Senate signs off on redistricting mapSix months and three special sessions later, plan sits on Perry's desk
10:16 PM CDT on Sunday, October 12, 2003
By ROBERT T. GARRETT / The Dallas Morning News
AUSTIN – The Senate on Sunday capped six months of political warfare, approving a congressional redistricting map drawn to increase Republican representation in Washington.
Senators adjourned the year's third special session about 7:30 p.m. after sending the congressional redistricting bill to Gov. Rick Perry by a mostly party-line vote, 17-14.
The new congressional districts are designed to favor the GOP in four to seven districts that Democrats now hold, swinging the balance of power. Democrats control 17 of the state's 32 seats in the U.S. House.
All 12 Democratic senators voted against the plan. They were joined by dissenting Republicans Troy Fraser of Horseshoe Bay and Bill Ratliff of Mount Pleasant.
"The northern half of my current district becomes dominated by suburban D-FW," Mr. Ratliff said. "My constituents didn't want to do redistricting. I didn't want to do redistricting."
The bruising battle left Democrats smoldering with resentment.
"It's ... a sad day because it was just a clear, blatant abuse of power intended to build the Republican Party at the expense of Democrats and more specifically, the white incumbent, the Anglo incumbent, and the minorities whom they represent," said Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo.
And, alluding to Democrats' next move, Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, said, "Before the sun sets tomorrow, someone will probably be in a court."
GOP bickering
The often-contentious debate also deepened differences between Republican leaders, with sniping between Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and House Speaker Tom Craddick of Midland.
The two men ended the session disputing each other's accounts of whether, on Friday morning, they had agreed on the sequence in which the Legislature would vote on redistricting and an unrelated state government reorganization bill.
Mr. Dewhurst said he told the speaker the reorganization, which would strip powers from GOP Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, was important to a number of senators whose votes were key to passing the new congressional map. Mr. Dewhurst said Mr. Craddick agreed the House would pass redistricting and government reorganization, but the House later appeared to be reneging on the anti-Strayhorn measure.
"We did not have a deal on redistricting," Mr. Craddick shot back. "That's crazy. ... That didn't happen."
The squabbling was academic. The House on Sunday afternoon passed the bill stripping Mrs. Strayhorn's office of power to audit schools and state agencies. GOP senators who had held the redistricting bill hostage, because they wanted Mrs. Strayhorn punished for criticisms of the Legislature, agreed to proceed to a final vote on redistricting.
All through the third special session, Republicans in the two chambers were at odds. Differences were resolved when U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Sugar Land, arrived in Austin last week to mediate.
Mr. DeLay had earlier lobbied the Republican leadership to redraw congressional lines crafted by the federal court after the Legislature could not agree in 2001.
Democrats have denounced the resulting map as racist, while Republicans have said it was necessary to undo past gerrymandering and to better reflect the state's tilt toward the GOP, which controls all top state offices.
Redistricting gained momentum this year after Republicans claimed a majority of the state House and Senate.
House Democrats blocked it during the regular session, fleeing in May to Oklahoma and denying the chamber a quorum to do business.
In late June, Mr. Perry summoned lawmakers back to Austin to work on redistricting, but Senate rules required that two-thirds of the chambers' members approve any measure before it could come to the floor for a vote.
A second special session also ended in failure after 11 Democratic senators, upset that the two-thirds rule had been subsequently jettisoned, holed up in New Mexico for 45 days. That denied the Senate a quorum, broken Sept. 2 when Mr. Whitmire left the Democrats and returned to Texas.
Mr. Perry called a third special session, highlighted by wrangling within the GOP over West Texas and Mr. Craddick's demand for a district anchored in his hometown of Midland.
Effect on primary
While Mr. DeLay's mediation provided a comprise, it likely will mean that the state's primary will be a week later than planned, on March 9. The extra time will be needed for U.S. Justice Department and federal court review of the plan.
If the new district map, which the House passed Friday, gains necessary approval, it will eliminate one of the last vestiges of the era, from the 1870s to the 1970s, when Democrats ruled Texas' political roost.
The map was changed in the third special session's waning days to reflect an aggressive Republican strategy to go after white Democratic incumbents. Democrats claimed the tactic violates the federal Voting Rights Act, weakening minorities' ability to elect representative members to Congress.
"As soon as the governor signs it, the ball is in our hands," said Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, vowing the Democrats will challenge the new map in court.
Republicans rejected such reasoning. They said their plan would elect one more Hispanic member to Congress and one more black member, in addition to the seven Hispanics and two blacks now representing Texas.
The redistricting battle has kept the Legislature in session for more days this year than in any previous year. Both Democrats and some Republicans have warned it could leave a lingering residue of partisan ill will after a decade of vaunted bipartisanship.
Mr. Perry and Mr. Dewhurst have predicted tempers will cool and cooperation will return when lawmakers tackle reform of school finance and the state's tax structure in coming months.
But Sen. Mario Gallegos, D-Houston, said Democratic lawmakers won't soon forget how their colleagues tried to fine them each $57,000 for their New Mexico trip and bulldozed the map through to passage.
"The emotions are high," Mr. Gallegos said. "I'd be lying to you if I told you it isn't going to spill over into school finance. That's another emotional issue."
Staff writer George Kuempel in Austin contributed to this report.
E-mail rtgarrett@dallasnews.com.
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