1. Among other things, the Census helps determine how congressional districts are drawn and so could affect which party controls the Congress at the beginning of the next century. 2. A lawyer for the state told an apparently divided court that the district was drawn for legitimate partisan reasons and not for unlawful race-conscious motives. 3. But Norwood warned this week that an effort to draw his district out from under him could cause him to move up his schedule. 4. But that underlines once again that there might be a better way to draw political districts in Texas. 5. But, they say, the use of sampling to apportion seats in the House and draw congressional districts is illegal and could be manipulated for partisan advantage. 6. Clinton administration officials interpreted the decision to mean that sampling could be used for drawing legislative districts and for handing out federal aid. 7. Census numbers determine how legislative districts are drawn and how billions of dollars in federal spending will be distributed over the next decade. 8. Consequently, the districts may be drawn to favor Democrats. 9. Evans had already been expected to provide the states, for purposes of drawing congressional districts, only those population figures derived from the basic census count. 10. First the judges hauled all the parties in the redistricting case into a hearing, demanding to know why the Legislature rather than the court should draw the districts. |