MoveOn has provided a great collection of information and links about what’s going on over in Texas. So far, they’ve raised over $400,000 dollars for an ad campaign aimed at getting the word out about what’s really going on.
What is actually going on over in Texas? (you might ask). Well, here’s a letter from State Senator Rodney Ellis that will explain the situation a little better. I’ve also included the “background” he mentions at the top of the “more” section — and the entire MoveOn.org email underneath it.
Dear friends,
I am writing to you from a hotel room in Albuquerque, New Mexico,
where I and 10 of my colleagues in the Texas Senate have been forced
to reside for the past 20 days. If we return to our homes, families,
friends, and constituents, the Governor of Texas will have us
arrested.
I know, it sounds more like a banana republic than the dignified
democracy on which we have long prided ourselves. We are effectively
exiled from the state due to our unalterable opposition to a
Republican effort — pushed by Tom Delay and Karl Rove, and led by
Texas Governor Rick Perry — that would rewrite the map of Texas
Congressional districts in order to elect at least 5 more Republicans
to Congress.
You may not have heard much about the current breakdown in Texas
politics. The Republican power play in California has obscured the
Republican power play in Texas that has forced my colleagues and me to
leave the state.
Recognizing that public pressure is the only thing that can break the
current stalemate, our friends at MoveOn have offered to support our
efforts by sharing this email with you. In it, you will find:
-Background information on how the situation in Texas developed;
-Analysis of what’s at stake for Democrats and the democratic process;
The Republican redistricting effort shatters the tradition of
performing redistricting only once a decade immediately after the
Census — making redistricting a perpetual partisan process. It
elevates partisan politics above minority voting rights, in
contravention of the federal Voting Rights Act. It intends to decimate
the Democratic party in Texas, and lock in a Republican majority in
the U.S. House of Representatives. And Republican efforts to force a
vote on this issue by changing the rules of legislative procedure
threaten to undermine the rule of law in Texas.
We do not take lightly our decision to leave the state. It was the
only means left to us under the rules of procedure in Texas to block
this injustice. We are fighting for our principles and beliefs, and we
can win this fight with your support.
Sincerely,
Rodney Ellis
Texas State Senator (Houston)
August 18, 2003
The complete MoveOn.org email is underneath this “background” section.
Here’s the background information that Rodney Ellis refers to:
Background:
During the 2001 session of the Texas Legislature, the legislature was
unable to pass a Congressional redistricting plan as it is required to
do following the decennial Census. A three judge federal panel was
forced to draw the plan. Neither Governor Rick Perry or then Attorney
General John Cornyn, both Republicans, objected to the plan, which was
reviewed and approved by the U.S. Supreme Court.
The 2002 Congressional elections, the first held under the new
redistricting plan, resulted in a Congressional delegation from Texas
consisting of 17 Democrats and 15 Republicans. However, five of the 17
Democrats prevailed only because they were able to win the support of
Republican and independent voters. All statewide Republican candidates
carried these five districts. Most experts agree that the current plan
has 20 strong or leaning Republican districts and 12 Democratic
districts.
Meanwhile, the 2001 redistricting of Texas legislative seats (which
was enacted by the Republican-controlled Legislative Redistricting
Board, after the legislature again gridlocked in its efforts) resulted
in wide Republican majorities in both the Texas House and Texas
Senate. Now Tom Delay has made it his priority to force the
Republican-controlled Legislature to enact a new redistricting plan to
increase the number of Republican-leaning Congressional districts.
Republicans believe they can manipulate the districts to elect as many
as 22 Republicans out of the 32 member Texas Congressional delegation.
They achieve this by packing minority voters into as few districts as
possible and breaking apart rural districts so that the impact of
independent voters will be reduced and suburban Republican voters will
dominate.
During the regular session of the Texas Legislature, Democratic
members of the Texas House of Representatives exercised an
unprecedented parliamentary move to prevent the House from passing Tom
Delay’s redistricting plan. While Democrats are in the minority of the
House of Representatives, the state constitution requires that at
least 2/3 of the House be present for the House to pass a bill.
