Last week, Virginia’s voters chose to support a redistricting plan which could reduce the number of Republican representatives in its congressional delegation from 5 out of 11 to only 1. The election results perfectly show why just because one can do something, one shouldn’t necessarily do it. After all, whatever tactic used by one party to try to gain an advantage over the other can then be used by the other to retaliate. In other words, don’t do to others what you don’t want done to you: You’re simply giving your opponents new ideas, and they may in fact do to you what you’ve done to them.
We all know the Golden Rule: Treat others how you want to be treated. It’s a principle which, in one form or another, is one of the basic principles not only of Christianity but of most, if not all, other religions as well.
One of the versions of the Golden Rule underpinning Confucianism is more passive: “Don’t do to others what you don’t want done to you.” And while the Confucian version doesn’t say so, a good reason why you shouldn’t do to others what you don’t want done to you is that if you do so, you may provoke retaliation. In other words, be careful what you do to others, for they may do it to you, too.
Last summer, the Republican-dominated Texas legislature, prompted by President Trump and Governor Abbott, voted to redraw congressional district boundaries to produce up to 5 new Republicans in the 2026 midterm elections.
This mid-decade redistricting was not unconstitutional. The Constitution requires that every ten years, following a national census, the number of representatives each state is allowed in the House of Representatives be recalculated, based on population shifts and changes throughout the country. Moreover, the U. S. Supreme Court has mandated that every congressional district, and every election district for every other legislature—state legislature, city council, county commission, whatever—be redrawn to ensure that each election district for each lawmaking body in each state be equal in population to all other districts for the same legislature: “one person, one vote.”
But while the Constitution requires reapportionment and redistricting at least once every ten years, it puts no upper limit on how many redistricting exercises may be conducted. It allowed the Texas legislature to produce more Republican-dominated congressional districts in 2003 following the failure of the 2002 elections to produce a congressional delegation with a majority of Republicans, and it has allowed the legislature to expand the number of Republican-dominated districts in time for the 2026 elections as well. Of course, each Republican seat gained is a Democratic seat lost, and vice versa.
President Trump pushed Texas to redistrict for fear of Republican losses this fall, and he’s right to be concerned. As I’ve written before, in midterm elections, the party of the President typically loses seats in Congress as voters dissatisfied with the job the President is doing take out their anger by voting for the opposition party’s congressional candidates.
And currently, matters look bad for President Trump and the GOP. Trump’s approval rating, according to polling averages, has sunk to 33%, while 58% of the voters disapprove of his conduct of the war in Iran and the resulting increase in the cost of oil. The GOP’s loss of the House of Representatives is almost certain, and doubts that the GOP can hold the Senate are growing, too. Impeachment next January is a very real possibility.
But President Trump, Governor Abbott, and the Texas legislature were being too clever by half. Pushing Texas to redistrict is proving to be the wrong way to save the GOP’s majority in the House or even minimize its losses. In response to Trump’s gambit, California’s Democratic voters last November chose to authorize a new redistricting plan, which could flip up to 5 congressional districts from Republican to Democratic dominance. And last week, Virginia’s voters likewise approved a redistricting scheme which would flip an additional 5 congressional districts from Republican to Democratic dominance as well. Consequently, Democrats could take away from the GOP up to 10 congressional seats they might not otherwise have tried to target.
In politics, much can be reasonably certain, but nothing is 100% inevitable. It’s possible that Republican losses this fall won’t be as bad as some currently forecast. Should we win the war in Iran, oil prices may go down and Trump’s approval ratings may go up. Republicans in red states—notably Florida—may produce redistricting plans to flip House seats from Democratic to Republican. Democratic primary voters, inspired by New York City Mayor Mamdani, may nominate other progressive ideologues for offices who can be defeated by Republicans who accuse them of extremism.
Nonetheless, each party, if it wants to increase its appeal to the voters and thereby win more offices, would be best advised to abstain from tactics which may be legal yet inspire retaliation. Rather, each party should concentrate on running stronger candidates advocating more rational and beneficial policies. Doing so will not be as much fun as pulling fast ones on the opposition, but will benefit both parties and the voters in the long run. So be careful what you do to others, for they may do it to you, too.
Malcolm L. Cross has lived in Stephenville since 1987 and taught politics and government at Tarleton for 36 years, retiring in 2023. His political and civic activities include service on the Stephenville City Council (2000-2014) and on the Erath County Republican Executive Committee (1990-2024). He was Mayor pro-tem of Stephenville from 2008 to 2014. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Stephenville
Economic Development Authority since 2018, and as chair of the Erath County Appraisal District’s Appraisal Review Board since 2015. He is also a member of the Stephenville Rotary Club, the Board of Vestry of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, and the Executive Committee of the Boy Scouts’ Pecan Valley District. Views expressed in this column are his and do not reflect those of The Flash as a whole.
Be the first to comment