This is about the National Football League, gerrymandering and Eleanor Roosevelt.
Eleanor Roosevelt, a woman who was far more than just the spouse of one of our greatest presidents, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, famously said, “Do what you feel in your heart is right, for you’ll be criticized anyway. You’ll be damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.”
In the case Gill v. Whitford, the U.S. Supreme Court is considering a case that goes to the heart of our democracy. The question: Just how far could Wisconsin Republicans go in creating laughably tortured shapes for legislative districts to ensure their side could retain political power?
Zillions of words have been written about gerrymandering. It’s distorting our political process beyond repair. It forces candidates on both sides to move to the extremes to win. In many parts of the country, the only elections that matter are party primaries. Primaries by their nature are low turnout affairs for true believers. This polarized, dysfunctional mess makes general election voting almost irrelevant.
Meanwhile, the party in power uses an argument that you never accepted when your kids tried it: “Well, the other side did it when they were in power.” You’d laugh in your kid’s face and send him to his room. When politicians use that excuse, they keep their jobs.
This case will be difficult for the court. That’s because while gerrymandering to this extreme is despicable and wrong, it may not be illegal or unconstitutional since legislatures make the rules to create voting districts.
Behind the scenes, the politicians wink. They all know it’s wrong and destabilizing. Only a courageous few speak out. “Oh,” they say. “It’s complicated to fix this.” Really? It shouldn’t be hard to find a solution in a country that invented nuclear weapons, landed men on the moon and even found a way for the Cubs to win a World Series – at least last year. Stop making excuses.
Let the computers do it. Pass a law to write a program that gives priorities to logical shapes – like rectangles instead of snakes – and geographic boundaries of counties and cities to cover the required population. Require a super-majority of the legislature to overturn the computer map. A bipartisan panel should agree on the basic parameters for the software.
NFL owners face a similar dilemma between doing what’s right vs. exercising their legal authority. They quite likely have a legal right to suspend a player for exercising his First Amendment rights to kneel for the National Anthem. That’s because even though everyone has a right to take a knee during the National Anthem, you don’t have a Constitutional right to do it as an employee of the Dallas Cowboys or with your own employer. Ask Colin Kaepernick.
Some call this week’s owner statement a copout, but I disagree. The NFL owners might not be at the level of channeling Eleanor Roosevelt, but it’s not easy to take a politically unpopular position that can damage your business. More impressive to me is this: These wealthy, rich white men seem to be trying to understand why many of their employees -- primarily black players, many from far more difficult circumstances -- see the world quite differently.
We should applaud this behavior. Somehow, we have come to see empathy as a wimpy quality instead of something to admire. You can be against kneeling during the National Anthem but still respect that others who feel differently about the state of things in our country might love America just as much and have life experiences that are worth discussing. Honest dialogue pushes our country in the right direction. This point seems lost to the Master-of-Distraction-and-Bully-in-Chief in the White House.
The owners certainly know they’re damned if they do, and damned if they don’t, so good for them if they are doing what they think is right and accepting the consequences. It’s an example for politicians to follow more often. Getting rid of gerrymandering would be an excellent start.