Ought Californians Cast Their Ballots to Redraw District Lines and Combat Texas's Aggressive Tactics with Similar Measures?

What, precisely, is the role of Congress? In the second presidency of Donald Trump, it is difficult to determine. The power to declare war, traditionally viewed as a crucial congressional authority, has turned into a unclear right of the executive branch in the time since September 11; the president, in the past few months, has asserted even more of that power for himself, authorizing military actions on boats in the Caribbean.

The authority over spending seems to have largely been stripped from the legislative branch as well; currently, under the leadership of budget chief, the OMB director, much of the ability to appropriate federal funds has also shifted to the executive, with the administration asserting the authority to cancel congressionally authorized expenditures and attempting to move the money elsewhere. It’s not like they’re passing any legislation, either; virtually all legislation must now be packed into budget reconciliation bills, huge perennial essential omnibus legislation that can circumvent the senate obstruction. But when these don’t pass – and more and more, they don’t – the government simply shuts down. At least, large sections of the administration shut down – and it’s uncertain how many citizens are aware. Currently, the federal government has been closed all month; there are no signs of it resuming operations anytime soon. But the presidency continues humming along.

And so the question of control of Congress can seem rather moot. Why should Americans be concerned who holds a majority in a institution that has mostly abolished itself?

And yet Prop 50, California’s redistricting referendum that could provide five additional House seats to the Democrats if it is embraced by voters in a upcoming vote in the coming weeks, has seized the attention of liberals nationwide. Partly, it is a delayed response to developments occurring elsewhere: GOP-led states have long adopted extreme partisan gerrymandering while large blue states such as the Golden State, New York and Washington draw their district lines via nonpartisan independent commissions, an asymmetry that has led to closely divided House control and a long-term sense, by the left, that their political group is bringing a knife to a gun fight. The state proposal is explicitly intended as a countermove to a mid-decade redistricting that recently passed in Texas, which installed maps that will give the GOP an five more positions in the state House representation in the upcoming term; comparable boundary changes are in progress in states such as Missouri and Indiana. (Democrats in the Old Dominion are also following the state’s example in attempting to alter districts.)

The state initiative seems likely to be approved, as Democratic and liberal electorate respond with fear and anger to Trump’s authoritarian centralization of authority and seek ways to restrain his worst tendencies. But the proposition is not free from controversy. Some opponents caution that the move could backfire, with Democratic-controlled states’ efforts to change districts setting off a revenge cycle in which red states do additional to draw their districts so as to eliminate any possibility of Democratic competitiveness. Different critics have critiqued the proposal on more purely principled democratic bases: a electoral area that is drawn in such a manner that the outcome of the election is not in question, they say, is one that cannot be said to be genuinely democratic: it means, inevitably, that the power of opposing voices is muted, and that the process of deliberation, argument and convincing that is meant to characterize a functioning political system will be limited only to primary elections, if it happens at all.

It is worth considering each of these objections on their own terms. The initial critique, that Prop 50 will spur conservatives to redraw their respective maps in response, fails as a logical argument: it is illogical to say that the GOP will be compelled to behave in undemocratic ways by Democrats’ actions when they are already engaging in such behavior in the absence of those actions. The GOP, it can be noted, has required no any motivation of retaliation to redraw boundaries that guarantee permanent positions for themselves: they have been willing to do this for their own benefit, in the total absence of Democratic reciprocation, for a long time.

The second critique, in my view, is more significant, reflecting not just a strategic disagreement about how to address the Republicans’ undemocratic shift, but a sort of sad wish for a distinct nation than the one that the US has turned into. It is true that in a better situation – in the world that most Democrats, it is believed, desire and hope for – Prop 50 would be unappealing to our principles, and not required by our situation. It is not good to manipulate targeted population groups; it is harmful for elected officials to select their constituents, instead of the other way around; it is negative that votes are made uncontested. That these measures have become necessary in order to slow the authoritarian advance of Trump’s control and reduce the amount of harm he is capable to cause is sad; it is a sign of how much we have fallen from something more like a democracy. But they are required. It is only once the fight against Trumpism has been successfully concluded that we can mourn what opposing it has transformed us into.

If Congress fails to in reality have lawmaking, military or appropriations authority, what is it, exactly, that the proposition’s additional five Democratic representatives will be sent to the capital to do? One aspect that the House and Senate still retains is the authority to compel testimony, and the ability to examine. Even in our time of sclerotic government and legislative decline, it has utilized of that authority to great effect. In 2027, if Prop 50 passes and California’s new representatives are sworn in, they will become a part of a body with the power to investigate the president, to broadcast their investigations into his conduct and to force associates of his inner circle to give evidence. It’s significant, and more importantly, it’s not anything that any conservative would do.

• Moira Donegan is a news outlet columnist