A Workable Standard

In the third episode of The Consent of the Governed, “A Workable Standard,” host Carter Hanson discusses the Hofeller files, statistical outlier analysis, and begins looking at Rucho v. Common Cause, the most recent important gerrymandering Supreme Court case.

From the episode: “Statistical outlier analyses of North Carolina, similar to that of Pennsylvania, reveal extreme Republican gerrymanders. In 2014, mathematicians Jonathan Mattingly and Christy Vaughn published one such analysis, revealing that, in a sampling of 100 maps in their ensemble, in no map did Democrats receive 4 or less of North Carolina’s 13 congressional seats, and Democrats averaged 7.6 Democratic seats. At the time, Democrats held only 3 congressional seats in the state.”

The Consent of the Governed is hosted, produced, and written by Carter Hanson, from his home in Boulder, Colorado. The Consent of the Governed is the main expression of my Kolbe Fellowship project. The Kolbe Fellowship program is a ten-week research fellowship for social sciences and humanities students at Gettysburg College in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The Consent of the Governed’s theme music was written by Natalie Dolan and James Lamb. Thanks to Professor Beth Campbell Hetrick, who is the faculty advisor for this project. You can find us on Podbean, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, and Medium.