SCOTUS BLOCKS NORTH CAROLINA ANTI-GERRYMANDERING DECISION FROM LOWER COURT (2018 & 2020)

SCOTUS BLOCKS NC ANTI-GERRYMANDERING DECISION FROM LOWER COURT:

GOP’S NC VOTING DISTRICTS APPROVED.

BLACK ELITE NORTH CAROLINA LEADERS & WHITE DEM LEADERS WERE TOO BUSY BEING RACIALLY DIVIDED TO SEE THIS POLITICAL ALBATROSS LOOMING OVERHEAD.

WHILE BLACK ELITE & WHITE DEM LEADERS WERE COMFORTABLY BLOCKING PROGRESS FOR LOCAL NC VOTERS, THE GOP QUIETLY REVISED NORTH CAROLINA’S VOTING DISTRICTS.

“We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”

DR MARTIN LUTHER KING JR, 1964


Sources: NY Times, PBS News, The Young Turks, YouTube


**** Supreme Court Temporarily Blocks North Carolina Gerrymandering Ruling


WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday temporarily blocked a trial court’s order requiring North Carolina lawmakers to produce a revised congressional voting map, making it likely that the midterm elections this year will be conducted using districts favorable to Republican candidates.

The trial court had found that Republican legislators in the state had violated the Constitution by drawing congressional voting districts to hurt the electoral chances of Democratic candidates.

The Supreme Court’s move was expected and not particularly telling. The court, which is considering two other major tests of partisan gerrymandering, has granted stays in similar settings. Its decisions in the pending cases, from Wisconsin and Maryland, are likely to effectively decide the North Carolina case, too.

Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor noted dissents from Thursday’s order, which was brief and unsigned.

The previous North Carolina decision, issued by a three-judge panel last week, was the first from a federal court to strike down a congressional map as a partisan gerrymander. Republican state lawmakers, the court said, had violated the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection by drawing voting districts to their party’s advantage.

The judges noted that the legislator responsible for drawing the map had not disguised his intentions. “I think electing Republicans is better than electing Democrats,” said the legislator, Representative David Lewis, a Republican. “So I drew this map to help foster what I think is better for the country.”

The plan worked. In 2016, the court said, Republican congressional candidates won 53 percent of the statewide vote. But they won in 10 of the 13 congressional districts, or 77 percent of them.

The Supreme Court has ruled that racial gerrymandering can violate the Constitution. But it has never struck down a voting map as an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander.

Republicans and, in private, many Democrats in North Carolina had expected the Supreme Court to stay last week’s ruling, which ordered legislators to prepare a new map by Jan. 24. But elected officials and political strategists had been preparing for the possibility of a hasty redrawing of the congressional map and an upending of carefully laid plans for the midterm campaigns.

Even the brief gap between the trial court’s ruling and the Supreme Court’s order left the state in turmoil weeks before the deadline to declare candidacies.

Few states in recent years have seen as much political turbulence as North Carolina, where Republicans took control of the General Assembly in 2010 and now face off regularly with a Democratic governor. Many of the high-decibel clashes in North Carolina, even before Gov. Roy Cooper was elected in 2016, focused on elections and voting procedures.

A voter ID law has been the subject of contentious litigation, and a different three-judge panel concluded that many of the state’s legislative districts had been racially gerrymandered. In 2016, a court struck down a different version of the congressional map, saying it was a racial gerrymander.

But last week’s ruling stirred particular anger in Raleigh, the state capital, with Republicans infuriated that the judges had begun making arrangements for a court-appointed expert to draw a map as an alternative to one that the Legislature might develop.

Although observers said the three-judge panel’s ruling, stayed or not, had offered Democrats a valuable talking point in the months before midterm elections, Republicans welcomed the Supreme Court’s order on Thursday.

“We did fully expect this, but we are still grateful,” said Dallas Woodhouse, the executive director of the North Carolina Republican Party, who complained in an interview that the lower court had tried to “inject chaos into our elections.” Mr. Woodhouse said he fully expected that this year’s elections would be carried out under the existing map.

Critics of the map expressed disappointment and frustration with the court’s order.

“We still believe the day is coming soon for the General Assembly to be held to account for this madness,” said Allison Riggs of the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, which represents the League of Women Voters of North Carolina, a group that challenged the map. “The law and the facts of this case make that clear.”

J. Michael Bitzer, a political scientist at Catawba College, near Charlotte, said the Supreme Court’s order was an important, if perhaps temporary, win for Republicans in North Carolina.

“Certainly, Republicans will view this as a victory but probably a short-term victory,” he said. “They certainly dodged a bullet tonight. The question is: ‘How long do we have before the Wisconsin decision comes down, and what kind of impact will that have on 2018’s elections?’”

In October, the Supreme Court heard arguments in the case from Wisconsin. The trial court in that case had struck down a voting map for the State Assembly as an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander.

The Supreme Court has also agreed to decide whether Maryland Democrats crossed a constitutional line by redrawing House districts to flip a Republican-held seat to Democratic control.

In asking the Supreme Court to block the North Carolina ruling, state lawmakers said the trial court had made legal errors and unreasonable demands, notably in ordering new congressional maps to be drawn by Jan. 24.

The lawmakers’ brief reminded the justices that they had granted a stay in the Wisconsin case. “Particularly given the relief this court already granted to Wisconsin,” they wrote, “it makes no sense whatsoever to force North Carolina to immediately remedy a purported partisan gerrymandering violation and commence its 2018 election cycle under a new court-imposed map before this court can even decide whether and under what circumstances such claims may be adjudicated.”

In their own brief, lawyers for Democrats challenging the map said the lawmakers’ motive in seeking a stay was “plain as day.”

“The Republican contingent of the legislature wants to enjoy the fruits of their grossly unconstitutional actions for yet another election cycle,” the brief said.

North Carolina's History Of Illegal, Partisan Gerrymandering: Stealing Elections!

NC: 12th Congressional District Seat Tricky Piece Of Redistricting Puzzle


With the newfound power of redistricting in their hands, North Carolina Republicans will likely seek to draw districts that give them a chance to win more congressional seats in future elections. Despite winning statewide congressional voting by a 55-45 percent margin, Democrats hold just a 7-6 edge in congressional seats. With the power to shape district maps at their disposal, Republicans should easily be able to reverse that margin, at minimum.

Nevertheless, redistricting has been a contentious process in the past, with a myriad of lawsuits resulting from the the Voting Rights Act (VRA).

While the intent of the law is to ensure that racial minorities have fair representation in Congress, along the way, it sometimes mitigates partisan gerrymandering. In practice, it prevents a bloc of minority voters concentrated in a geographic area from having their voting power diluted or spread across multiple congressional districts. Section 5 of the VRA means the General Assembly must “preclear” their redistricting plans with the U.S. Department of Justice.

The two districts in North Carolina subject to section 5 of the VRA are the 12th and 1st districts; the DOJ will have final say in deciding how these districts will be drawn.

These requirements first took place after the 1990 U.S. Census, which was followed by two African-American congressmen winning election in 1992, the first time in more than 90 years that an African-American represented North Carolina in Congress. The 12th district has been represented by Mel Watt since 1992; he’s won the seat capturing around 70 percent of the vote each time.

The original district, as drawn in 1992, was 64 percent African-American and spanned almost the entire length of the state, south to north. Parts of the district were very narrow, running along Interstate 85 to connect urban parts of the district around Charlotte to Durham, which is more than 150 miles away.

