California's congressional districts

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Map of California's congressional districts since 2003.

California is the most populous U.S. state and as a result has the most representation in the United States House of Representatives, with 53 Representatives. Each Representative represents one congressional district.

[edit] 1992: Court ordered districts

The 1990 census gave California seven additional congressional seats. Attempts by the legislature to draw up new districts were unsuccessful, as three different plans drawn up by the Democratic-controlled Legislature were vetoed by Republican governor Pete Wilson. In September 1991 the California Supreme Court took jurisdiction over the redistricting process to break the stalemate.^[1]^[2] Districts were drawn up by a panel of retired judges.

[edit] 2002: Bipartisan gerrymandering

California's 38th congressional district

After the 2000 census, the California State Legislature was obliged to complete redistricting for House of Representatives districts as well as California State Assembly and California State Senate districts. It was mutually decided by legislators that the status quo in terms of balance of power would be preserved - a so-called Incumbent Protection Plan.^[3] A bipartisan gerrymandering effort was done, and districts were configured in such a way that they were dominated by one or the other party, with few districts that could be considered competitive. In some cases this results in extremely convoluted boundary lines.

In the 2004 elections, a win by less than 55 percent of the vote was quite rare. This was seen in only five out of 80 State Assembly seats and two out of 20 State Senate seats up for election. The congressional seats were even less competitive than the state legislative districts - just three of the 53 districts were won with less than 60 percent majority in 2004.

[edit] Results in some districts during the 2000s

California's 11th congressional district. The 10th district is immediately north in Contra Costa and Solano Counties.

In earlier elections, the almost evenly divided 10th district was a focus of national attention, owing to its balanced electorate with a slight Republican edge in registration and a Republican advantage in electoral participation. Since its creation in 1990, the district had been held by a Republican, Congressman Bill Baker, a former State Assembly member, for whom the district was designed. After several weak challenges to the seat by Democrats, the election was hotly contested in 1996 by a newcomer to politics, Ellen Tauscher, a candidate with sufficient funds of her own to be competitive against the incumbent. Receiving a great amount of grass roots support from local Democratic clubs and votes from moderate Republican women, her defeat of Congressman Baker was considered a great victory for what many consider a 'middle of the road' Democrat. Her district is now 'safe' (she won reelection with 65.8 percent of the vote in 2004) and the recent congressional election drew no national attention to California.

In 2006, the only Congressional seat in California to change hands was the 11th, which is made up of some of the inland parts of the San Francisco Bay Area plus portions of the Central Valley east of the Bay Area. It was taken from long-time Republlican incumbent Richard Pombo by Democratic political neophyte Jerry McNerney.

The 4th district, north of Sacramento, where Democratic Air Force veteran Charlie Brown faced off against Republican State Senator Tom McClintock to take the seat held by retiring Republican Congressman John Doolittle, was considered competitive. McClintock won by a slim margin.

The 50th district, in the San Diego suburbs, where Francine Busby (D) challenged Brian Bilbray (R), first in a special election to replace convicted felon Duke Cunningham (R), and then in the general election, probably would have been very competitive if Busby had not made an ill-considered and poorly-received remark that became connected to the locally-sensitive issue of immigration: she remarked that one does not "need papers" to vote. Indeed, California law prohibits poll workers from requesting ID under most circumstances. Voters need some sort of ID in order to register to vote, but not at the polls.) However, it was easy to interpret her statement as saying that illegal immigrants could vote.

[edit] 2012: Citizens Redistricting Commission

Proposition 11, a California ballot proposition known as the Voters FIRST Act, was approved by the voters on November 4, 2008. It removed from the California Legislature the responsibility for drawing the state's congressional districts, and gave the responsibility instead to a 14 member Citizens Commission.^[4] It also required that the districts drawn up (1) comply with the federal Voting Rights Act; (2) make districts contiguous; (3) respect, to the extent possible, the integrity of cities, counties, neighborhoods and "communities of interest"; and (4) to the extent possible, make districts compact. Several of these terms are not defined in law. .

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger had earlier proposed placing the redistricting process in the hands of retired judges, which was on the November ballot as an initiative in a special election (called by the Governor on June 14, 2005), Proposition 77. The special election was held on November 8, 2005. However, the initiative was overwhelmingly defeated, with 59 percent voting no. All initiatives, including those proposed by the Governor's allies and several independent initiatives, failed that year.