Because it was clear that the Republicans would entertain no debate
and brook no compromise in their effort to rewrite the rules by which
members of Congress are elected, the Democrats were forced to break
the quorum to prevent the bill from passing. Because the Republican
Speaker of the House and Governor called on state law enforcement
officials to physically compel the Democrats to return, the lawmakers
removed themselves to a Holiday Inn in Ardmore, Oklahoma — outside
the reach of state troops(1). In there effort to apprehend the
Democrats, Tom Delay officially sought the help of the Department of
Homeland Security, the Department of Transportation and the Department
of Justice.
The House Democrats (nicknamed the “Killer D’s”, based on an earlier
episode in Texas history in which a group of Democratic state senators
called the “Killer Bees” broke the quorum in the Senate over a
similarly political stalemate) succeeded in stopping Delay’s
redistricting plan during the regular session, returning to Texas
after the legislative deadline had expired for the House to pass
legislation. However, because the Texas Legislature meets in regular
session only every two years, the state constitution gives the
Governor the power to call a 30-day special legislative session at any
time between regular sessions. Despite statewide protests from Texas
citizens who oppose Tom Delay’s redistricting plan, the Governor has
called two special sessions(2) already this summer to attempt to force
the legislature to enact a new plan.
The first called session expired in a deadlock, as 12 of 31 Texas
Senators(3) opposed the plan. Under Senate rules and tradition, a 2/3
vote is required to consider any bill on the floor of the Senate,
giving 11 Senators the power to block a vote(4). The Republican
Governor and Lieutenant Governor then determined they would do away
with the 2/3 rule, and called another special session, forcing 11
Democratic Senators to break the quorum and leave the state.(5) These
Senators have spent the past 22 days in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
The Governor has indicated he will continue calling special sessions
until the Republican redistricting plan is enacted, despite the fact
that the Republican-controlled Texas Supreme Court recently rejected
the Governor’s writ of mandamus filing to compel the Senators to
return to the Senate. Meanwhile, eleven Democratic state senators are
exiled from their state, unable to be with their families, friends,
and constituents, for fear of being arrested as part of a partisan
power play by Republicans. In the most recent indignity, Republican
Senators voted to fine the absent Democrats up to $5,000 per day, and
to revoke parking and other privileges for their staffs as long as the
Senators are away.
What’s at stake:
At stake, on the surface, is whether Tom Delay will succeed in
exploiting Republican control of the Texas Legislature to add to the
Republican majority in the United States Congress. But deeper issues
are also at stake.
1. If the Republicans succeed in redrawing the Texas Congressional
lines to guarantee the election of five to seven more Republicans, it
will ensure that Republicans hold the majority in the U.S. House of
Representatives for the entire decade and will likely result in Tom
Delay becoming Speaker of the House.(6)
2. The Republican advantage would be gained by removing many African
American and Hispanic voters from their current Congressional
districts and “packing” them into a few districts that already have
Democratic majorities. The voting power of these minority voters would
be dramatically diluted by the Republican plan, in contravention of
the federal Voting Rights Act. If the Republicans succeed, over 1.4
million African American and Hispanic voters will be harmed. It would
be the largest disenfranchisement of minority voters since the Voting
Rights Act was passed.
3. Redistricting exists for the purpose of reapportioning voters among
political districts to account for population shifts. The purpose of
this reapportionment is to ensure a roughly equal number of voters in
each district, to preserve the principle of “one man, one vote.”(7)
For this reason, redistricting has always been conducted immediately
following the U.S. Census’ decennial population reports. Tom Delay now
proposes a new redistricting plan two years after the Census report
simply because Republicans gained control over the Texas Legislature
in 2002 and now have the power to enact a much more Republican-
friendly plan than the one drawn by the federal courts two years ago.
This is an unprecedented approach to redistricting, one that
subordinates its original purpose of ensuring the principle of “one
man, one vote” to the purpose of perpetual partisan politics.
Redistricting, in this model, would never be a settled matter, and
districts would constantly be in flux depending on the balance of
political power in the Legislature.