The Supreme Court in Shaw v. Hunt ruled the district unconstitutional in 1996, finding that the oddly-shaped district was drawn up for explicitly racial purposes in violation of the 14th Amendment. The lines of the district were tweaked to exclude parts of Durham in 1998.

In 2009, a U.S. Supreme Court case, Bartlett v. Strickland — involving North Carolina General Assembly districts — eliminated the consideration of “crossover voters” who vote with Minorities to elect a candidate of their choice in districts like the 12th.

The case is important because it establishes ground rules that will apply nationwide during the redrawing of Voting districts following the 2010 census. It could result in a reduction of Minority districts by encouraging district drafters to pack traditional Minority districts with more than 50 percent Minority voters, rather than aiming for widespread distribution across several Voting districts.

The decision comes in a case challenging the creation of North Carolina’s House District 18. State officials tasked with redrawing North Carolina’s voting map found themselves caught between two competing laws.

The VRA mandates that new districts may not be drawn in such a way as to dilute the existing political clout of minority voters in minority voting districts. But North Carolina has a law requiring that counties not be split up within voting districts.

State officials discovered that if they adhered to the “whole county provision” of state law, the Minority voting age population in District 18 would be reduced from 39 percent to 35 percent.

Concerned that the reduction would amount to Illegal minority vote dilution, the officials concluded that they were required to ignore the state’s whole county provision to avoid violating the federal voting rights law.

One of the affected counties filed suit, claiming the state law’s whole county provision should be upheld. The North Carolina Supreme Court agreed.

According to David T. Canon, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, this ruling will make re-crafting the 12th district easier for Republicans. Canon says that after the Bartlett v. Strickland ruling, “The only thing that matters is the percentage of minority voters in the district.”

Republicans will be able to use redistricting techniques such as “packing” and “cracking” but would risk disapproval from the DOJ.

“Cracking” means dividing a district and moving its parts into several other districts in order to reduce the power of the minority voters, while “packing” would heavily concentrate Minority voters into one district. Canon thinks in order to meet DOJ approval, the 12th district, “would likely need to have somewhere between 45 and 55 percent minority voters.”

Once the 12th and 1st districts have been approved by the DOJ, Republicans can piece together the remaining districts in an effort to capture seats in 2012 currently held by Democrats.">with a myriad of lawsuits resulting from the the Voting Rights Act (VRA).

While the intent of the law is to ensure that racial minorities have fair representation in Congress, along the way, it sometimes mitigates partisan gerrymandering. In practice, it prevents a bloc of minority voters concentrated in a geographic area from having their voting power diluted or spread across multiple congressional districts. Section 5 of the VRA means the General Assembly must “preclear” their redistricting plans with the U.S. Department of Justice.

The two districts in North Carolina subject to section 5 of the VRA are the 12th and 1st districts; the DOJ will have final say in deciding how these districts will be drawn.

These requirements first took place after the 1990 U.S. Census, which was followed by two African-American congressmen winning election in 1992, the first time in more than 90 years that an African-American represented North Carolina in Congress. The 12th district has been represented by Mel Watt since 1992; he’s won the seat capturing around 70 percent of the vote each time.

The original district, as drawn in 1992, was 64 percent African-American and spanned almost the entire length of the state, south to north. Parts of the district were very narrow, running along Interstate 85 to connect urban parts of the district around Charlotte to Durham, which is more than 150 miles away.

The Supreme Court in Shaw v. Hunt ruled the district unconstitutional in 1996, finding that the oddly-shaped district was drawn up for explicitly racial purposes in violation of the 14th Amendment. The lines of the district were tweaked to exclude parts of Durham in 1998.

In 2009, a U.S. Supreme Court case, Bartlett v. Strickland — involving North Carolina General Assembly districts — eliminated the consideration of “crossover voters” who vote with minorities to elect a candidate of their choice in districts like the 12th.

The case is important because it establishes ground rules that will apply nationwide during the redrawing of voting districts following the 2010 census. It could result in a reduction of minority districts by encouraging district drafters to pack traditional minority districts with more than 50 percent minority voters, rather than aiming for widespread distribution across several voting districts.

The decision comes in a case challenging the creation of North Carolina’s House District 18. State officials tasked with redrawing North Carolina’s voting map found themselves caught between two competing laws.

The VRA mandates that new districts may not be drawn in such a way as to dilute the existing political clout of minority voters in minority voting districts. But North Carolina has a law requiring that counties not be split up within voting districts.

State officials discovered that if they adhered to the “whole county provision” of state law, the minority voting age population in District 18 would be reduced from 39 percent to 35 percent.

Concerned that the reduction would amount to illegal minority vote dilution, the officials concluded that they were required to ignore the state’s whole county provision to avoid violating the federal voting rights law.

One of the affected counties filed suit, claiming the state law’s whole county provision should be upheld. The North Carolina Supreme Court agreed.

According to David T. Canon, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, this ruling will make re-crafting the 12th district easier for Republicans. Canon says that after the Bartlett v. Strickland ruling, “The only thing that matters is the percentage of minority voters in the district.”

Republicans will be able to use redistricting techniques such as “packing” and “cracking” but would risk disapproval from the DOJ. “Cracking” means dividing a district and moving its parts into several other districts in order to reduce the power of the minority voters, while “packing” would heavily concentrate minority voters into one district.

Canon thinks in order to meet DOJ approval, the 12th district, “would likely need to have somewhere between 45 and 55 percent minority voters.”

Once the 12th and 1st districts have been approved by the DOJ, Republicans can piece together the remaining districts in an effort to capture seats in 2012 currently held by Democrats.




US Supreme Court Holds To Narrow Interpretation Of The Voting Rights Act



The Federal Voting Rights Act does not authorize vote dilution lawsuits in voting districts in which a particular racial or ethnic group comprises less than 50 percent of the voting age population.

In a 5 to 4 decision announced on Monday, the US Supreme Court rejected a claim that so-called minority crossover districts qualify for protection under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA). Instead, the court's conservative wing embraced a narrow view of the law.

Crossover districts are those in which a cohesive minority voting population can elect candidates of its choice by forming a coalition with cross-over votes from whites or other non-minority voters.

The case is important because it establishes ground rules that will apply nationwide during the redrawing of voting districts following the 2010 census. It could result in a reduction of minority districts by encouraging district drafters to pack traditional minority districts with more than 50 percent minority voters, rather than aiming for widespread distribution across several voting districts.

The decision comes in a case challenging the creation of North Carolina's House District 18. State officials tasked with redrawing North Carolina's voting map found themselves caught between two competing laws.

The VRA mandates that new districts may not be drawn in such a way as to dilute the existing political clout of minority voters in minority voting districts. But North Carolina has a law requiring that counties not be split up within voting districts.

State officials discovered that if they adhered to the "whole county provision" of state law, the minority voting age population in District 18 would be reduced from 39 percent to 35 percent.

Concerned that the reduction would amount to illegal minority vote dilution, the officials concluded that they were required to ignore the state's whole county provision to avoid violating the federal voting rights law.

One of the affected counties filed suit, claiming the state law's whole county provision should be upheld. The North Carolina Supreme Court agreed.

In affirming that decision, a plurality of the US Supreme Court ruled that the Voting Rights Act protects the voting clout of minority voters in districts in which minority voters comprise more than 50 percent of the voting age population.

"The rule provides straightforward guidance to courts and to those officials charged with drawing district lines to comply with Section 2 [of the VRA]," wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy in the plurality decision.

