Courts cannot settle what counts as partisan entrenchment without an agreed baseline.

Evidence

Courts and commentators have disagreed for decades about whether an unfair, or entrenching, partisan distribution of districts should be determined by reference to a baseline of majority rule, proportional representation, or something else. In Vieth v. Jubelirer, a plurality of the Supreme Court threw up its collective hands, describing the attempt to arrive at a judicially manageable standard as “[e]ighteen years of judicial effort with virtually nothing to show for it.” — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 412

Categorization

• XREF: Extends the reader’s durability-of-entrenchment question: indeterminacy of baseline is one cause of an entrenching norm lasting — courts can’t define it away. — connects to: Even astute judges can miss familiar partisan entrenchment tactics. — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 115; Judges recognize partisan gerrymandering as a constitutional harm but lack an enforceable remedy — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 99

Broader Connections

• Judges recognize partisan gerrymandering as a constitutional harm but lack an enforceable remedy #corroborates (0.75) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 99