Stealing our democracy

Stealing our democracy

There has been a lot of con- troversy surrounding Ohio’s newly redistricted congressional map. Very few people believe that the new plan is truly fair and balanced. To most, it just represents the latest iteration of gerrymandering, a sad reality that we have come to expect from state politics. The problem is that this process severely undercuts the fundamentals of our democracy.

The Constitution gives citizens both the right and responsibility to elect their representatives to Congress. But what happens when that process is so thoroughly constrained that our vote becomes irrelevant? The newly adopted Ohio congressional map does just that, creating 12 solidly Republican districts and four Democratic districts. It makes elections a mere formality.

It’s true that gerrymandering is as old as the state of Ohio, but that doesn’t mean that we should just accept it. It’s clear that this new map was formulated to divide the state into uncontestable zones, as documents from the office of House Speaker John Boehner have recently shown. We must speak out against this outrageous proposal, not as Republicans or Democrats, but as Ohioans. All of our votes matter, whether we live in large cities or on sprawling farmlands. Ohio is a swing state, not a bastion of ideological extremism. In these tough times, it is more important than ever that we remain balanced, instead of being divided along cruel, partisan lines.

Shammas Malik, Akron

The writer is a political science and international studies student at The Ohio State University.