"We decline to depart from the uniform interpretation of Section 2 that has guided federal courts and state and local officials for more than 20 years," he said in the opinion.

"Minority groups in crossover districts cannot form a voting majority without crossover voters," Justice Kennedy wrote. "In those districts minority voters have the same opportunity to elect their candidate as any other political group with the same relative voting strength."

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito joined Kennedy's decision in full. Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia concurred in the judgment, but did not agree with the underlying reasoning.

In a dissent, Justice David Souter said the plurality was being unfaithful to the intent of the Voting Rights Act.

"Minority voters in districts with minority populations under 50 percent routinely elect representatives of their choice," he said. "The effects of the plurality's unwillingness to face this fact are disturbing by any measure and flatly at odds with the obvious purpose of the act."

Justice Souter added, "States will be required under the plurality's rule to pack black voters into additional majority-minority districts, contracting the number of districts where racial minorities are having success in transcending racial divisions in securing their preferred representation."

Justice Kennedy said that enforcing the VRA to protect minority voting clout in districts where minority voters did not constitute a majority would "grant special protection to a minority group's right to form political coalitions."

He added, "Section 2 does not impose on those who draw election districts a duty to give minority voters the most potential, or the best potential, to elect a candidate by attracting crossover voters." The law safeguards those who already possess the "potential to elect" favored representatives from losing that potential through vote dilution, he wrote.

In a dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said the high court's decision "severely undermines" the aim of the act. "Today's decision returns the ball to Congress' court," she wrote. "The legislature has just cause to clarify beyond debate the appropriate reading of Section 2."

The case is Bartlett v. Strickland (07-689).




Supreme Court Limits Redistricting Provision Of Voting Rights Act


This week the US Supreme Court ruled on the scope of the minority vote dilution component (section 2) of the Voting Rights Act (VRA). In doing so the court interpreted the VRA to only protect the voting power of minority groups when they constitute a majority of the electorate in a legislative district. This ruling makes the requirements of section 2 significantly narrower then the defendant in the case, the chief elections official for the state of North Carolina, had believed it to be.

North Carolina had broken its own constitution's requirement that legislative districts respect county boundaries in order to avoid diminishing the concentration of African-American voters from 39% to 35% when redrawing a district in 2003. One of the now-split counties sued, resulting in this week's ruling.

Though the VRA speaks only generally of preventing the dilution of minority votes in order to preserve the ability of minorities to elect candidates of their own choosing, the court has now made clear that only districts with a majority of minority voters (a so called "majority-minority district") are protected from vote dilution. In North Carolina the district in question is a "coalition district" where minority voters are able to pick their choice of candidate only when joined in coalition with other voters.

The controlling opinion was written by Justice Kennedy in the conviction that courts need a clear rule for when section 2 applies to avoid what he views as the constitutionally suspect insertion of race into government decision making. While this decision is a loss for minority voting power and will likely lead to a greater number of minority "packed" districts, many Circuits Courts have previously adopted the Supreme Court's view, limiting the impact of this particular ruling.

The most positive aspect of the decision was a strong statement by Justice Kennedy that "racial discrimination and racially polarized voting are not ancient history." Court watchers almost unanimously viewed Justice Kennedy's forceful assertions about the continued problems of racism as a sign that the court in another coming voting rights case (which will almost assuredly see Kennedy casting another deciding vote) will likely uphold the power of the Department of Justice to "pre-clear" election law changes in jurisdictions with a history of disenfranchising minorities to make sure that they don't violate voting rights.




Mel Watt Most Liberal NC Rep, Most Gerrymandered District (12th)


So Mel Watt is North Carolina's most Liberal Congressional Rep.

Really?

I guess "Liberal" is the new buzz word for sorry, ineffective Democrats seeking to raise Campaign funds.

Isn't Mel Watt's 12th District the MOST gerrymandered Congressional District in the state? He's been in there WAY too long.

Mel ONLY caters to Wall Street and his Fraternity/ Sorority friends that's it!

Where do you think Self-Serving, Sneaky, Empty-hearted Mayors like Anthony Foxx spawned from? Politicians like Mel Watt.

Mel is an Incumbent who keeps the rest of his constituents (mainly African-Americans) within North Carolina's 12th District poor so they can never challenge him.

Thus he's basically useless.

Due to North Carolina's Racist history, there was definitely a time when Gerrymandered districts were necessary.

However Politicians like Mel Watt are now abusing the true intended purpose of Gerrymandering for their own personal gain.

They advocate and push Straight Ticket Voting from their poorest Constituents which allows them to remain in Public Office NOT to help, but to become personally Wealthy.

In fact Mel Watt is so crooked he introduced a watered down amendment in 2009 which would have granted Wall Street execs more power to be corrupt and play games with Taxpayer money.

Even Alan Grayson slammed Mel Watt's bill.




Too many Black Youth are dropping out of High School and NOT attending College because of Mel Watt's Selfishness and Greed.

Does Mel care? Don't count on it!

North Carolina, especially Charlotte deserves better.

We need fresh blood in Congress.

Time to go Mel! Bye-bye.


View Larger Map


Sources: Americanindependent.com, Christian Science Monitor, C-Span, McClatchy Newspapers, MSNBC, Southern Studies, WRAL, Youtube, Google Maps

Mel Watt (Gerrymanderer) Not Fully Onboard With Obama's Tax Cut Deal? I'm Surprised!

N.C. Democrats Wary Of Obama Tax Deal


As President Barack Obama worked Tuesday to sell the tax deal he reached late Monday with Republicans, Democrats across North Carolina offered somewhat tepid reviews of the plan.

The White House is pitching the deal as a "framework," allowing it some wiggle room as it moves through Congress. It includes a menu of tax extensions, tax cuts and tax credits, a package that some observers think could run more than $700 billion over two years.

"There’re some things in it I like, and some things in it I don’t like," said U.S. Rep. Mel Watt, a Charlotte Democrat, who is studying the deal. "It’s always a balancing act. It’s even more of a balancing act in this political environment."

As soon as the deal was announced, some liberals grumbled that the president had caved into Republican demands. Activists crashed two White House phone lines in logging their opposition Tuesday.

U.S. Rep. David Price, a Chapel Hill Democrat, said in a statement that Republicans were holding the middle class "hostage."

"It appears Republicans will only support extending unemployment insurance for jobless Americans and extending lower rates for middle class taxpayers if the wealthiest people in the country are given generous, unaffordable breaks on both income and estate taxes," Price said. "In short, Republicans are holding middle class taxpayers , the unemployed, and the country’s fiscal future hostage to the well-off, their peculiar brand of class warfare."

The deal includes a 13-month extension of unemployment benefits, tax cuts for the middle class, a 2 percentage point cut in payroll taxes and an extension of several tax credits – all of which some Democrats said would help the middle class.

It all comes as Americans increasingly say they’re worried about the national debt.

"It doesn’t make any hard choices," Watt acknowledged. "At some point we’re going to have to bite the bullet, but we’re not going to do it yet."

Obama told reporters in a White House news conference Tuesday that though he vehemently opposed extending tax cuts to the wealthy, he made the deal with Republicans to prevent what he considered long-term impacts to jobless Americans.

"This is a situation where tens of millions of people would be directly damaged and immediately damaged," Obama said.

Across North Carolina, 232,285 residents could lose unemployment benefits in the coming year without the extension, according to a White House estimate released last week.

More than 16,000 of those residents live in Mecklenburg County, and Charlotte Mayor Anthony Foxx joined a White House conference call with reporters Tuesday to sell Obama’s deal.

"Fighting a battle over these issues any longer would only have worked to the disadvantage of the American people," Foxx said.

He acknowledged having qualms about extending tax cuts for the wealthy, but he said the tax credits for business expenses and for research and development will help Charlotte companies.

"(Obama) is also working to put the pieces in place to create jobs over the long term, and that is ultimately what all of us want," Foxx said. "What I’m most interested in is focusing on the fact that we’re going to be able to see businesses buy equipment and buy products that will help them grow, and the ripple effect is job growth, and that’s what we’re all interested in."

Many of Obama’s strongest supporters in the North Carolina delegation remained quiet Tuesday. U.S. Rep. Brad Miller’s spokeswoman said he is still thinking about the details of the plan. So is Price, of Chapel Hill. But moderate Democrats were more open to the deal.

U.S. Rep. Larry Kissell, a Biscoe Democrat, is happy to see lawmakers and the president work together for both unemployment benefits and tax cuts, said his spokesman, Christopher Schuler. "We’re happy with the framework they’ve reached."

U.S. Rep. Mike McIntyre of Lumberton also liked the deal.

"Ensuring no tax increases for any Americans, extending unemployment benefits for those out of work, and providing workers with a payroll tax holiday is a strong way to finish the 111th Congress," McIntyre said in a statement. "Congress should pass this agreement, and keep working in a bi-partisan manner to get our economy moving again."

Watt said he expects to spend a lot of time studying the policy impacts before deciding how to vote.

"I don’t know how I will vote ultimately, because it’s just too early," Watt said. "I try not to be reactionary."







NC: 12th Congressional District Seat Tricky Piece Of Redistricting Puzzle


With the newfound power of redistricting in their hands, North Carolina Republicans will likely seek to draw districts that give them a chance to win more congressional seats in future elections. Despite winning statewide congressional voting by a 55-45 percent margin, Democrats hold just a 7-6 edge in congressional seats. With the power to shape district maps at their disposal, Republicans should easily be able to reverse that margin, at minimum.

Nevertheless, redistricting has been a contentious process in the past, with a myriad of lawsuits resulting from the the Voting Rights Act (VRA).

While the intent of the law is to ensure that racial minorities have fair representation in Congress, along the way, it sometimes mitigates partisan gerrymandering. In practice, it prevents a bloc of minority voters concentrated in a geographic area from having their voting power diluted or spread across multiple congressional districts. Section 5 of the VRA means the General Assembly must “preclear” their redistricting plans with the U.S. Department of Justice.

The two districts in North Carolina subject to section 5 of the VRA are the 12th and 1st districts; the DOJ will have final say in deciding how these districts will be drawn.

These requirements first took place after the 1990 U.S. Census, which was followed by two African-American congressmen winning election in 1992, the first time in more than 90 years that an African-American represented North Carolina in Congress. The 12th district has been represented by Mel Watt since 1992; he’s won the seat capturing around 70 percent of the vote each time.

The original district, as drawn in 1992, was 64 percent African-American and spanned almost the entire length of the state, south to north. Parts of the district were very narrow, running along Interstate 85 to connect urban parts of the district around Charlotte to Durham, which is more than 150 miles away.

The Supreme Court in Shaw v. Hunt ruled the district unconstitutional in 1996, finding that the oddly-shaped district was drawn up for explicitly racial purposes in violation of the 14th Amendment. The lines of the district were tweaked to exclude parts of Durham in 1998.

In 2009, a U.S. Supreme Court case, Bartlett v. Strickland — involving North Carolina General Assembly districts — eliminated the consideration of “crossover voters” who vote with Minorities to elect a candidate of their choice in districts like the 12th.

The case is important because it establishes ground rules that will apply nationwide during the redrawing of Voting districts following the 2010 census. It could result in a reduction of Minority districts by encouraging district drafters to pack traditional Minority districts with more than 50 percent Minority voters, rather than aiming for widespread distribution across several Voting districts.

The decision comes in a case challenging the creation of North Carolina’s House District 18. State officials tasked with redrawing North Carolina’s voting map found themselves caught between two competing laws.

The VRA mandates that new districts may not be drawn in such a way as to dilute the existing political clout of minority voters in minority voting districts. But North Carolina has a law requiring that counties not be split up within voting districts.

State officials discovered that if they adhered to the “whole county provision” of state law, the Minority voting age population in District 18 would be reduced from 39 percent to 35 percent.

Concerned that the reduction would amount to Illegal minority vote dilution, the officials concluded that they were required to ignore the state’s whole county provision to avoid violating the federal voting rights law.

One of the affected counties filed suit, claiming the state law’s whole county provision should be upheld. The North Carolina Supreme Court agreed.

According to David T. Canon, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, this ruling will make re-crafting the 12th district easier for Republicans. Canon says that after the Bartlett v. Strickland ruling, “The only thing that matters is the percentage of minority voters in the district.”

Republicans will be able to use redistricting techniques such as “packing” and “cracking” but would risk disapproval from the DOJ.

“Cracking” means dividing a district and moving its parts into several other districts in order to reduce the power of the minority voters, while “packing” would heavily concentrate Minority voters into one district. Canon thinks in order to meet DOJ approval, the 12th district, “would likely need to have somewhere between 45 and 55 percent minority voters.”

Once the 12th and 1st districts have been approved by the DOJ, Republicans can piece together the remaining districts in an effort to capture seats in 2012 currently held by Democrats.">with a myriad of lawsuits resulting from the the Voting Rights Act (VRA).

While the intent of the law is to ensure that racial minorities have fair representation in Congress, along the way, it sometimes mitigates partisan gerrymandering. In practice, it prevents a bloc of minority voters concentrated in a geographic area from having their voting power diluted or spread across multiple congressional districts. Section 5 of the VRA means the General Assembly must “preclear” their redistricting plans with the U.S. Department of Justice.

The two districts in North Carolina subject to section 5 of the VRA are the 12th and 1st districts; the DOJ will have final say in deciding how these districts will be drawn.

These requirements first took place after the 1990 U.S. Census, which was followed by two African-American congressmen winning election in 1992, the first time in more than 90 years that an African-American represented North Carolina in Congress. The 12th district has been represented by Mel Watt since 1992; he’s won the seat capturing around 70 percent of the vote each time.

The original district, as drawn in 1992, was 64 percent African-American and spanned almost the entire length of the state, south to north. Parts of the district were very narrow, running along Interstate 85 to connect urban parts of the district around Charlotte to Durham, which is more than 150 miles away.

The Supreme Court in Shaw v. Hunt ruled the district unconstitutional in 1996, finding that the oddly-shaped district was drawn up for explicitly racial purposes in violation of the 14th Amendment. The lines of the district were tweaked to exclude parts of Durham in 1998.

In 2009, a U.S. Supreme Court case, Bartlett v. Strickland — involving North Carolina General Assembly districts — eliminated the consideration of “crossover voters” who vote with minorities to elect a candidate of their choice in districts like the 12th.

The case is important because it establishes ground rules that will apply nationwide during the redrawing of voting districts following the 2010 census. It could result in a reduction of minority districts by encouraging district drafters to pack traditional minority districts with more than 50 percent minority voters, rather than aiming for widespread distribution across several voting districts.

The decision comes in a case challenging the creation of North Carolina’s House District 18. State officials tasked with redrawing North Carolina’s voting map found themselves caught between two competing laws.

