The controlling party may try to force the opposition party into as few districts as possible. Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012. BIBLIOGRAPHY. to divide the constituencies of (a voting area) so as to give one party an unfair advantage, to manipulate or adapt to one's advantage, Proportional Representation Applied To Party Government. To divide (a geographic area) into voting districts in a way that gives one party an unfair advantage in elections. One of the congressional districts was said to be shaped like a salamander, to which one Federalist reportedly said: No, it’s a gerrymander. The gerrymander is not produced by the iniquity of parties, it is the outcome of the district system. By Andrew Prokop Jun 27, 2019, 11:40am EDT Elections may be nominally free, but governments engage in extensive gerrymandering, manipulation of voter registration and harassment of opposition parties. The districts are so badly gerrymandered that a challenger can't win. Credit: “The Gerrymander” Boston Gazette March 26, 1812. The word is a combination of the words Gerry, for the state's governor, Elbridge Gerry, and salamander, as a particular electoral district was jokingly said to be shaped like a lizard. Gerrymandering can take on a few different forms. Here's what you need to know about gerrymandering, the word you're hearing so much about today. to subject (a state, county, etc.) To change the boundaries of legislative districts to favor one party over another. In 1962, the Supreme Court ruled that districts must and have reasonable borders and must represent the population appropriately. How to use gerrymandering … As nouns the difference between reapportionment and gerrymandering is that reapportionment is the act of reapportioning; a second or subsequent apportionment while gerrymandering is (politics) the practice of redrawing electoral districts to gain an electoral advantage for a political party. The term gerrymander typically refers to the creation of electoral districts that have bizarre shapes in order to condition the outcome of an election. From the Cambridge English Corpus In contrast, if local boundaries are respected, levels of malapportionment increase, while gerrymandering becomes more difficult to accomplish. The Supreme Court just said federal courts can’t stop partisan gerrymandering It was a 5-4 ruling, with the conservatives in the majority. to a gerrymander. Gerrymander definition is - the act or method of gerrymandering. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Under such a system all unfairness would disappear, and the gerrymander would be impossible. Gerrymandering definition: Gerrymandering is the act of altering political boundaries in order to give an unfair... | Meaning, pronunciation, translations and examples Gerrymandering is just one of the tools used by governments to give their parties a leg up against the competition. As a verb gerrymandering is Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. How Do You Spell Chanukah (Or Is It Hanukkah)? gerrymander: 1 v divide unfairly and to one's advantage; of voting districts Type of: divide , part , separate come apart n an act of gerrymandering (dividing a voting area so as to give your own party an unfair advantage) Type of: cheat , cheating a deception for profit to yourself Le terme gerrymander s'inspire d'Elbridge Gerry, gouverneur démocrate-républicain de l'État du Massachusetts de 1810 à 1812.. Il existe peu de cas de gerrymandering dans l'histoire du Québec. Or they may draw strangely shaped districts to split opposition votes or combine the votes of the party in power. Consequently, every apportionment act involves more or less of the gerrymander. Let’s start with the basic definition, explore the history, and review the applications in today’s climate. How to Interpret a Correlation Coefficient r, How to Translate a Website with Google Translate. Gerrymandering definition is - the practice of dividing or arranging a territorial unit into election districts in a way that gives one political party an unfair advantage in elections. The Most Insincere Compliments And What To Say Instead. Or they may try to dilute the opposition across many districts so that they won’t have a voting majority in any of them. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins “Crow” vs. “Raven”: Do You Know The Difference? It was from this incident that the word "gerrymander," so often heard in politics in these days, took its name. Gerrymandering. Gerrymander definition: to divide the constituencies of (a voting area) so as to give one party an unfair... | Meaning, pronunciation, translations and examples Gerrymandering occurs when voting districts are redrawn to benefit one party over another in elections, forcing the other side to “waste” votes. Gerrymandering -- drawing political boundaries to give your party a numeric advantage over an opposing party -- is a difficult process to explain. Définition. What Is The Difference Between “It’s” And “Its”? Countries such as the U.K., Australia, Canada and most of those in Europe have transferred responsibility for defining constituency boundaries to neutral or cross-party bodies. 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