Acting Steuben County state Supreme Court Justice Patrick McAllister shouldn’t worry about the calendar for this year’s primary for Congress and state Senate. If he finds that the highly partisan gerrymandered lines drawn by the Legislature’s Democratic supermajority and signed by Gov. Kathy Hochul violate the state Constitution, which they sure as shinola do, he can and should order up new, fairer lines and push back the June 28 primary into August if need be.
The one thing McAllister can’t do, even though he mentioned it from the bench during the two-hour hearing last Thursday, is direct a new round of elections, with new lines, next year. While a possibility for the Senate, which conceivably could have back-to-back one-year terms for Albany, there cannot be a redo next year for Congress, as right at the very beginning of the U.S. Constitution, Article I, Section 2, it has been unchanged since James Madison wrote it down in Philly in 1787: “The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States.” Twenty four months it is and will stay.
Unless McAllister tosses these warped congressional lines this year, New Yorkers will be stuck with them until at least 2025.