The VRA mandates that new districts may not be drawn in such a way as to dilute the existing political clout of minority voters in minority voting districts. But North Carolina has a law requiring that counties not be split up within voting districts.

State officials discovered that if they adhered to the “whole county provision” of state law, the minority voting age population in District 18 would be reduced from 39 percent to 35 percent.

Concerned that the reduction would amount to illegal minority vote dilution, the officials concluded that they were required to ignore the state’s whole county provision to avoid violating the federal voting rights law.

One of the affected counties filed suit, claiming the state law’s whole county provision should be upheld. The North Carolina Supreme Court agreed.

According to David T. Canon, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, this ruling will make re-crafting the 12th district easier for Republicans. Canon says that after the Bartlett v. Strickland ruling, “The only thing that matters is the percentage of minority voters in the district.”

Republicans will be able to use redistricting techniques such as “packing” and “cracking” but would risk disapproval from the DOJ. “Cracking” means dividing a district and moving its parts into several other districts in order to reduce the power of the minority voters, while “packing” would heavily concentrate minority voters into one district.

Canon thinks in order to meet DOJ approval, the 12th district, “would likely need to have somewhere between 45 and 55 percent minority voters.”

Once the 12th and 1st districts have been approved by the DOJ, Republicans can piece together the remaining districts in an effort to capture seats in 2012 currently held by Democrats.




Mel Watt Most Liberal NC Rep, Most Gerrymandered District (12th)


So Mel Watt is North Carolina's most Liberal Congressional Rep.

Really?

I guess "Liberal" is the new buzz word for sorry, ineffective Democrats seeking to raise Campaign funds.

Isn't Mel Watt's 12th District the MOST gerrymandered Congressional District in the state? He's been in there WAY too long.

Mel ONLY caters to Wall Street and his Fraternity/ Sorority friends that's it!

Where do you think Self-Serving, Sneaky, Empty-hearted Mayors like Anthony Foxx spawned from? Politicians like Mel Watt.

Mel is an Incumbent who keeps the rest of his constituents (mainly African-Americans) within North Carolina's 12th District poor so they can never challenge him.

Thus he's basically useless.

Due to North Carolina's Racist history, there was definitely a time when Gerrymandered districts were necessary.

However Politicians like Mel Watt are now abusing the true intended purpose of Gerrymandering for their own personal gain.

They advocate and push Straight Ticket Voting from their poorest Constituents which allows them to remain in Public Office NOT to help, but to become personally Wealthy.

In fact Mel Watt is so crooked he introduced a watered down amendment in 2009 which would have granted Wall Street execs more power to be corrupt and play games with Taxpayer money.

Even Alan Grayson slammed Mel Watt's bill.




Too many Black Youth are dropping out of High School and NOT attending College because of Mel Watt's Selfishness and Greed.

Does Mel care? Don't count on it!

North Carolina, especially Charlotte deserves better.

We need fresh blood in Congress.

Time to go Mel! Bye-bye.


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Sources: Americanindependent.com, C-Span, McClatchy Newspapers, MSNBC, Youtube, Google Maps

Gerrymandering 101: Its Fraud! No Longer Needed!

The Top Ten Most Gerrymandered Congressional Districts In The United States



(10.) North Carolina-12

This is what most people imagine when they think of a gerrymandered district — what I call “Gerrymander Classic.” NC-12 looks very much like the gerrymandered districts of the 19th century, but taken to extremes. As bad as it is, NC-12 at least looks like a congressional district, with meandering lines, consistent width, and hand-drawn appearance. As we’ll soon see, modern gerrymandering is often another animal altogether, with jarring shapes and artificial boundaries that are not just offensive to the eye but somehow feel like an insult to rationality.


(9.) Florida-20

This is what gerrymandering looks like in the modern era: ugly. Gone are any attempts at aesthetics. In the old days, redistricters at least tried to disguise their gerrymandering by drawing district lines that looked almost kinda sorta reasonable. No more. Nowadays many districts, with FL-20 being a good example, seem to be the result of computer algorithms with no regard whatsoever for human or natural boundaries. Needless to say, all sense of “community” within a congressional is out the window altogether when it is shaped like this, with jagged tendrils reaching out every which way to gobble up the desired demographic.


(8.) Pennsylvania-12

PA-12 is a rare example of “packing” (jamming as many opposition voters as possible into one district) that backfired. This district was created to be a Democratic stronghold formerly held by Congressman Jack Murtha, who was assumed to have a lock on the district. At the last redistricting in 2000, the Republicans in charge gave up on the area, which is solidly unionized, and decided to “pack” Murtha’s new district with as many Democrats as possible, to allow the remaining districts in the region a chance to have slim Republican majorities. But in the intervening ten years everything has changed: the area grew more and more conservative, and the locally popular Murtha died, opening up the seat to possible challengers.

In the 2010 election, PA-12 barely remained Democratic with Mark Critz winning by a hairsbreadth 50.8%-49.2% margin — while most of the surrounding districts overwhelmingly went Republican. Thus, if the foolish 2000 Republican redistricters had not consciously set out to create a “packed” Democratic district, and had instead just drawn the boundaries at random, they could have easily won all the races in the area, instead of losing this one (and the adjacent PA-4) by the slimmest of margins. Note to gerrymanderers: THINGS CHANGE. What may appear to be a wise gerrymander maneuver today may blow up in your face sometime in the future.


(7.) North Carolina-6

I have included NC-6 as a perfect example of “inverse gerrymandering,” a district that is partly hollowed out internally by a different gerrymandered district — in this case, the northern end of NC-12, our first example above. NC-6 is a stark reminder that no gerrymander is freestanding: all congressional districts are interlocked like jigsaw puzzle pieces, and every time you enclose any area by some outrageous boundary line, you are disincluding that same area from some surrounding district. So for every gerrymander you create, you are likely to also have a less-noticeable but just as offensive inverse gerrymander next door.


(6.) Florida-3

Florida has more than its fair share of gerrymandering nightmares. But while many of the state’s districts were admittedly drawn to favor Republican candidates, FL-3 is instead a federally mandated “minority-majority” district gerrymandered to give Black Voters a voice:

[FL-3] was drawn in 1992 to be North Florida’s black-majority seat and Democrats were shifted from the surrounding districts to make the surrounding districts more Republican. It currently stretches from Jacksonville’s downtown in the north to Orlando’s in the south, and stretches east and west to include other largely minority and Democratic areas such as Gainesville, Sanford and Eatonville.

As a result of this gerrymandering, the district is strongly Democratic with a Cook Partisan Voting Index of D +18 and gave Obama 73% of its vote in the 2008 election. It is 50.9% black and 35.4% white. …

The 3rd District is at the center of the debate over the potential impact of the FairDistricts initiative. Due to its shape, the 3rd is one of several districts that violate restrictions in the initiative which require compact districts that conform to geographical and political boundaries. On the other hand, the 3rd District is protected by the Voting Rights Act and a non-compact shape may be necessary to ensure it remains an effective African-American seat.

The “FairDistricts Initiative,” ballot proposals designed to finally make Florida’s redistricting theoretically nonpartisan, was finally approved by voters this year on November 2 — but was immediately challenged in court not by the Republicans as you might imagine but by none other than Corrine Brown, the representative of FL-3! Why? Because the new law stipulates that districts be geographically compact, which would eliminate her voting bloc and most likely her seat in Congress, when FL-3 is totally reconfigured next year. Which is ironic, because Republicans also view the new law with disdain, seeing it as a plot to swing the redistricting advantage back to the Democrats. Sigh. Can’t we all just get along?
(Answer: NO!)



(5.) Illinois-17

Political scientists love to cite IL-17 as the prototypical gerrymandered district, and you are likely to see IL-17 used as the illustration in many academic treatises about redistricting. And we can see why here. Its shape has often been described as “a rabbit on a skateboard,” though to me it looks more like an embryonic ichneumon wasp with a pancreatic cyst.

We saw above how PA-12 was a gerrymandering blunder by the Republicans; IL-17 is the opposite, a gerrymandered district created by Democrats to ensure themselves a seat in western Illinois — but which this year was snatched from their grasp by Tea Party candidate and now congressman-elect Bobby Schilling. Ooops! The Democrats went out on a limb when drawing IL-17 — several limbs, by the looks of it — but the wave election of 2010 changed the electoral landscape. Let me repeat my warning to over-confident redistricters next year: THINGS CHANGE. Gerrymander at your own risk.


(4.) Florida-22

Florida-22 isn’t a congressional district: it’s series of random lines generated by a malfunctioning dot-matrix printer. What else could explain the sheer purposelessness of the innumerable jagged ins and outs of a district so thin that in a few places you could run across it in under a minute? All of this to achieve — what? A district that is almost perfectly balanced between Democrats and Republicans. Couldn’t the same result have been effected a little more simply, perhaps by circling some random part of a Florida map with a felt pen?

But all is forgiven, Florida-22, because on November 2 you elected as your representative Allen West MFC (My Favorite Congressman), quite obviously the next President of the United States.


(3.) Arizona-2


Arizona’s second district is the one most likely to make people burst out laughing. I mean, c’mon. And the explanation for this atrocity only makes it seem worse:

The odd shape of the district is indicative of the use of gerrymandering in its construction. The unusual division was not, however, drawn to favor politicians.

Owing to historic tensions between the Hopi and the Navajo Native American tribes and since tribal boundary disputes are a federal matter, it was thought inappropriate that both tribes should be represented in the U.S. House of Representatives by the same member. Since the Hopi reservation is completely surrounded by the Navajo reservation, and in order to comply with current Arizona redistricting laws, some means of connection was required that avoided including large portions of Navajo land, hence the narrow riverine connection.

So, the district was drawn this way so that Hopis and Navajos don’t give each other “electoral cooties” by having to vote for the same congressman? What — is America now a 3rd-grade playground? Imagine how Republicans in Nancy Pelosi’s district feel, or Democrats in rural Texas. All across America people have to line up at polling places alongside people whom they despise.
Get over it!


(2.) Maryland-3

Maryland-3 is the poster child for the lunacy that is gerrymandering. And the funniest part? The Democratic politicians who created it deny that it’s gerrymandered at all:

The new district was concocted after the 2000 Census when Maryland, like all states, drew up new congressional and state legislative district boundaries to reflect changes in the population.

Former Secretary of State John T. Willis, who was in charge of the redistricting as chairman of the Governor’s Redistricting Advisory Committee, said the committee did not mean for the 3rd District to look like it does. That’s just how the numbers worked out, he said.

“It’s a very complex situation, and population is the No. 1 driving characteristic,” Willis said.

The final plan, Willis noted proudly, created eight congressional districts that had almost exactly the same number of people in them.

“All of our congressional districts don’t deviate by more than one person,” he said.
But Rascovar said that no matter how the committee “painted it”, the new boundaries were drawn to favor Democratic candidates in the 2nd District.

“They needed ‘x’ number of votes . . . what you end up doing is juggling these neighborhood votes, and it becomes absurd,” Rascovar said.

“The most absurd is that the politicians drawing up these districts are no longer concerned with the neighborhoods,” he said. “All they care is, ‘How many loyal Democrats can I get in this district?’ ”

Willis disagreed. Although the interests of incumbent representatives were taken into consideration, he said, no single district was favored.


(1.) Illinois-4

Here it is: The most ridiculous congressional district in the entire country. No, you’re not looking at two districts; IL-4 has two absurdly gerrymandered halves held together by a thin strip of land at its western edge that is nothing more than the median strip along Interstate Highway 294. The end result is a gerrymandered gerrymander, a complete mockery of what congressional representation is even supposed to be. As with AZ-2, the intention behind IL-4 was to create an ethnic enclave, in this case an Hispanic-majority district within an otherwise overwhelmingly non-Hispanic Chicago. Problem is, Chicago has two completely distinct and geographically separate Hispanic neighborhoods — one Puerto Rican, the other Mexican — but neither is large enough to constitute a district majority on its own. Solution? Lump all Hispanics together into a supposedly coherent cultural grouping, and then carefully draw a line surrounding every single Hispanic household in Chicago, linking the two distant neighborhoods by means of an uninhabited highway margin. Voila! One Hispanic congressperson, by design. And as a side-effect, the most preposterous congressional district in the United States.

But wait — our gerrymander tour isn’t over. If you think those ten were bad, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. While they may have indeed been the ten most gerrymandered districts in the nation, at least they shared something admirable in common: They were legal. The same cannot be said about our next ten districts, which may not be as crazily shaped as the ones above, but which are in one crucial aspect far worse: they’re noncontiguous.

The whole reason gerrymandering even exists as a practice in the first place is to overcome the requirement that each congressional district be contiguous — in other words, a unified single enclosed area, however strangely shaped it may be. This self-evident need to create contiguous districts is the whole reason why gerrymandered district boundaries wander all over the landscape, so as to enclose certain sought-after voters while still keeping them geographically connected to the rest of the district. Without the requirement to have each district be contiguous, politicians could easily have created a new level of fantasmagorial gerrymandering in which demographic groupings are enclosed without any regard to where they might be located on a map, forging “districts” out of disconnected topological islands.

Thank heavens that can never happen, right? Right?

Wrong.

The politicians in charge of redistricting are so brazen in some states that they seem to have gotten drunk on gerrymander wine, tossing caution to the wind and cavalierly creating noncontiguous congressional districts with portions completely cut off from the rest of the voters. How in the world they got away with this, I have no idea — apparently, if you have the hubris to create gerrymandered districts in the first place, it’s not so big a step to cross the invisible boundary between unethical and illegal.

That said, I am unaware of any federal law stipulating that districts be contiguous; it seems to be legislated on a state-by-state basis. And it could very well be that certain states intentionally fail to pass or enforce such a law, if it serves a political purpose to violate it. After all, who’s going to prosecute the redistricters? Themselves?

If this trend continues, perhaps the time has come to enact nationwide guidelines expressly prohibiting noncontiguous congressional districts.


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Sources: Pajamas Media, Wikipedia, Youtube, Google Maps

Mel Watt Most Liberal NC Rep, Most Gerrymandered District (12th)

So Mel Watt is North Carolina's most Liberal Congressional Rep.

Really?

I guess "Liberal" is the new buzz word for sorry, ineffective Democrats seeking to raise Campaign funds.

Isn't Mel Watt's 12th District the MOST gerrymandered Congressional District in the state? He's been in there WAY too long.

Mel ONLY caters to Wall Street and his Fraternity/ Sorority friends that's it!

Mel is an Incumbent who keeps the rest of his constituents (mainly African-Americans) within North Carolina's 12th District poor so they can never challenge him.

Thus he's basically useless.

Due to North Carolina's Racist history, there was definitely a time when Gerrymandered districts were necessary.