The California Citizens Redistricting Commission certified final district maps on August 15, 2011, which will take effect with the 2012 election.^[5] The new districts are described as more "purple" than "red" or "blue" - that is, more mixed in electoral composition compared to the mostly "safe" districts of the previous decade, where incumbents were almost guaranteed re-election. An interactive map comparing the old districts with the new ones is available via the Los Angeles Times.^[6] The new maps could cost Republicans several congressional seats; Republicans are pondering whether to challenge the maps, possibly in court or via a referendum petition.^[7]

[edit] Political affiliations of Representatives

Representatives' Political Persuasion - 112th United States Congress
District	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th
Representative	Mike Thompson	Wally Herger	Dan Lungren	Tom McClintock	Doris Matsui	Lynn Woolsey	George Miller	Nancy Pelosi
Conservative Test^[8]	25%	100%	100%	92%	17%	8%	13%	5%
Progressive Test^[9]	84%	3%	4%	4%	93%	94%	94%	94%
CPVI^[10]	D+13	R+11	R+6	R+10	D+15	D+23	D+19	D+35

Representatives' Political Persuasion - 112th United States Congress
District	9th	10th	11th	12th	13th	14th	15th	16th
Representative	Barbara Lee	John Garamendi	Jerry McNerney	Jackie Speier	Pete Stark	Anna Eshoo	Mike Honda	Zoe Lofgren
Conservative Test	13%	TBD	TBD	TBD	8%	17%	13%	17%
Progressive Test	97%	TBD	94%	TBD	93%	88%	94%	87%
CPVI	D+37	D+11	R+1	D+23	D+22	D+21	D+15	D+16

Representatives' Political Persuasion - 112th United States Congress
District	17th	18th	19th	20th	21st	22nd	23rd	24th
Representative	Sam Farr	Dennis Cardoza	Jeff Denham	Jim Costa	Devin Nunes	Kevin McCarthy	Lois Capps	Elton Gallegly
Conservative Test	22%	46%	100%	50%	100%	TBD	17%	100%
Progressive Test	90%	75%	3%	74%	3%	0%	88%	6%
CPVI	D+19	D+4	R+9	D+5	R+13	R+16	D+12	R+4

Representatives' Political Persuasion - 112th United States Congress
District	25th	26th	27th	28th	29th	30th	31st	32nd
Representative	Howard McKeon	David Dreier	Brad Sherman	Howard Berman	Adam Schiff	Henry Waxman	Xavier Becerra	Judy Chu
Conservative Test	100%	100%	17%	17%	13%	13%	17%	13%
Progressive Test	4%	5%	83%	87%	85%	92%	92%	95%
CPVI	R+6	R+3	D+13	D+23	D+14	D+18	D+29	D+15

Representatives' Political Persuasion - 112th United States Congress
District	33rd	34th	35th	36th	37th	38th	39th	40th
Representative	Karen Bass	Lucille Roybal-Allard	Maxine Waters	Janice Hahn	Laura Richardson	Grace Napolitano	Linda Sánchez	Edward Royce
Conservative Test	17%	16%	9%	36%	TBD	13%	13%	100%
Progressive Test	92%	93%	93%	76%	98%	90%	96%	7%
CPVI	D+35	D+23	D+31	D+12	D+26	D+18	D+12	R+8

Representatives' Political Persuasion - 112th United States Congress
District	41st	42nd	43rd	44th	45th	46th	47th	48th
Representative	Jerry Lewis	Gary Miller	Joe Baca	Ken Calvert	Mary Bono Mack	Dana Rohrabacher	Loretta Sanchez	John Campbell
Conservative Test	100%	100%	35%	100%	100%	100%	38%	100%
Progressive Test	10%	2%	81%	5%	11%	8%	84%	3%
CPVI	R+10	R+10	D+13	R+6	R+3	R+6	D+4	R+6

Representatives' Political Persuasion - 112th United States Congress
CA District	49st	50th	51st	52nd	53rd
Representative	Darrell Issa	Brian Bilbray	Bob Filner	Duncan D. Hunter	Susan Davis
Conservative Test	100%	TBD	17%	96%	17%
Progressive Test	5%	15%	94%	5%	86%
CPVI	R+10	R+3	D+8	R+9	D+14