The last time the Pennsylvania Supreme Court had to navigate territory as uncharted as that which it faces now — following the unprecedented decision last week to reject the state Legislative Reapportionment Commission’s House and Senate maps — it took four months for the justices to issue an opinion.
That was in 1972, after revisions to the state constitution in 1968 put the process of redrawing legislative lines into the hands of a government commission, as the court started a 40-year trend of upholding the commission’s plans. The current Supreme Court bucked that trend last Wednesday in a 4-3 per curiam order narrowly remanding the redistricting process to the commission and heeding the call of several citizens, a united Senate Democratic caucus, and a handful of would-be separated boroughs, all of which appealed the commission’s “final” plan from December.