4. The Texas Legislature has traditionally been defined by a spirit of
bipartisanship and cooperation. This issue has polarized the
legislature in a way that threatens to destroy that tradition. The
Republicans have effectively exiled their Democratic counterparts in a
power play that makes our state look more like a banana republic than
a dignified democracy. The arbitrary decision to discard the 2/3 rule
in the Senate sets a precedent that undermines that body’s tradition
of consensus and cooperation. The deployment of state law enforcement
officials to apprehend boycotting legislators erodes the separation of
powers between the executive and legislative branches of government,
and diminishes legislators’ ability to represent their constituents as
they see fit. The unilateral Republican effort to penalize Democratic
Senators and their staffs
What is needed:
The Democratic Senators currently in Albuquerque have two critical
needs. The first is to generate increased public awareness of the
situation. By all reason, every day the Senators are out of the state
this story should get bigger. Instead, news media have gradually lost
interest in the story. The California recall has dominated the
attention of the national media, and the Texas media has largely lost
interest in the story — out of sight, out of mind. Without public
attention to this story, the Republicans have all the leverage — if
it does not cost them politically, it costs them nothing(8) to
continue calling special sessions until the Texas 11 are forced to
come home.
The second critical need is funding. The cost of hotels, meeting
rooms, staff support, and public relations efforts is mounting. In
addition, the Senators must defend themselves legally against
Republican efforts to compel their return, while also filing legal
claims against the Republican power play. The Senators are actively
raising money for the Texas Senate Democratic Caucus Fund to offset
these costs and prepare themselves for a stay of indefinite duration
in Albuquerque.
Notes:
1. A recent Department of Justice investigation chronicled Republican
state officials’ illegal attempts to use federal resources —
including anti-terrorism resources from the Department of Homeland
Security — to compel the Democratic lawmakers’ return. See
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51520-2003Aug12.html
for a news report on the Justice Department investigation, or
http://www.usdoj.gov/oig/special/03-08a/final.pdf for a copy of the
complete Justice Department report.
2. At a cost to taxpayers of over $1.5 million per session.
3. House Republicans passed a redistricting bill in the special
session despite an outpouring of public opposition in hearings across
the state. All 12 Democratic state senators opposed the plan, along
with Republican state senator (and former Lieutenant Governor) Bill
Ratliff.
4. The “2/3 rule” requires the Senate to reach broader consensus on
difficult issues than a simple majority vote. It is a combination of
official Senate rules and tradition. The rules of the Senate require a
2/3 vote to suspend the “regular order of business” to consider a bill
that is not the first bill on the Senate calendar. By tradition, the
Senate has always placed a “blocker bill” at the top of the Senate
calendar, so that every bill requires a suspension of the regular
order of business to be considered. The process requires compromise
and consensus to achieve a 2/3 majority on each bill. One Texas
insider has said that the 2/3 rule is “what separates us from
animals.”
5. In fact, the Governor and Lt. Governor attempted to “surprise” the
Senators by calling the second special one day early and “trap” them
in the Senate Chamber. The Senators were able to escape the Capitol
with literally minutes to spare.
6. Republican party activist Grover Norquist, head of the Washington
D.C.-based Americans for Tax Reform, was quoted as follows in the
August 17 Fort Worth Star Telegram: “Republicans will hold the House
for the next decade through 2012 if Texas redistrictsIt depresses the
hell out of the Democrats and makes it doubly impossible to take the
House and probably depresses their fund raisingAnything that helps
strengthen the Republican leadership helps DeLay become speaker
someday if he wants it.”
7. Established in the landmark case Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186 (1962)
8. Notwithstanding the millions of dollars it is costing taxpayers.
Here is the full text of the email from MoveOn that was sent out to me:
In one day MoveOn members have contributed more than $400,000 for our
“Defend Democracy” campaign. We’ve been overwhelmed by the response.
The 11 Texas legislators who are right now risking everything for us
and for democracy are deeply grateful to receive this support.
Let’s raise a $1,000,000 to make this our biggest campaign ever.
Let’s take this campaign to national media outlets, and go deep with
Texas media. Let’s take it to California. Let’s connect the dots.
