCT SUMMARY
3,424,956 *26.9 41 LOW D* WIN
2,524,621 19.9 + 19 HIGH D WIN
5,949,577 46.8 = 60 D WIN
1,913,448 15.1 + 20 R WIN
7,863,025 61.9 = 80 WIN
3,928,948 30.9 + 76 LOSE
11,791,973 92.8 = 156 TOTAL
920,569 7.2 + NONVOTES
12,712,542 100.0 = TOTAL VOTES
* ANTI-DEMOCRACY MINORITY RULE PERCENT
167,428 MAXWIN-50
39,328 MINWIN-32
106,683 MAXLOSE-16
4.26 MAXWIN/MINWIN
2.71 MAXLOSE/MINWIN
226,268 MAXDIST-6
69,417 MINDIST-32
3.26 MAXDIST/MINDIST
1.54 MAXLOSE/MINDIST
DATA-
https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/prior-elections/statewide-election-results/general-election-november-6-2018/statement-vote/
19 under PA 50
60 over PA 50, under PA 100
1 over PA 100
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Billions of folks flocking to the ANTI-Democracy Minority Rule Top 2 Primary CA Soviet Socialist Republic – esp INVADERS crossing southern CA border ???
SCOTUS FOLKS since 1789 HAVE INVENTED A ZILLION buzz phrases to analyze legal stuff.
2 BIG ones —
What cannot be done directly cannot be done indirectly. Cummings v. Missouri, 71 U.S. 277, 325 (1867); U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, 514 U.S. 778, 829 (1995).
A law must be tested by its operation and effect. Near v. Minnesota, 283 U.S. 697, 708-709 (1931); U.S. Term Limits, Inc., supra, 514 U.S., at 831.
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The Term Limits case was an election law case.
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Thus OK to have a DIRECT minority rule regimes regime in CA
— in addition to the indirect minority rule gerrymander regimes ???
IE – a MONARCH or perhaps a 3 Party Boss OLIGARCHY making ALL CA laws ???
Folks with ANY brain cells can decipher what *Republican Form of Government* in 4-4 means ??? —
since the DARK AGE occult SCOTUS math / legal MORONS are brain dead ignorant about RFG.
typo
Thus OK to have a DIRECT minority rule regime in CA
— in addition to the INDIRECT minority rule gerrymander regimes ???
Correction —
districts = 2 [rural] to 6 [urban] times total votes last guv election / total members
80 CA Assembly >>> 40 to 14 districts — possible 20 Average — Ave 4 per district.
Perhaps D, R and 3-5 minor parties would elect members.