Little known fact: the Virginia constitution establishes a senate consisting of 33-40 members and a house consisting of 90-100 members. Wouldn’t it be wonderfully evil for the majority party to simply eliminate some of the minority party’s seats?
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No.
Alright. Good talk.
Yes, it would be – evil, that is.
You would have to do it when you redistricted, so you couldn’t just decide that “I don’t like Scott Lingamfelter, so we’re abolishing his district.” His voters — and he himself — would have to go into some other district or districts. You could do what the Republicans did in 2001 — redraw the lines to put three Democratic incumbents in the same district (in the Roanoke area) — but you could do that at the decennial redistricting anyway.
It wouldn’t be evil — I reserve “evil” for things that have a bit more of a life-and-death ring to them — but it would be intensely partisan.
I hope that if Democrats get control of the process for 2011, we adopt Creigh Deeds’ suggestion of a non-partisan redistricting commission. It has worked well in places that have tried it, like Iowa.
Is it possible for the voters in a district with no challenger to vote for none of the above? Say the voters of the 42nd district for example (they have no good candidate) voted for None of the Above, could that district then simply rely on the good leadership of delegates from nearby districts?
Absolutely, Scott — just leave that section of the ballot incomplete. It’s common to tally election results by undervotes, so your dissent will not go ignored.
Any idea why the constitution was written with those numbers as (fairly small) ranges rather than fixed values? What’s the point?
And leaving the ballot section blank is sort of like voting for “none of the above” except that none of the above can’t win. Not that I agree with those who think a binding “none of the above” option is a good idea.
Interesting possibilities were this to happen. I would expect the effect would be to increase Democratic percentages in the bodies as it would be harder to avoid population centers, similar to the way the State Senate is more moderate than the House.