By Mike Asmus
Texas Insider Report: AUSTIN Texas The round of legislative redistricting undertaken by the Texas Legislature in 2003 set in motion GOP gains for the Lone Star States Congressional Delegation in the 2004 elections. In fact the four added congressional seats won by Republicans in Texas in 2004 were key in furthering the GOP majority in the U.S. House by three seats. These state and federal gains were the product of a plan fulfilled.
A plan designed and shepherded by Texas Congressman Tom DeLay. And while lauded as hero going into 2005 the Hammer would relinquish his leadership role later that year and wouldnt even be on the ballot for 2006.
Tom DeLay had amassed a fair amount of political power by the close of the 20th century. First elected to Congress in 1984 after having served three terms in the Texas House DeLay was named majority whip by his peers following the GOPs 1994 taking of the U.S. House. In legis-speak the whip apprises majority members of the partys position on issues encourages members thinking otherwise to reconsider and strives to ensure they in fact cast their votes as their party leaders subtly and not-so-subtly suggest.
Congressman DeLay quickly proved adept in the role of majority whip so much so that hed earned an unsubtle nickname underscoring his powers of persuasion. By 2000 the Hammer had begun to worry about the slipping number of House Republicans. Where 1994 had minted 230 GOP representatives the elections of six years later had sent just 221 Republicans to the 435-member body.
Slip four more spots and the House would be under new management.
DeLay and members of the House leadership team had turned a focused eye on legislative redistricting as a prime component to reversing the mounting slide in GOP ranks. Done by the legislatures of the 50 states following each decennial census redistricting resets the boundary lines of state legislative
and congressional districts to keep the make-ups of the districts aligned with population and demographic changes.
Partisanship typically influences the process invariably increasing the number of districts likely friendly to the pen-wielding majority party.
A number of state legislatures were led by Republicans for the 2001 round of redistricting which translated to GOP gains in those states and in their congressional delegations.
The Texas Legislature however was split at the time with Republicans leading the Senate and Democrats controlling the House. The resulting map perpetuated the decidedly Democratic-friendly theme set in 1991 when Democrats held both state chambers.
Republicans felt strongly that the map did not reflect the DNA of states GOP which had been significantly strengthened over the 1990s. The 2002 elections were a mixed bag.
The U.S. House gained eight Republican seats though none of these new wins were from Texas where voters set the congressional delegation at 17 Democrats and 15 Republicans. But these same voters put a Republican majority in the state House.
Going into the 2003 legislative session conservatives would now hold both houses of the legislature a first in modern Texas history.
The newly-minted bi-cameral majority embarked on a bold plan to redistrict what had just been redistricted in the prior legislative session of 2001.
(Texass regular legislative sessions are biennial.) The legislative mapmaking of 2003 garnered a lot of attention for a lot of reasons.
Mid-decade redistricting was not unprecedented but is rare in occurrence. Another focal point of the scrutiny was Congressman DeLay who personally assisted state lawmakers in the process.
Im a Texan trying to get things done DeLay told reporters while ferrying maps between delegations on either side of the statehouse.
Get things done he did.
As mentioned earlier the 2004 elections now based on the re-redistricting map markedly improved the strength of conservatives. The Texas GOP congressional delegation grew by four Republicans. GOP membership in the U.S. House as a whole grew by three making the conservative majority two seats stronger than the one created in the 1994 takeover.
For Congressman DeLay victories to be savored and perhaps further capitalized upon. Having risen to House majority leader following the 2002 elections there was renewed talk of a possible speakership in the lawmaker from Sugar Lands future.
Backing up in the flow chart a bit we find Majority Leader DeLay also had a hand in the big 2002 win for Texas House Republicans.
Determined after the unsatisfying results of the 2001 redistricting round to help obtain a statehouse-wide majority so as to then have another go at the maps the Congressman established fundraising vehicles to help drive wins in state House races for 2002. Just how these vehicles were structured and operated later came under scrutiny.
By the fall of 2005 scrutiny had become an indictment and DeLay relinquished his leadership post. At this point he was also the subject of a review related to the dealings of D.C. lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
In January of 2006 DeLay assured his increasingly heat-sensitive colleagues that he would not seek to regain the majority leader slot. As the year wore on
it became less and less likely that he would seek to keep his seat in the fall elections. This speculation ended when Tom DeLay resigned from Congress in June of 2006. Out of Washington but still in hot water the temperature only continued to build in his legislative retirement.
Though no Abramoff-related indictments ever materialized DeLay was convicted last November on two counts related to converting corporate donations into political contributions and then directing the money to the 2002 campaigns of Texas House candidates. Earlier this month he was sentenced to three years in prison on one charge and 10 years probation on the other.
DeLay remains free during his appeal having posted a $10000 bond.
The political landscape of 2006 was very different from the one just a cycle before. Congressman DeLay had become Citizen DeLay. And the years fall elections not only washed away the GOPs congressional gains of 2004 they washed away the Republican House majority and the GOP majority in the Senate.
Republican losses across the boards (including the race for Chief Executive) would be further compounded in 2008 in large part due to a widely appealing aura created by a widely accomplished orator.
Now markedly in the minority in both houses of Congress the GOPs majority hold in the Texas House fell to a single seat in the 150-member body. But the weather vane of political prominence hasnt fixed on any one party for long during this centurys first decade.
To finish out the timeline a broad vote of no confidence cast on Democratic leadership in Washington (both in the Capitol and the Oval Office) this past November swung the arrow back to R with significant conservative gains
made in local state and federal offices across the nation. Earlier this month Republicans took firm control of the U.S. House (with bolstered numbers in the U.S. Senate) and posted an even stronger two-thirds-plus majority in the Texas House (with a maintained majority in the state Senate).
Along with writing and adopting a budget redrawing state legislative and congressional district boundaries is a key task for Texas lawmakers in the current session. The strong GOP delegation in the Texas Legislature combined with a Republican Texas governor sets up the possibility of a relatively swift redistricting round.
But sometimes the strength in numbers playbook can tear under its own weight.
Brokering compromise across two camps of fairly equal numbers requires deft use of the gavel; brokering peace among members of a burgeoning majority camp can require swinging something with a bit more heft.
A hammer perhaps ...
A former mayor & State Senate Communications Director Mike Asmus managed the 2010 congressional campaign of Donna Campbell who remains in the hunt for 2012.
