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Article snippet: WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court announced on Monday that it would consider whether partisan gerrymandering violates the Constitution, potentially setting the stage for a ruling that could for the first time impose limits on a practice that has helped define American politics since the early days of the Republic. The term gerrymander was coined after Elbridge Gerry, Massachusetts’s governor, signed an 1812 law that included a voting district shaped like a salamander to help the electoral prospects of his party. Over the centuries, lawmakers have become ever more sophisticated in redrawing legislative maps after each decennial census, carving out oddly shaped districts for state legislatures and the House of Representatives that favor their parties’ candidates. While the Supreme Court has struck down voting districts as racial gerrymanders, it has never disallowed a legislative map because of partisan gerrymandering. The new case is an appeal of a decision striking down the legislative map for the Wisconsin State Assembly drawn after Republicans gained control of the state’s government in 2010. The decision was the first from a federal court in more than 30 years to reject a voting map as an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander. The map, Judge Kenneth F. Ripple wrote for the majority of a divided three-judge Federal District Court, “was designed to make it more difficult for Democrats, compared to Republicans, to translate their votes into seats.” Paul Smith, a law... Link to the full article to read more