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Massachusetts

Prison-based gerrymandering violates the constitutional principle of "One Person, One Vote." The Supreme Court requires districts to be based on equal population in order to give each resident the same access to government. But a longstanding flaw in the Census counts incarcerated people as residents of the prison location, even though they can't vote and aren't a part of the surrounding community.

When legislators claim people incarcerated in their districts are legitimate constituents, they award people who live close to the prison more of a say in government than everybody else.

The state legislature and some municipalities have previously counted incarcerated people as residents of the prison location, inflating the local population counts used for legislative districts. Padding legislative districts with prison populations artificially enhances the weight of a vote cast in those districts at the expense of all districts that do not contain a prison.

Legislation:

Massachusetts is already in the process of redistricting. Although a restrictive state constitutional clause in Massachusetts may makes it too late to change the way incarcerated people are counted (as Maryland and New York did this year), the legislature can still ameliorate some of the worst effects of prison-based gerrymandering.

Because of Massachusetts' unique distribution of prison population in the data collected by the Census, the legislature can limit how much the prison population skews the size of the districts. To avoid giving districts with prisons more political clout than is warranted based on their actual resident population, Massachusetts can use the permissible population deviations to compensate for prison populations.

Counting incarcerated populations as if they resided where the correctional facility is located also causes other problems for towns in Massachusetts. The towns of Harvard, Lancaster, Middletown, and Shirley have asked the Governor to introduce special legislation (H03439, H03440, H03468, and 2001 Mass. Acts ch. 133, respectively) so that they would do not need to draw additional precincts for the non-voting prison population.

Massachusetts can also call on the Census Bureau to change the way the Bureau counts prison populations. If the Census counted incarcerated people at their residential addresses, it would create a permanent solution to prison-based gerrymandering for the nation.

Massachusetts leaders

It’s impossible to include everyone who is working toward fair districting in Massachusetts, but if you are looking to get involved, these are some of the people and organizations you might want to contact:

  • at Ex-Prisoners and Prisoners Organizing for Community Advancement (EPOCA)
  • at The Center for Church and Prison
  • at Boston Workers Alliance
  • Brenda Wright at Demos
  • at the Prison Policy Initiative

Testimony

  • Peter Wagner and Brenda Wright, Before the Special Joint Committee on Redistricting of the Massachusetts General Court, October 25, 2011
  • Brenda Wright, Before the Special Joint Committee on Redistricting of the Massachusetts General Court May 14, 2011
  • Peter Wagner, Before the Special Joint Committee on Redistricting of the Massachusetts General Court May 31, 2011

Solutions

  • Over-populating districts: Selective over-population of districts that contain large prison populations is a simple solution that is implementable this redistricting cycle. It requires no additional data and relies on existing redistricting practices.
  • Changing the Census: The Census Bureau welcomes input from data users, this includes states using Census data in redistricting. A change in the way prison populations are recorded in the data would make it easier for Massachusetts, and governments across the country, to draw districts that aren't skewed by prisons.

Additional reading