However Politicians like Mel Watt are now abusing the true intended purpose of Gerrymandering for their own personal gain.

They advocate and push Straight Ticket Voting from their poorest Constituents which allows them to remain in Public Office NOT to help, but to become personally Wealthy.

In fact Mel Watt is so crooked he introduced a watered down amendment in 2009 which would have granted Wall Street execs more power to be corrupt and play games with Taxpayer money.

Even Alan Grayson slammed Mel Watt's bill.

Too many Black Youth are dropping out of High School and NOT attending College because of Mel Watt's Selfishness and Greed.

Does Mel care? Don't count on it!

North Carolina, especially Charlotte deserves better.

We need fresh blood in Congress.

Time to go Mel! Bye-bye.





Mel Watt Most Liberal North Carolina U.S. House Member


An annual list of how members of Congress stack up, ideologically speaking, has U.S. Rep. Mel Watt as the most Liberal member of the state's House delegation while U.S. Rep. Patrick McHenry is the most Conservative.

National Journal studied 97 roll-call votes that it used to establish where House members ranked in terms of how liberal or conservative they were.

Watt, a Charlotte Democrat, was among eight House members who were tied for the most Liberal in the chamber. Watt was the 423rd most Conservative House member.

McHenry, a Cherryville Republican, was the 17th most conservative member of the chamber and the 413th most liberal. Virginia Foxx, a Banner Elk Republican, was the 19th most conservative member and the 411th most liberal.

No other members of the state's delegation cracked the top 20 as either Conservative or Liberal.

Here's how they ranked, in alphabetical order:

G.K. Butterfield: Democrat, Wilson. 88th most liberal, 343rd most conservative.

Howard Coble: Republican, Greensboro. 348th most liberal, 82nd most conservative.

Bob Etheridge: Democrat, Lillington. 169th most liberal, 262nd most conservative.

Walter Jones: Republican, Farmville. 274th most liberal, 155th most conservative.

Larry Kissell: Democrat, Biscoe. 214th most liberal, 217th most conservative.

Mike McIntyre: Democrat, Lumberton. 247th most liberal, 184th most conservative.

Brad Miller: Democrat, Raleigh. 143rd most liberal, 184th most conservative.

Sue Myrick: Republican, Charlotte. 395th most liberal, 34th most conservative.

David Price: Democrat, Chapel Hill. 35th most liberal, 394th most conservative.

Heath Shuler: Democrat, Waynesville. 239th most liberal, 192nd most conservative.







Audit The Fed Effort Under Threat In House


A Bi-partisan effort to force Transparency on the Federal Reserve is suddenly in jeopardy after a House Financial Services Committee member introduced an amendment that would let the multi-trillion dollar organization continue throwing tax dollars around in secret.

Rep. Mel Watt, a Democrat from North Carolina, has introduced an amendment intended as an alternative to the measure to audit the Federal Reserve introduced by Reps. Ron Paul (R-Texas) and Alan Grayson's (D-Fla.) . But instead of increasing transparency, as the amendment claims to do, Watt's measure would instead make the institution more opaque.

The measure could come for a vote anytime this week. Read the amendment here.

Watt pitched his amendment in a letter to colleagues circulated Tuesday. "While my amendment will certainly fall short of demands by those intent on destroying the independence (if not the existence) of the Fed, the critics of my amendment will have to concede...that my amendment will provide transparency of the Fed's financial operations that will be completely unprecedented," he wrote.

In fact, the critics are conceding no such thing. "The Watt Amendment, as written today, actually places new restrictions on the little authority that exists, such as it is, for independent auditing of the Fed," Grayson said. "It keeps in place all existing restrictions and adds four more. So I don't see why anybody would reasonably think that it creates unprecedented authority to audit the Fed."

The devil, as always, is in the details. While Watt's amendment talks a big game about opening up the Fed to a complete audit, all of the new powers granted must be carried out "each case in accordance with subsections (b) and (e)."

Those subsections of the current law delineate the many restrictions that an auditor confronts when seeking to audit the Fed. Watt's measure not only leaves those in place but requires all audits to abide by them.

And in addition to the current restrictions in place, it creates new ones. An auditor could not look at loans or liquidity arrangements the Fed enters into, the terms of those arrangements, or the effect of those loans and other liquidity deals on "reserves, the balance sheet or financial condition of a Federal reserve bank or the Federal Reserve System."

The Fed has expanded its balance sheet drastically over the last year, entering into exotic swap arrangements and otherwise pumping trillions of dollars into the economy. How it has done so and who has been on the receiving end would remain secret under Watt's bill.

By contrast, the Paul-Grayson amendment is patterned after Paul's bill H.R. 1207, which has broad bipartisan support. It has more than 310 cosponsors in a chamber with 435 members.

Paul's measure would repeal the provisions that Watt's leaves in place. If every member who cosponsored Paul's bill votes for it in committee this week, it would have the votes to pass. Watt's amendment is an effort to peel off votes.

Paul spokesman Jesse Benton said that Watt's proposal falls far short of the transparency that the multi-trillion dollar organization needs.

"The new exemptions are described as limited but they are extremely broad," Grayson said. They're so broad, in fact, that there would be very little left for an auditor to look into. What could an auditor check up on?

"Count the pencils on the desks," Grayson speculated. "Perhaps check on proper Metro card usage."

Watt wasn't immediately available, but his letter to colleagues is here:

Dear Financial Services Committee Colleague:

This week during the Financial Services Committee markup of the Financial Stability Improvement Act of 2009, I plan to introduce an amendment to provide historic transparency to the operations of the Federal Reserve. While my amendment will certainly fall short of demands by those intent on destroying the independence (if not the existence) of the Fed, the critics of my amendment will have to concede (1) that I have worked diligently with them to find all possible common ground and (2) that my amendment will provide transparency of the Fed's financial operations that will be completely unprecedented.

My amendment acknowledges that taxpayers have a right to know how their money is being spent. To that end, my amendment will expand the audit powers of the Government Accountability Office ("GAO") over the Federal Reserve to all financial activities of the Fed.

I. Complete GAO Audit Authority of the Numbers.

Under my amendment, the GAO will have complete authority to review and audit, including by onsite examination:

(1) Federal Reserve programs, activities and operations: A full audit of the functions, programs, activities and operations of the Federal Reserve Board and Federal reserve banks relating to prudential supervision, provision of currency, check clearing and collection services, payment systems operations and provision of wire transfer services;

(2) Federal Reserve financial statements: A full audit, of the kind performed by outside auditors, of the Federal Reserve's financial statements, including all the Fed's assets and liabilities no matter how they are acquired or incurred; and

(3) "Emergency" 13(3) lending facilities: An audit of the emergency actions taken by the Fed under Section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act ("13(3) powers") to extend credit to a single partnership or corporation, or broad liquidity facilities for distressed markets, including:

* The effectiveness of the Fed's internal control structure to ensure limited risk exposure to the Fed with respect to each liquidity facility and the prevention of waste, fraud and abuse in the use of that facility;

* Whether the collateral policies and procedures appropriately address risk to the Fed;

* Whether credit extended and fees charged by the Fed are collected in accordance with the terms and conditions established by the Fed;

* The manner in which the Federal Reserve system accounts for the facility on its balance sheet and the adequacy of the procedures for financial reporting.

For example, my amendment would allow the GAO to audit the financial aspects of multi-billion dollar credit facilities extended to Bear Stearns and AIG during last year's financial crisis, as well as the broader market credit facilities such as the Term Asset-backed Loan Facility (TALF). In addition, the specific names of borrowers of 13(3) credit facilities would be disclosed after 1 year.

