On July 11, the Utah Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion in League of Women Voters Utah v Utah State Legislature, 2024 UT 21. It says that the 2018 initiative, passed by voters to impose a nonpartisan redistricting process, is reinstated. Here is the opinion.
In 2020 the legislature had repealed the 2018 initiative, and thus eliminated the nonpartisan redistricting process. But the State Supreme Court interprets the Utah Constitution to say the legislature can’t do that. It is thus a huge win for the initiative process as well as the nonpartisan redistricting process. The opinion says the legislature can alter initiatives that have already passed, but only to facilitate the purpose of that initiative, not to destroy it.
The hearing had been exactly a year ago, so this was a long time coming. As a result the state’s U.S. House boundaries will probably be altered next year. Thanks to Manual Haddad for the news.
Can there really be a “nonpartisan” restricting process? These so-called “independent” redistricting commissions have to be chosen by someone.
https://legacy.utcourts.gov/opinions/supopin/League%20of%20Women%20Voters%20v.%20Utah%20State%20Legislature20240711.pdf
UT SCT OP – TODAY
Thank you, Thomas Jones, for the link to the opinion. I put it in the body of the post.
Thomas Jones passed away on December 31, 2021. AZ is a bot.
TROLL MORONS NEVER PASS AWAY –
THEY JUST RE-CYCLE AND REPEAT THEIR TROLL MORON TRASH POSTS
No, bot. You’re a bot, not a troll moron, even though you repeat troll moron posts endlessly.
Not non partisan. Controlled by commies.
FELON LIARS – PARTY UNDER-COVER HACKS ON VARIOUS *NONPARTISAN* THINGS
— ESP MINORITY RULE GERRYMANDER THINGS — CA / MI / ETC
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/nation/2024/07/11/utah-supreme-court-sides-with-opponents-of-redistricting-that-carved-up-democratic-leaning-area/74369711007/
AP STORY ON UT SCT OP
“Not non partisan. Controlled by commies.”
The communist party doesn’t count.
COMMIE PARTY DOES NOT COUNT ITS DEAD/ENSLAVED VICTIMS ???
OLDE RUSSIA/ USSR / RED CHINA/ CUBA / N KOREA/ ETC
How many victims of capitalism?
Zero. Victims of a lack of neighborly charitableness under capitalism, sure. But not even a single victim of capitalism itself, per definition. That’s like saying “victims of liberty”: it is an oxymoron.
That’d be like holding guns responsible for gun crime, instead of criminals. Any liberty can be abused, that doesn’t mean that there is anything wrong with liberty.
@WZ,
It might be better to say it is non-partisan criteria. Partisan data could not be used in drawing districts.
Utah limits the initiative to statutes. A 2018 initiative provided for an independent redistricting commission that would use non-partisan criteria such as avoiding splits of cities and counties, etc. the commission would produce three maps and the legislature would pick one, or it could create its own that adhered to the criteria.
The Legislature which is vested with legislative authority then “amended” (euphemism for gutted) the procedure. It kept the commission, but said the the Legislature _may_ consider the commission plans. The commission labored for months with dozens of hearings. The Legislature then passed its map in a few days that divided Salt Lake County between four congressional districts, saying that Utah was a combination of urban and rural, and that this map made each district a combination of urban and rural.
The map was challenged in state district court. The district court ruled that the legislative gerrymander violated the right to vote, but it was OK to change any statutes passed by the initiative. Both sides appealed.
The Utah Supreme Court has ruled that the legislature can only make technical changes to initiated statutes. Otherwise it would frustrate the will of the People to alter or reform their form of governance. The case will go back to the district court which could order the Legislature to go back to the original statute, and pick one of the three plans.
The ruling (which includes maps) makes for interesting reading.
“Zero. Victims of a lack of neighborly charitableness under capitalism, sure. But not even a single victim of capitalism itself, per definition.”
Then your definition is faulty. Capitalism means whatever serves the (usually short term) bottom line of capitalists, regardless of consequences to employees, contractors, consumers, competitors, society, or the environment.
We are all victims of capitalism in multitudes of ways, and our species and planet is in its crosshairs.
Not at all, your definition of capitalism is faulty. As is your definition of capitalists, which seems to extend only to employers, contract givers and sellers.
If you get shot in the street, who is to blame? James Madison and the other founding fathers responsible for the Second Amendment? The gun manufacturer? The gun itself? Or the person who shot you?
If your answer is anything other than the person who shot you, then you deserve to be shot and should be blamed for getting yourself shot.
I said, blaming capitalism for lack of neighborly charitableness, is like holding guns responsible for gun crime, instead of criminals; but in fact it is even more preposterous: it’s like holding guns responsible for knife crime, instead of people going on stabbing sprees.
The difference between capitalism and communism, is that capitalism does not create any victims while communism makes everyone a victim.
Capitalism gives people the freedom to dispose of their property as they see fit, including voluntary charity to care for those the owner considers to be in need. Communism takes away both the freedom and property, and redistributes the property as the tyrant seizing is sees fit.
There can be no charity without voluntary basis. And there can be no victim of the freedom to dispose of ones property as the one sees fit.
“The difference between capitalism and communism, is that capitalism does not create any victims while communism makes everyone a victim.”
You have that backwards.
“Capitalism gives people the freedom to dispose of their property as they see fit”
“Their” property is the problem with that.
Having ownership of your own property and the freedom to dispose of it as you see fit, is not a problem. If you have an issue with who owns what property, that is a distinct problem, but it is not a problem with or caused by capitalism.
As for having all ownership abolished, all property seized and redistributed. Yes, that does make everyone a victim – aside perhaps from the one doing the redistributing – including any net beneficiary of the distribution. While it is impossible, per definition, for their to be such a thing as “a victim of liberty”.
*there
The idea of property is the problem. Having it seized and redistributed is the solution. Far from victimizing anyone, it is overdue justice from the institutionalized robbery, extortion and rape that is private property ownership.
Capitalism is the opposite of liberty.
You are doing that thing where you blame Madison for some thug randomly shooting you in the street without provocation.
The oppressive system of capitalism is what creates the conditions which drive people to such lifestyles or choices. Thugs don’t just randomly shoot people. In many countries it’s virtually unknown. Many things create social conditions, but capitalism is their root cause.
You have that backwards. Social conditions where thugs randomly shoot people appear in the formerly capitalist Anglosphere, Francosphere and Hispanosphere as it moves away from capitalism, and disappear in Slavosphere as it moves away from communism. If anything can be concluded from that it is that communism is their root cause and capitalism is the cure.
Taran is just one of many of Robert K Stock’s trolling personas.