They're Back!

51 Texas Democrats today returned triumphantly to Austin, having managed to prevent the passage of a redistricting bill by hiding out in Oklahoma until there was no time left in the current legislative session for it to be passed.

It's an interesting story; when I first heard about the exodus, it seemed as if the Democrats were just throwing a tantrum by running away, but it's not quite that simple. Every ten years, the Legislature redraws the district maps for Texas, changing the boundaries for senate, house, and educational areas. The last redrafting was supposed to take place in 2001, but the Legislature failed to come to an agreement, and after a series of lawsuits, the task was given to a panel comprised of three Federal judges. This new map would likely have given Democrats 17 out of the 32 Congressional seats available in Texas.

At this point, Tom DeLay (R-Texas), Majority Leader of the House of Representatives came up with a new set of districting plans which would have seen Republicans ending up with 19 of the 32 seats, and the flight of the Democrats at the weekend was a last-ditch attempt to stop this new map from replacing the one approved by the three-judge panel, as the GOP currently has a sizable majority in the Texas House of Representatives. The only way to stop the bill from passing was to invoke the quorum rule.

Not only did the Texas Republicans call the fleeing Democrats "legislative terrorists", they used the Office of Homeland Security to track them to the Holiday Inn in Oklahoma. An excellent idea, and not at all a waste of time for an agency that's supposed to be hunting down terrorists.

Okay, I've finished boring you now. I'm just cursed with finding these things interesting.