ABSTRACT
In this chapter the author describes the substantive and procedural issues surrounding the tradeoffs that he gained as the public member of the commission that redrew the boundaries of New Jersey's state legislative districts. He discusses New Jersey's experiment with redistricting by commission and explains to the tradeoffs between representing geographic communities and Gingles-style improvements in minority representation. The success of New Jersey's experiment in redistricting its legislative districts has persuaded the state's political activists, journalists, and citizen groups that the mixed process really is a better way of redrawing legislative boundaries and should be extended to other levels of government. The quest of population equality has eroded geographic community less in redrawing state legislative districts, since the courts still permit a 10 percent variation between the most and least populous districts. After the census data are released, the party delegations have a month to agree on the boundaries of the forty legislative districts.
