The Supreme Court justices down in Washington just sent a clear message to a Supreme Court justice up in Steuben County: In assessing partisan redistricting, judges should measure the lines drawn by legislatures against state laws and the state Constitution.
Forgive any confusion, as in New York, Supreme Court is the basic trial court, where Acting Justice Patrick McAllister is now hearing a challenge brought by Republicans to lines for congressional and state Senate seats drawn by the Legislature’s Democratic supermajority and signed by Gov. Hochul. The Dems ignored maps prepared by the new state Independent Redistricting Commission. The lawmakers, under Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, were bipartisan about it. They rejected the maps offered by the panel’s Democrats and the panel’s Republicans in favor of their own, hyper-gerrymandered outcome.
Once, Democrats reviled such brazen rigging of the democratic process.
