“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where
he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Civil Rights and Liberties
Advocating for Fair Voting Districts
The firm has a history of defending democracy by arguing against unconstitutional gerrymandering. In 2017, we submitted a brief in Gill v. Whitford arguing that severe partisan gerrymandering undermined the basic democratic principle that elected officials should represent and be accountable to their constituents. Similarly, in 2019, we filed briefs in Rucho v. Common Cause and Lamone v. Besinek arguing that election manipulation through partisan gerrymandering violated fundamental American democratic principles of representativeness and accountability in government.
Our commitment to ensuring fairly drawn redistricting maps continued in 2024. Jersey City is required to be organized into political subdivisions that by law must be roughly equal in size, compact, and contiguous. In the latest redistricting process, Jersey City ran afoul of these principles and created a redistricting map that transformed one district into a crescent shape and divided several historical neighborhoods, and even some residential buildings, into different districts. Community groups sued to strike the proposed map. When the case reached the New Jersey Supreme Court, on behalf of the ACLU of New Jersey, we submitted a friend-of-the court brief in Jersey City United Against the New Ward Map v. Jersey City Ward Commission.
Our brief argued that the current redistricting map in Jersey City violates the state’s Municipal Ward Law, dividing communities of interest and historical districts. The Municipal Ward Law requires ward commissioners to “fix and determine the ward boundaries so that each ward is formed of compact and contiguous territory,” which did not occur here. Our brief further argued that the court should use the standard common in courts throughout the country for defining compactness of districts.
We await an opinion in this case and are hopeful that the New Jersey Supreme Court will allow for a robust remand hearing to allow plaintiffs to show that the map is insufficiently compact and unfairly divides communities, which will help restore fair voting districts in Jersey City.
