August 13, 2025

Times have changed. So has gerrymandering. 

The first time I saw how new congressional maps were drawn was after the 2000 census. The process was difficult, imprecise and time-consuming. The only data available came from the census itself. Although computers existed, they were too limited, and the software was too primitive to be of much use. Instead, we sat together in a large room surrounded by physical maps.

Gerrymandering has always existed, but it has never been as easy to accomplish as it is today — both from a legal and technological standpoint. Back in the day, legal constraints — such as “one person, one vote,” the Voting Rights Act and various state laws — placed limits on mapmakers. Political considerations and long-standing norms also discouraged extreme gerrymandering: respecting political boundaries, keeping communities of interest intact and maintaining established patterns of representation.

The political maneuvering — the “gerrymandering” — was based largely on one’s sense of the district, its people and its population trends. With a largely fluid electorate, predicting how a district would vote was more art than science. As the decade wore on...