In sum, the GAO will have new powers under my amendment to audit every aspect of the Fed's nearly $2 trillion balance sheet, providing unprecedented transparency to the American people.

II. No Interference with Monetary Policy.

The critics of my amendment will say that it does not allow the GAO to audit or second guess Fed monetary policy decisions. They are correct. My amendment strikes a sensible balance between providing increased transparency to the public, while preserving the long-standing independence of the Federal Reserve regarding the making of monetary policy. Every industrialized nation observes strict independence of their central banks to set monetary policy and shields them from undue political interference. Such independence from political interference is important for several reasons:

* An independent central bank can limit inflation and promote economic growth. If there is even the perception that politics is interfering with monetary policy decisions, fears of inflation could rise and erode market confidence in the ability of the central bank to make sound economic decisions, which could cause higher prices and increased job losses;

* Bond rating agencies view the independence of central banks as an important factor in determining sovereign credit ratings. An erosion of Federal Reserve independence could harm the credit rating of Treasury bills, increasing our cost of borrowing and hurting the economy in the form of higher prices to all American consumers;

* Foreign central banks would fear engaging in transactions with a politically compromised Federal Reserve, which could destabilize the U.S. and international economies.

Recently, over 400 economists, academics and former government officials signed the attached petition supporting the independence of the Federal Reserve regarding monetary policy. The petition included three winners of the Nobel Prize in economics and five former presidents of the American Economics Association. The notion that we should allow the GAO or any other government agency to audit or second guess Fed monetary policy is nonsensical and would be terrible public policy.

Conclusion:

My amendment strikes the appropriate balance of increasing Federal Reserve transparency while preventing political interference with monetary policy. Only a transparent central bank, free from political interference, can effectively carry out its congressionally-required dual mandate of stable prices and fostering job growth. I hope you will support the amendment to provide an historic advance of transparency at the Federal Reserve while preserving its independence to be able to fulfill the dual missions for which it was formed.

/S/

MELVIN L. WATT







R.I.P. Mel Watt: We Come To Bury Him Not Praise Him


Posted Tue, 10/31/2006 - 18:00 by Leutisha Stills

Rep. Mel Watt of North Carolina is stepping down after 2 years as chair of the Congressional Black Caucus. CBC Watch correspondent Leutisha Stills evaluates his tenure, and pronounces Watt dead on arrival.

In looking back at how the Congressional Black Caucus has operated in the last two years, we at CBC Monitor, have not come to praise Congressman Mel Watt's (D-NC), leadership, but to bury him in his performance as Chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus for the past two years.

You can't really praise an individual's leadership when they consistently subverted it to do the will of House Minority Leader, Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), in the hopes of receiving favorable treatment from her. Watt's obsequious relationship with Pelosi negatively impacted everything the CBC attempted to do as a Caucus, and rendered them virtually ineffective.

The fact that the CBC is as ineffective as Mel Gibson's apology for his anti-Semitic remarks, was not lost on individuals attending this year's CBC Legislative Weekend. It was reported to CBC Monitor by reliable sources on Capitol Hill that attendance at this year's conference was down by an estimated 15,000 people. Well, people get tired of attending events, using their own money, vacation time and travel, to listen to elected officials talk loud and say nothing, as well as do talk loud and do nothing.

"Watt's obsequious relationship with Pelosi negatively impacted everything the CBC attempted to do as a Caucus."

Mel Watt deserves all the ridicule, scorn and derision we can hurl upon him, for his decided lack of leadership and a woeful unwillingness to call out any renegade CBC member for voting the corporate interests that serve to decimate the majority Black districts they represent, in the name of maintaining unanimity. Even when his own colleagues made the customary laudable speeches, praising his leadership, one got the sense that they really didn't mean what they said.

His repeated capitulation to House Minority Leader Pelosi, one assumes, is in the hope that he positions himself well for a plum committee assignment, should the Democrats take back Congress in November, by holding himself out to Pelosi as being a "good, non-threatening Negro," while selling out his own Caucus, even though he always voted in such a way that earned him a position on the Honor Roll since we began publishing the Report Card.

Well, for his trouble to attempt to maintain unanimity, as well as subverting the CBC's own political agenda (if they ever had one) to stay in Pelosi's good graces, those who relied on the CBC being the "Conscience of the Congress" got the following results of Black Leadership for their reliance:

* 20 CBC members were scrubbed off the list of lawmakers who sponsored legislation to renew provisions of the Voting Rights Act, because Pelosi, in code words, deemed the bill "too Black," and was afraid she wouldn't be able to get the reich-wing bigots in the GOP to sign off on it.

* The isolation of, and slinging under the bus of one of their own members (Rep. Cynthia McKinney, D-GA), for crying out about corruption in the Bush Administration, as well as being subjecting to racial profiling by the Capitol Hill Police, while circling the wagons to protect a member of the CBC who was so corrupt in the selling of his office that he has the moniker of "Dollar Bill," and is currently under a Federal indictment for bribery (Rep. William Jefferson, D-LA).

* We believe the CBC's willingness to follow Pelosi's orders and isolate McKinney may have played a direct role in her primary loss this past August. We know that their circling the wagons around Jefferson has cost the Caucus in terms of credibility among many progressive organizations, especially when, instead of taking action to handle the Jefferson matter themselves, they waited until Pelosi took the action of removing Jefferson from his committee assignments and then they cried "Foul" and implied that Pelosi's actions were racially motivated.

They probably were, but the CBC leadership did not have to abdicate personal responsibility in calling out one of their own for ethics violations and corruption of their office. We would expect the CBC to be as vigilant about their own members as they are about the system of Checks and Balances in the Federal Government.

"Watt provided derelict Black members cover in their duty as lawmakers."

* The failure to publicly censure CBC members who voted for anti-people legislation (such as the Bankruptcy bill; Net Neutrality, Estate Tax Repeal, Border Protection Act, Authorization of Iraq War, etc), when the sense of the majority of the Caucus (better than 60%) was against such legislation and voted accordingly.

In excusing the votes of the renegade members, Watt provided them cover to be derelict in their duty as lawmakers, while publicly chastising organizations such as CBC Monitor, for daring to publish Report Cards highlighting such dereliction.

There are many examples of Mel Watt's dereliction as a leader of the CBC, which we have expanded on in several issues of the Black Commentator, so there is no need to do anymore than write Mr. Watt's obituary on his tenure as CBC Chairman. His obituary, from our standpoint, is brief:

He often voted correctly, but when it came to matters of importance, and holding the Caucus together as a Caucus, in leadership, HE WAS MISSING IN ACTION.

Rather than advance the Agenda of the Caucus he often sought to subvert it, at the directive of the House Minority Leader.

In so doing, and refusing to have the Caucus take positions on things that mattered, the Caucus was absent from any political position of importance.

Mel Watt threw away any bargaining chips the Caucus would have had, and rendered 41 House Members and 1 Senator as no more than bumbling fools on Capitol Hill.

In evaluating the leadership of Congressman Mel Watt as CBC Chair, we cannot praise him, we can only bury him.

Leutisha Stills, a member of the CBC Monitor, is on the Faculty Administration of George Mason University, in Fairfax, Virginia. She can be reached at leutishastills1@hotmail.com.



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Sources: McClatchy Newspapers, Huffington Post, Black Agenda Report, MSNBC, C-Span, Youtube, Google Maps