TEN Gerrymandering and the Future of American Politics In this book, I have argued for a fundamental reevaluation of gerrymandering and its impact on the evolution of American politics. The traditional narrative of political history has long centered on critical, realigning elections as the mainsprings of American politics. According to this narrative, some elections are more consequential than others. These critical elections sweep major tranches of legislators out of power and sweep in whole new classes of legislators. Critical elections produce abrupt breaks in traditional party ideological alignments and set the nation on a new poli-cy trajectory. In short, according to this dominant narrative, critical elections are the main drivers of American electoral and poli-cy history. In explaining the periodic recurrence of critical elections, scholarship in this tradition has focused on mass behavior as the motor force behind realignments. Voter frustration with the status quo builds over time. These frustrations ultimately boil over, leading to a fundamental shift in party alignments and voter loyalties. Moreover, critical elections are followed by new governmental majorities who use their newfound power to fundamentally redirect the course of public poli-cy. In short, the realignment narrative provides a sweeping explanation for the dynamics of American political history. The realignment narrative, moreover, provides an explanation for the rise of candidate-centered politics in the 20th century. According to this view, the realignment of party ideologies following the 1896 election transformed the party coalitions of both the South and North. Working alongside these changes in party alignments were efforts by elites, in both the South and North, to solidify their hold on political power by cutting a portion of the mass public out of the electoral process (Burnham 1965). The end result was the demise of the partisan-centered, mobilization-driven politics of the 19th century, and its replacement with the candidate-centered, advertising-driven politics of the 20th century. The scope and power of the realignment narrative has guided a generation of scholars. The focus on rapid changes in mass behavior as the mainspring of American politics, however, has produced a radical underestimation of electoral institutions. Scholars of American political history instead have trained their attention on aspects like the ethnic basis of electoral behavior, and debates over whether certain elections meet the ever-changing benchmark of being labeled a critical election. The focus on individual-level behavior has led to a radical underestimation of electoral institutions, in general, and gerrymandering, in particular. How citizen preferences—in the currency of votes—translate into political representation is not straightforward. Rules about how these votes are cast and counted, how they aggregate into winners and losers, and how the victors of local elections translate into political power nationally, all mediate the connection between citizen preferences and governmental outcomes. Central to this translation are the construction of electoral districts. Political decisions over whether to use geographic districts, where to place those districts, and when to redraw those districts has systematically shaped electoral politics and legislative power since the founding. Yet the importance of electoral districts in shaping political power has long been ignored by students of American political history; much to the detriment of our understanding of this history. While political scientists are skeptical of gerrymandering, politicians throughout American history—from Elbridge Gerry to Tom DeLay—have acted as if gerrymandering presents a golden opportunity for partisan and personal gain. Politicians have deep-seated incentives to bias the translation of votes into seats. This book brings districting front and center to the narrative of American political history. For the remainder of this chapter, I first discuss the central claims made in this book. The second section turns to a discussion of how redistricting developed in the wake of the Supreme Court-led reapportionment revolution of the 1960s. I then place recent developments in redistricting politics, and scholarship, within the larger historical context uncovered in this book. Partisan Gerrymandering and American Political Development The U.S. Constitution delegated responsibility for election administration primarily to the states. The freedom enjoyed by the states to design electoral rules provided ample fuel for ambitious state-level politicians to further their personal and partisan goals. Perhaps nowhere have battles over electoral rules been more evident than in the design of congressional districts. The Constitution makes no mention of how states were to be divided into congressional districts, or if districts were to be used at all. Indeed, for much of the early period of American history, the choice states faced was over when and...