POLI 1100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Majority Minority
22 May 2018
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I. Getting elected to Congress
a. Reapportionment: every ten years we re-divide the house seats according to population
b. Redistricting: whenever the census burea changes the number of house seats each state
gets, the statae has to determine how to divide their districts. Only guideline is they
have to have roughly equal population
c. Gerrymandering: re-drawing boundaries for political purposes.
i. Partisan gerrymandering: draw district boundaries to benefit party
ii. Racial gerrymandering: majority minority districts.
1. Represented by minority campus.
2. problem: bleaching: when you start packing the minorities into a
district, all of the districts around them are becoming white and more
likely to become republicans.
iii. Cracking: take a district that is overwhelmingly democratic and splittling them
up to two republican districts.
iv. Packing: putting every democrat or republican in one district
d. Requirements for running for congress
i. Formal
1. Few requirements. Residency requirements and US citizen. 25 years old
for house, 30 years old in senate.
ii. Informal
1. What does the district look like?
a. Ca’t ru i a district that otes oerheligly for the
opposite party
b. Partisan suitability
2. Connections to the district?
3. Timing: national conditions.
a. Whether there is an incumbent: very difficult to beat
incumbents
i. Have a lot of resources, have established bonds with
community.
4. Funding: average house seat is 1.6 million dollars. 4-5 million for senate
seat.
a. Two models: rich person donates to his/her own campaign.
5. National political environment.
a. Midter electios: presidet’s party loses seats
b. Presidet’s coattail.
i. Once coattails are gone, voters may stay home.
ii.
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