George Bush and Karl Rove have been counting on getting away with
these underhanded tactics — on bullying their opposition into
submission, on playing every dirty trick in the book. With your help,
we can make it cost them dearly. If you can, please make a
contribution today:
http://moveon.org/texasads
We’ve added a progress graph to our contribution page so that you can
see how close we are towards our goal. Click above to see our
progress.
Our democracy has survived 227 years for one simple reason: when
confronted by extremism, Americans have always united in defense of
freedom. The redistricting fight in Texas is a piece of a larger
attack on democracy nationwide — Impeachment; the 2000 election;
intimidation on Capital Hill; the California recall; and now
congressional redistricting at the whim of the Majority in Congress.
Texas is a first step. Next week, we will ask for your help to defeat
the California recall — specifically, to recruit friends and family
in California who are angry about the recall and want to do something
about it. We can stop this attack on Democracy if we once again stand
united. We’ll stop it in Texas, California, Washington DC and wherever
it occurs.
Sincerely,
–Carrie, Eli, Joan, Noah, Peter, Wes, and Zack
The MoveOn Team
August 21st, 2003
Once again, here is the letter from State Senator Rodney Ellis and
background information on the events in Texas.
___________________
Dear friends,
I am writing to you from a hotel room in Albuquerque, New Mexico,
where I and 10 of my colleagues in the Texas Senate have been forced
to reside for the past 20 days. If we return to our homes, families,
friends, and constituents, the Governor of Texas will have us
arrested.
I know, it sounds more like a banana republic than the dignified
democracy on which we have long prided ourselves. We are effectively
exiled from the state due to our unalterable opposition to a
Republican effort — pushed by Tom Delay and Karl Rove, and led by
Texas Governor Rick Perry — that would rewrite the map of Texas
Congressional districts in order to elect at least 5 more Republicans
to Congress.
You may not have heard much about the current breakdown in Texas
politics. The Republican power play in California has obscured the
Republican power play in Texas that has forced my colleagues and me to
leave the state.
Recognizing that public pressure is the only thing that can break the
current stalemate, our friends at MoveOn have offered to support our
efforts by sharing this email with you. In it, you will find:
-Background information on how the situation in Texas developed;
-Analysis of what’s at stake for Democrats and the democratic process;
The Republican redistricting effort shatters the tradition of
performing redistricting only once a decade immediately after the
Census — making redistricting a perpetual partisan process. It
elevates partisan politics above minority voting rights, in
contravention of the federal Voting Rights Act. It intends to decimate
the Democratic party in Texas, and lock in a Republican majority in
the U.S. House of Representatives. And Republican efforts to force a
vote on this issue by changing the rules of legislative procedure
threaten to undermine the rule of law in Texas.
We do not take lightly our decision to leave the state. It was the
only means left to us under the rules of procedure in Texas to block
this injustice. We are fighting for our principles and beliefs, and we
can win this fight with your support.
Sincerely,
Rodney Ellis
Texas State Senator (Houston)
August 18, 2003
___________________
Background:
During the 2001 session of the Texas Legislature, the legislature was
unable to pass a Congressional redistricting plan as it is required to
do following the decennial Census. A three judge federal panel was
forced to draw the plan. Neither Governor Rick Perry or then Attorney
General John Cornyn, both Republicans, objected to the plan, which was
reviewed and approved by the U.S. Supreme Court.
The 2002 Congressional elections, the first held under the new
redistricting plan, resulted in a Congressional delegation from Texas
consisting of 17 Democrats and 15 Republicans. However, five of the 17
Democrats prevailed only because they were able to win the support of
Republican and independent voters. All statewide Republican candidates
carried these five districts. Most experts agree that the current plan
has 20 strong or leaning Republican districts and 12 Democratic
districts.
Meanwhile, the 2001 redistricting of Texas legislative seats (which
was enacted by the Republican-controlled Legislative Redistricting
Board, after the legislature again gridlocked in its efforts) resulted
in wide Republican majorities in both the Texas House and Texas
Senate. Now Tom Delay has made it his priority to force the
Republican-controlled Legislature to enact a new redistricting plan to
increase the number of Republican-leaning Congressional districts.
