From Assignment Task:
Your task is to writea 1-page (single-spaced) memoregarding apolicy relating to Electoral Policy. For example, you may choose the presidential caucus. In this case, you would explain the current rules concerning presidential caucuses, the consequences of those rules and why you want to change the process (why is it a problem), then propose your solution. You must then explain why your solution addresses the problem.
You must:
Summarize the situation
Describe why this is an important issue and why the president should take action
Explain what the president is to do and justify why this is the best course of action.
You may pick any topic relating to elections and electoral policies. Good topics include (but are not limited to): presidential caucuses, off-year elections, the long election cycle, voter registration across the states, primary elections. Bad topics include (but are not limited to): which candidate is the best, why a particular candidate is being treated unfairly, among others.
*** I've attached an example of an example of the memo ***
Policy Memo – Electoral Policy To: Dr. Eugenis From: Kate Eugenis Date: 8/13/2019 Subject: Creating Representative Districts As you know, one of we face as a nation involves the drawing of congressional districts. As a representative democracy, our system of government relies on voters to delegate responsibility to individuals who represent them during lawmaking. One way the legitimacy of this practice can be thrown into question deals with the way congressional districts are drawn. Ideally, congressional districts are drawn in a way to best represent the population living in the state, and to make sure that everyone has fair access to the government. However, when partisan bodies are given control of this process, there is the potential for abuse as lawmakers create districts that are more likely to support their party. For example, Texas-35 stretches in almost a straight line from Austin to San Antonio, despite the fact that the two cities are very far apart from each other. This has the effect of diminishing the power of the voters in the urban centers by diluting their votes with people who live in the rural stretch of land between the two cities. This is a problem because as districts are gerrymandered to produce particular electoral outcomes, the will of the people and the voice of the people can become routinely ignored.[footnoteRef:1] Eventually this leads to feelings of diminishing efficacy as the government is not responsive to large groups of people. This has multiple consequences. Locally, it means that the most important election moves to the primary – where fewer people are able to vote for the representative. Additionally, it reduces the number of competitive districts in Congress and increases partisanship as representatives are able to move further and further to the extreme edges of the ideology. As most people fall in the middle of the political spectrum, it is not advantageous for the members of Congress to represent the outer fringes of politics. [1: https://www.ced.org/reports/solving-the-problem-of-partisan-gerrymandering#section4] I offer two possible solutions to this problem. First, and as a bare minimum, all states should redistrict using a neutral body made up of judges to ensure the districts are fair and accurately represent a majority of people in the community. This means that effort is made to ensure that districts do not break up neighborhoods or communities. Second, and as a more advanced solution, we should use the power of computers and machine learning to create districts that are neutral and take into account the needs of citizens.[footnoteRef:2] This can be done multiple ways. We could program in the demographics of each square block of the city: the ethnicity, gender, median income, education, and top professions. Then we would layer in natural city breaking points such as major freeways, rivers, train tracks, or anything else that serves as a natural barrier in the city. Finally, we would add in school district boundaries so the computer already has a sense of the natural boundaries of the communities. From here we could program the computer to create compact districts that represent voting communities. We would need to re-do the districts after every census in order to put the most accurate information in the algorithm (and to ensure that congressional districts change and evolve with a changing demographic). [2: http://time.com/4960635/can-computers-fix-gerrymandering/] Please accept my suggestions and thank you for your time.