As our report explains, "prison-based gerrymandering" is a practice whereby many states and local governments count incarcerated persons as residents of the areas where they are housed when election district lines are drawn. This practice distorts our democratic process by artificially inflating the population count-and thus, the political influence-of the districts where prisons and jails are located. As a result, everyone living outside of those districts suffers a dilution of their voting power.

The easiest way to understand how prison-based gerrymandering undermines the integrity of our political process is to look at how prisons affect local elections. Most (in)famously, during the 2002 election cycle, the town of Anamosa, Iowa was divided into 4 City Council wards of about 1,370 people each. Ward 2, however, contained a state penitentiary that housed over 1,320 prisoners. Thus Ward 2's actual population was comprised of fewer than 60 non-incarcerated residents.

Anamosa's districting plan (pictured) therefore granted the approximately 60 constituents of Ward 2 the same level of political representation accorded to over 1,300 people living in each of the other wards. Remarkably, a man was elected to Anamosa's City Council from Ward 2 on the strength of two write-in votes.

The Anamosa example and others like it across the country make a mockery of the principle of "one person, one vote." Articulated by the Supreme Court in the seminal case Reynolds v. Sims, the one person, one vote principle requires that election districts be comprised of roughly the same number of constituents so that every person receives the same level of representation. As Anamosa illustrates, prison-based gerrymandering contravenes that basic principle of political equality.

Unfortunately, the Anamosa pattern has been replicated throughout the country, and at all levels of government - from school boards to city councils to statewide legislatures. It is a problem that is not limited to any particular region, and that distorts democracy for both rural and urban communities alike.

Undoubtedly, however, the communities that are the most thoroughly victimized by prison-based gerrymandering are urban communities of color-a result of the racial discrimination that infects our nation's criminal justice policies.

African Americans are 12.7 percent of the general population, but are 41.3 percent of the federal and state prison population; nearly 9 percent of all African-American men in their twenties or thirties lives in prison. But members of the disproportionately minority incarcerated population are largely held in areas that are both geographically and demographically far removed from their home communities: in New York, for example, approximately 77 percent of all prisoners are African-American or Latino, but 98 percent of all prison cells are located in disproportionately white State Senate districts. Nationally, rural communities make up only about 20 percent of the U.S. population, but it is estimated that 40 percent of all incarcerated persons are held in facilities located in rural areas.

Thus, in state legislatures across the country, prison-based gerrymandering dilutes minority voting strength and transfers political power from urban communities of color to predominantly white areas. This reliance for political power on an imported, captive, and disfranchised minority population is, unfortunately, all-too reminiscent of the infamous three-fifths compromise.

The unfairness of this phenomenon, as a practical matter, is not lost on most people. And legally, it raises substantial concerns under both Section 2 of the federal Voting Rights Act and the United States Constitution. But some argue that incarcerated individuals should be counted where they are physically present because communities that host prisons are required to provide services to inmates.

The reality, however, is that incarcerated individuals are not residents of the communities in which they are housed, as nearly every state has a constitutional or statutory provision stating that a person does not gain or lose residence by virtue of incarceration. In New York, for instance, Article II, Section 4 of the State Constitution provides: "For the purpose of voting, no person shall be deemed to have gained or lost a residence, by reason of his or her presence or absence . . . while confined in any public prison." If incarcerated persons are not residents of the places where they are held, it hardly makes sense to consider them constituents there.

And while communities that host prisons are clearly entitled to the resources that are necessary to run large prisons (and already receive an economic boost in the form of prison-related jobs), there is no reason for those communities to also receive an enhanced voice in the political process.

The rules on residency comport with basic common sense: incarcerated individuals cannot integrate into the surrounding community or build enduring ties there. They cannot utilize local services such as parks, libraries, or roads. They are not there voluntarily, and can be moved at any time at the discretion of the state. They cannot participate in local civic life - and, tellingly, in the two states where prisoners can vote without limitation (Maine and Vermont), they do so by absentee ballot in their home communities, not in the prison districts. They are not "constituents" of those districts in any normal sense of the word.

Earlier this year, Maryland became the first state in the country to definitively reject prison-based gerrymandering for the upcoming redistricting cycle, by passing the "No Representation Without Population Act."

Other states should enact similar legislation and take advantage of the Census Bureau's recent decision to release data on prison populations in time for the next redistricting cycle. For state and local governments, doing so would not only mark a reaffirmation of principles of democracy and political equality, it would also eliminate a potential source of legal liability in the always-contentious redistricting process.

For more information on prison-based gerrymandering, please read our full report, or visit our website, or visit the websites of our partners in the campaign to end prison-based gerrymandering: the Prison Policy Initiative, Dēmos and the Brennan Center for Justice.

[image via Prison Policy Initiative]

There's an odd - and therefore probably not surprising - proclivity among some Tea Party members to bemoan the Constitution's 17th Amendment, and call for its repeal.

David Firestone, in an op-ed for The New York Times, notes for us that the 17th Amendment was added to the Constitution in 1913 and provided "for the direct popular election" of U.S. senators. Before the amendment was adopted, state legislatures, "filled with men of property and stature," chose senators, Firestone writes.

Beyond some Tea Partiers, is there a groundswell of support for dumping the 17th Amendment and allowing state legislatures to select senators?

As Firestone notes, "A modern appreciation of democracy - not to mention a clear-eyed appraisal of today's dysfunctional state legislatures - should make the idea unthinkable. But many Tea Party members and their political candidates are thinking it anyway, convinced that returning to the pre-17th Amendment system would reduce the power of the federal government and enhance state rights."

Firestone concludes:

It may be true that appointed senators, accountable only to state legislators, would never approve of many useful federal mandates designed to put the national interest above local parochialism - including everything from the minimum wage to the new health care reform law.

Not enough Americans vote. But, fortunately, almost all like the idea that they can, a thoroughly modern sentiment that will confine this elitist notion to the fringes. That means Tea Partiers who are infuriated by the health care law and everything else now going on in Washington can no longer look to James Madison for a bailout. Their best remedy is the one they seem to spurn: a vote at the ballot box.

Most states and local governments are counting prisoners in creating election districts, maintains a report released today by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF).

In "Captive Constituents," the LDF notes that "most states and local governments count incarcerated persons as residents of the prison communities where they are housed when drawing election district lines, even though they are not residents of those communities and have no opportunity to build meaningful ties there."

"This practice is known as ‘prison-based gerrymandering,' and it distorts our democratic process by artificially inflating the population count - and thus, the political influence - of the districts where prisons and jails are located," said John Payton, LDF president and director-counsel, said in a press statement about the report."

The full report is available here.

We are witnesses today to an historic period in the civic engagement of Latinos in the United States. Latinos have become a permanent fixture of the American political experience, and the Census is an integral part of that. Every issue - healthcare, the economy, jobs, funding for schools, hospitals and roads -- is affected by the Census. Most importantly, the Census is at the core of our democracy. Census data are used by the federal government to distribute $440 billion annually in funds to states and localities. Each one of us is worth $1,400 to our community every year for ten years, until the next Census, so every person missed in the Census means less in resources for schools and clinics, transportation and jobs. It's like throwing money out the window.

In establishing our federal government system, the Founding Fathers determined that a count of the population was needed to see how truly representative the government was going to be, and that's why a Census undertaking every ten years was written into the Constitution. In the past, slaves were counted as 3/5 of a person in the Census, and Native Americans living on reservations were completely excluded. However, now that all persons are included, we need to ensure all Latinos are counted.

In 2000, up to three percent of Latinos were missed in the Census, representing unrealized political power and nearly $2 million in lost resources to the communities. The Census is about two simple things: Money and Power. Two things that no one freely gives up. And two things we must insist our community gets the share of resources and political influence we have earned and deserve.

There are some who have called for a Latino boycott of the Census until Congress approves immigration reform. But that effort has fallen on deaf ears in the immigrant community because immigrants understand how important it is to be included in the Census. They realize what is at stake, and they understand there is power in numbers. That is something we in the Latino community understand. How can we tell Congress what we need if we don't tell the Census Bureau who and where we are? The National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) Educational Fund considers that the 2010 Census will be the Latino Census because it will be the first Census in the history of the United States in which Latinos are the nation's second-largest population group, and it is the first time the U.S. Census Bureau mailed out 13 million bilingual (English/Spanish) forms to make sure ALL Latinos are counted. Latinos are 15% of the U.S. population and number 47 million strong. We account for 50% of this country's population growth, and we need to be counted.

The NALEO Educational Fund, along with the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Mi Familia Vota Education Fund, Univisión Communications, Entravisión Communications and ImpreMedia coordinates the ya es hora ¡HAGASE CONTAR! (It's Time Make Yourself Count!) campaign, which focuses on promoting the importance of the Census and educating individuals to fill out their forms and mail them back. The campaign is the largest and most comprehensive non-partisan effort to incorporate Latinos as full participants in the American political process.

A recent survey by Pew Hispanic Research shows our outreach is working. The study finds an overwhelming majority of Latinos - 70% -- believe that Census participation is good for the community. The poll highlights that most Latinos know the Census Bureau cannot give out personal information, nor can the information the Bureau gathers be used for law enforcement or immigration purposes. Nonetheless, the poll shows a greater understanding of the Census among foreign-born Latinos compared to their native-born counterparts. The NALEO Educational Fund has said and we will continue to maintain that the U.S. Census Bureau needs to invest more in reaching English-dominant Latinos, especially as the Bureau moves to its phase of reaching out to those who haven't mailed back their forms. We will be there all the way, making sure all Latinos are counted. We have a national toll-free bilingual hotline, 877-ELCENSO (877-352-3676) so that the public can call with questions about the Census and assistance in completing the form. Our outreach will continue through the rest of April and the month of May to help ensure we are all included in this very important decennial count.

[Image via U.S. Census Bureau, Public Information Office.]

Amid news of Justice David Souter's pending retirement and predictions that the Supreme Court stands poised to strike down Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, Professor Heather Gerken is lauding Souter's understandings of race and politics.

"Souter is perhaps the least politically connected person on the Court, and his home state of New Hampshire is a racially homogenous area that hasn't had much of a record either way with the Voting Rights Act," writes Gerken, a frequent ACS contributor. "Despite his lack of experience, Souter has carved out a position on the Voting Rights Act that is both more nuanced and more pragmatic than his brethren's."

Gerken proceeded: 

It is odd for the conservatives to demand that the state be color-blind when voters are decidedly not. In a world of racial bloc voting, race-blind districting is simply a recipe for disempowering racial minorities. But the dominant story of race told by the liberals on the Court - one that treats racial minorities as "objects of judicial solicitude, rather than as efficacious political actors in their own right," in the words of Stanford law professor Pamela Karlan - similarly misses something important. It misses the idea that putting representatives of the minority community into positions of power gives racial minorities the power to protect themselves, so that eventually they no longer need be wards of the Court.

Souter understands both of these things. Consider his take on majority-minority districting, a practice about which the Court has been fighting since before Souter joined the Court. The Court's conservatives generally see majority-minority districts as handouts, akin to affirmative action and business set-asides. The Court's liberals generally view majority-minority districts as unfortunate necessities, a race-conscious strategy for integrating legislatures when voters won't.

Souter sees majority-minority districts for what they are – a necessary part of the dynamic by which outsiders find their way to political integration.