Republicans believe they can manipulate the districts to elect as many
as 22 Republicans out of the 32 member Texas Congressional delegation.
They achieve this by packing minority voters into as few districts as
possible and breaking apart rural districts so that the impact of
independent voters will be reduced and suburban Republican voters will
dominate.
During the regular session of the Texas Legislature, Democratic
members of the Texas House of Representatives exercised an
unprecedented parliamentary move to prevent the House from passing Tom
Delay’s redistricting plan. While Democrats are in the minority of the
House of Representatives, the state constitution requires that at
least 2/3 of the House be present for the House to pass a bill.
Because it was clear that the Republicans would entertain no debate
and brook no compromise in their effort to rewrite the rules by which
members of Congress are elected, the Democrats were forced to break
the quorum to prevent the bill from passing. Because the Republican
Speaker of the House and Governor called on state law enforcement
officials to physically compel the Democrats to return, the lawmakers
removed themselves to a Holiday Inn in Ardmore, Oklahoma — outside
the reach of state troops(1). In there effort to apprehend the
Democrats, Tom Delay officially sought the help of the Department of
Homeland Security, the Department of Transportation and the Department
of Justice.
The House Democrats (nicknamed the “Killer D’s”, based on an earlier
episode in Texas history in which a group of Democratic state senators
called the “Killer Bees” broke the quorum in the Senate over a
similarly political stalemate) succeeded in stopping Delay’s
redistricting plan during the regular session, returning to Texas
after the legislative deadline had expired for the House to pass
legislation. However, because the Texas Legislature meets in regular
session only every two years, the state constitution gives the
Governor the power to call a 30-day special legislative session at any
time between regular sessions. Despite statewide protests from Texas
citizens who oppose Tom Delay’s redistricting plan, the Governor has
called two special sessions(2) already this summer to attempt to force
the legislature to enact a new plan.
The first called session expired in a deadlock, as 12 of 31 Texas
Senators(3) opposed the plan. Under Senate rules and tradition, a 2/3
vote is required to consider any bill on the floor of the Senate,
giving 11 Senators the power to block a vote(4). The Republican
Governor and Lieutenant Governor then determined they would do away
with the 2/3 rule, and called another special session, forcing 11
Democratic Senators to break the quorum and leave the state.(5) These
Senators have spent the past 22 days in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
The Governor has indicated he will continue calling special sessions
until the Republican redistricting plan is enacted, despite the fact
that the Republican-controlled Texas Supreme Court recently rejected
the Governor’s writ of mandamus filing to compel the Senators to
return to the Senate. Meanwhile, eleven Democratic state senators are
exiled from their state, unable to be with their families, friends,
and constituents, for fear of being arrested as part of a partisan
power play by Republicans. In the most recent indignity, Republican
Senators voted to fine the absent Democrats up to $5,000 per day, and
to revoke parking and other privileges for their staffs as long as the
Senators are away.
What’s at stake:
At stake, on the surface, is whether Tom Delay will succeed in
exploiting Republican control of the Texas Legislature to add to the
Republican majority in the United States Congress. But deeper issues
are also at stake.
1. If the Republicans succeed in redrawing the Texas Congressional
lines to guarantee the election of five to seven more Republicans, it
will ensure that Republicans hold the majority in the U.S. House of
Representatives for the entire decade and will likely result in Tom
Delay becoming Speaker of the House.(6)
2. The Republican advantage would be gained by removing many African
American and Hispanic voters from their current Congressional
districts and “packing” them into a few districts that already have
Democratic majorities. The voting power of these minority voters would
be dramatically diluted by the Republican plan, in contravention of
the federal Voting Rights Act. If the Republicans succeed, over 1.4
million African American and Hispanic voters will be harmed. It would
be the largest disenfranchisement of minority voters since the Voting
Rights Act was passed.
3. Redistricting exists for the purpose of reapportioning voters among
political districts to account for population shifts. The purpose of
this reapportionment is to ensure a roughly equal number of voters in
each district, to preserve the principle of “one man, one vote.”(7)
For this reason, redistricting has always been conducted immediately
following the U.S. Census’ decennial population reports. Tom Delay now
proposes a new redistricting plan two years after the Census report
simply because Republicans gained control over the Texas Legislature
in 2002 and now have the power to enact a much more Republican-
friendly plan than the one drawn by the federal courts two years ago.
