Louisiana v. Callais, Gerrymandering and Modern Election Tampering

In 1812 the term “Gerrymander” originated when Massachusetts Governor Elbridge Gerry approved a redistricting plan to favor his political allies by manipulating district boundaries. Newspapers, critical of the practice, quipped that the new boundaries of one district resembled that of a salamander. A political cartoon depicted the contorted district as a “Gerry-mander” (with a hard “g” – it’s pronounced Gary-Mander), combining the governor’s name with the amphibian shape. Gerrymandering had actually been around since the founding of the country, albeit as an unnamed practice, with evidence reaching back into the first decades of the United States’ system under the Constitution of the United States in Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina.