THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

A federal court has ruled that two of the 13 state Congressional districts are invalid as drawn, earning an elegent judicial WTF! from the 3 judge panel.

A federal court panel ruled on Friday that two of North Carolina's 13 congressional districts are racial gerrymanders and must be redrawn in two weeks.

An order, written by U.S. Circuit Judge Roger L. Gregory, also bars elections in North Carolina's 1st and 12th congressional districts until new maps are approved.

The ruling, released late on Friday afternoon, throws the North Carolina congressional and legislative maps in flux...

"Today's ruling once again shows the need for North Carolina to establish a nonpartisan system for drawing our state's voting maps," Bob Phillips, executive director of Common Cause North Carolina, which advocates for government transparency and accountability. "For years, partisan gerrymandering has led to costly litigation and deprived North Carolina voters of having a real choice and a voice in our elections. Fortunately, a growing number of citizens and leaders across the political spectrum agree that North Carolina should adopt an independent redistricting process."

The 1st Congressional District according to the lawsuit, is “akin to a Rorschach inkblot” that weaves through 24 counties, containing only five whole counties. The district is mostly in the northeastern part of the state and includes Durham, Elizabeth City, Roanoke Rapids, Rocky Mount, Goldsboro and New Bern.

The length of the district’s perimeter, according to the lawsuit, is 1,319 miles - “almost precisely the distance from Chapel Hill to Austin, Texas.”

The three voters contended that the Republican-led General Assembly that designed the maps in 2011 "ignored the common rural and agricultural interests" of Coastal Plain residents that federal courts have previously recognized. Durham, the newly added urban center, constitutes 25 percent of the district’s population.

The 12th Congressional District is 120 miles long but only 20 miles wide at its widest part. The district includes large portions of Charlotte and Greensboro connected by a thin strip — “averaging only a few miles wide” - that follows Interstate 85.

“A person traveling on Interstate 85 between the two cities would exit the district multiple times, as the district’s boundaries zig and zag to encircle African-American communities, " the federal lawsuit contended.

Naturally the Republicans who had worked so hard to corral the most Democrats into the fewest district whined about the negation of all their hard work. No one yet knows what effect the redrawing of the districts will have on other carefully executed districts.