This is an unprecedented approach to redistricting, one that
subordinates its original purpose of ensuring the principle of “one
man, one vote” to the purpose of perpetual partisan politics.
Redistricting, in this model, would never be a settled matter, and
districts would constantly be in flux depending on the balance of
political power in the Legislature.
4. The Texas Legislature has traditionally been defined by a spirit of
bipartisanship and cooperation. This issue has polarized the
legislature in a way that threatens to destroy that tradition. The
Republicans have effectively exiled their Democratic counterparts in a
power play that makes our state look more like a banana republic than
a dignified democracy. The arbitrary decision to discard the 2/3 rule
in the Senate sets a precedent that undermines that body’s tradition
of consensus and cooperation. The deployment of state law enforcement
officials to apprehend boycotting legislators erodes the separation of
powers between the executive and legislative branches of government,
and diminishes legislators’ ability to represent their constituents as
they see fit. The unilateral Republican effort to penalize Democratic
Senators and their staffs
What is needed:
The Democratic Senators currently in Albuquerque have two critical
needs. The first is to generate increased public awareness of the
situation. By all reason, every day the Senators are out of the state
this story should get bigger. Instead, news media have gradually lost
interest in the story. The California recall has dominated the
attention of the national media, and the Texas media has largely lost
interest in the story — out of sight, out of mind. Without public
attention to this story, the Republicans have all the leverage — if
it does not cost them politically, it costs them nothing(8) to
continue calling special sessions until the Texas 11 are forced to
come home.
The second critical need is funding. The cost of hotels, meeting
rooms, staff support, and public relations efforts is mounting. In
addition, the Senators must defend themselves legally against
Republican efforts to compel their return, while also filing legal
claims against the Republican power play. The Senators are actively
raising money for the Texas Senate Democratic Caucus Fund to offset
these costs and prepare themselves for a stay of indefinite duration
in Albuquerque.
Notes:
1. A recent Department of Justice investigation chronicled Republican
state officials’ illegal attempts to use federal resources —
including anti-terrorism resources from the Department of Homeland
Security — to compel the Democratic lawmakers’ return. See
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51520-2003Aug12.html
for a news report on the Justice Department investigation, or
http://www.usdoj.gov/oig/special/03-08a/final.pdf for a copy of the
complete Justice Department report.
2. At a cost to taxpayers of over $1.5 million per session.
3. House Republicans passed a redistricting bill in the special
session despite an outpouring of public opposition in hearings across
the state. All 12 Democratic state senators opposed the plan, along
with Republican state senator (and former Lieutenant Governor) Bill
Ratliff.
4. The “2/3 rule” requires the Senate to reach broader consensus on
difficult issues than a simple majority vote. It is a combination of
official Senate rules and tradition. The rules of the Senate require a
2/3 vote to suspend the “regular order of business” to consider a bill
that is not the first bill on the Senate calendar. By tradition, the
Senate has always placed a “blocker bill” at the top of the Senate
calendar, so that every bill requires a suspension of the regular
order of business to be considered. The process requires compromise
and consensus to achieve a 2/3 majority on each bill. One Texas
insider has said that the 2/3 rule is “what separates us from
animals.”
5. In fact, the Governor and Lt. Governor attempted to “surprise” the
Senators by calling the second special one day early and “trap” them
in the Senate Chamber. The Senators were able to escape the Capitol
with literally minutes to spare.
6. Republican party activist Grover Norquist, head of the Washington
D.C.-based Americans for Tax Reform, was quoted as follows in the
August 17 Fort Worth Star Telegram: “Republicans will hold the House
for the next decade through 2012 if Texas redistrictsIt depresses the
hell out of the Democrats and makes it doubly impossible to take the
House and probably depresses their fund raisingAnything that helps
strengthen the Republican leadership helps DeLay become speaker
someday if he wants it.”
7. Established in the landmark case Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186 (1962)
8. Notwithstanding the millions of dollars it is costing taxpayers.