Due to the tendency of our General Assembly to ignore Court injunctions to engage in Congressional redistricting, even when the legislature is granted broad power to do so, the Court is truly taking over the redistricting process.
In an order entered today, (based on a conference call with counsel yesterday) the Court has ordered the following:
So much for giving the G.A. an additional chance…
AND
…..
Time to submit your plans! Because no one in the legislature decided to pass a plan out of Committee, and no Republican decided to even submit a plan, all parties to the case enter this stage with equal authority.
But do you notice the fun part? We (the public) have been invited to participate!!! Feel free to submit your plan (with legal and factual explanations) for consideration to the Court. If you wrote it on the back of a napkin, please keep it to yourself. You have about two weeks to get your act together and submit a plan for the Special Master’s consideration. If I’m feeling particularly magnanimous (and it appears to be ethically allowed) I’ll publish some directions on how to electronically file as a member of the public. Perhaps our Congressional districts are best drawn by an overachieving high school student, or a politically inactive stay at home mom, or some lobbyist in Great Falls…
Perhaps now Republican leaders in the G.A. will start to take this process a little more seriously. If they don’t like the current system perhaps they could have done a little more from October 7, 2014 to the present.
For your edification here is the entire order:
