Legal Definitions - reapportionment

Reapportionment refers to the process of redrawing the boundaries of electoral districts for legislative bodies, such as state legislatures or the U.S. House of Representatives. This adjustment is primarily undertaken to ensure that each district contains a roughly equal number of people, reflecting shifts in population distribution identified by a census. The fundamental goal is to uphold the principle of "one person, one vote," meaning that each citizen's vote carries approximately the same weight, regardless of where they live within a state. This process is also commonly known as redistricting.

Here are some examples illustrating reapportionment:

• After the decennial U.S. Census, a state like Florida might discover its population has grown significantly, entitling it to two additional seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. To accommodate these new representatives and ensure that all congressional districts within Florida have roughly the same population, the state legislature would engage in reapportionment, redrawing all existing and new district lines across the state.

  This example demonstrates reapportionment because the state must adjust its federal electoral map to reflect its increased population and the resulting change in the number of representatives, ensuring each new district is equally populated.

• Consider a state where, over a decade, a major coastal region experiences rapid growth, while several inland counties see their populations decline. Even if the state's total number of seats in its own State Assembly remains constant, the legislature would need to undertake reapportionment. This would involve redrawing the boundaries of the State Assembly districts, likely making the coastal districts smaller geographically but more densely populated, and expanding the geographic size of inland districts to maintain an equal number of residents in each.

  This illustrates reapportionment as the state adjusts its internal legislative districts to account for significant population shifts within its borders, ensuring fair representation despite no change in the total number of legislative seats.

• Imagine a scenario where a state's overall population has remained stable, but there has been a substantial migration of residents from its northern suburbs to its southern suburbs. To ensure that voters in both parts of the state have equitable representation in the State Senate, the state government would initiate reapportionment. This would involve shrinking the geographic size of State Senate districts in the growing southern region and enlarging those in the northern region, all while aiming for an equal population count in each district.

  This example highlights reapportionment as the process used to realign legislative district boundaries to reflect internal population movements, thereby preserving the principle of equal representation across different regions of the state.