Interesting mini study - Gerrymandering in NC. Added plus - interview with a mathemitician!
brief text - most below. Video link - well worth watching - just below this sentence.
http://www.wral.com/news/state/nccapitol/video/17346839/
http://www.wral.com/how-fair-are-nc-s-voting-maps-we-did-the-math/17343694/
By Tyler Dukes, Mandy Mitchell & Justin Arner
Across the country, courts are wrestling with a fundamental question that has far-ranging impacts on democracy: How do you define an illegal partisan gerrymander?
Political maps have come a long way since 1812, when a newly-drawn, salamander-like district in Massachusetts invoked the ire of voters. Judges have found that a district doesn't have to look monstrous to qualify as unconstitutional, especially given the capabilities of mapmakers to use computational power to precisely slice and dice a state into pieces more favorable to Democrats or Republicans.
But where you draw the line on gerrymandering is a matter of debate so hotly contested it's currently before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Back in 2013, a team of mathematicians at Duke University, led by professor Jonathan Mattingly, set out to find a way to analyze maps to determine what was fair and what wasn't. Their methods worked so well that a three-judge panel in January used the research as justification to overturn Republican-drawn congressional maps from 2016.
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