Gerry + Mander (1812) w/ Harry Enten
This Day in Esoteric Political History
Jody Avirgan & Radiotopia
4.6 • 982 Ratings
🗓️ 24 March 2022
⏱️ 26 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
It’s March 24th. This day in 1812, a political cartoon appeared in a Boston newspaper lampooning a newly proposed election district. The district was the work of Governor Elbridge Gerry, and the cartoonist depicted the district in the shape of a salamander. Hence, the “gerrymander” was born.
Jody, Niki, and Kellie are joined by CNN (and former 538) reporter Harry Enten to discuss the origins of redistricting weirdness, proposals to curb it, and how the politics of the 19th century seem to be repeating themselves.
Be sure to check out Harry’s podcast Margins of Error!
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And don’t forget about Oprahdemics, hosted by Kellie, coming soon from Radiotopia.
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Our team: Jacob Feldman, Researcher/Producer; Brittani Brown, Producer; Khawla Nakua, Transcripts; music by Teen Daze and Blue Dot Sessions; Julie Shapiro and Audrey Mardavich, Executive Producers at Radiotopia
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history from radiotopia. |
| 0:07.0 | My name is Jody Avergan. |
| 0:10.0 | This day, March 26, 1812, a political cartoon appeared in the Boston Gazette. |
| 0:16.6 | The subject of the cartoon was a new voting district in Massachusetts that had been proposed |
| 0:21.0 | by the party of Governor Elbridge Jerry. The district had a very weird shape that had been proposed |
| 0:23.0 | the district had a very weird shape a sort of thick body and then this |
| 0:27.6 | long craning neck type part and the cartoonist took that shape and turned it into a caricature of a salamander. |
| 0:35.2 | And he dubbed this description the Jerry Mander, Governor Jerry a salamander, you get it. |
| 0:40.7 | And that is how we got the name for what happens when politicians |
| 0:44.3 | draw very convoluted shapes for districts often to gain a political edge by |
| 0:48.7 | including some voters or excluding some others and of course the shapes continue to this day gerrymandering is one of the I would say building blocks of our dysfunctional American democracy a long and proud tradition going all the way back to 1812. So let's talk about it with as always |
| 1:06.0 | Nicole Hammer of Columbia and Kelly Carter Jackson of Wausley. Hello there. |
| 1:09.9 | Hello Jody. Hey there and our special guest for this episode back on the show is Harry |
| 1:15.0 | Anton of CNN, host of the podcast Margins of Error, and my former compatriot on the 538 |
| 1:21.6 | podcast. Harry, good to see you again as always. |
| 1:24.0 | Shalom! Shalom to everybody. |
| 1:27.0 | It's a misty day outside my window, |
| 1:32.0 | but the warm feelings I have for all involved in this chat wipe |
| 1:36.9 | those clouds and that fog away in no time. Wow what a scene what a scene a |
| 1:42.3 | couple a couple Wow, what a scene, what a scene. |
| 1:43.0 | A couple fact checks to the intro that I wrote. |
| 1:47.0 | I'm going to fact check myself immediately. |
... |
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