ABSTRACT
In this chapter, David Eugene Price reflects on the relevance of his own and his state’s experience to key components of the reform agenda. Gerrymandering—the drawing of legislative districts, often in convoluted ways, for political advantage—is as old as the republic. Gerrymandering has since the 1980s been under intensifying legal challenge from the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the equal protection clause of the Constitution—complementary standards that are sometimes in tension. North Carolina has been at the center of this litigation. The most serious criticism of the two-year cycle is that it requires nonstop fundraising. But that is less a criticism of two-year terms than it is of the financial demands of politics. Public financing for congressional campaigns was initially part of the Federal Elections Campaign Act Amendments of 1974 but was eventually dropped. Within two months, the North Carolina legislature had passed a comprehensive voter suppression law that surely would have failed preclearance.
