Through tireless research, Yeargain has shown that elected boards and commissions across the country make important life decisions about their constituents—but all too often without truly representing them.
The reason: the districts of these statewide bodies are infrequently and inconsistently redrawn to reflect the changing populations and demographics of their constituents.
Decennial redistricting is supposed to happen every ten years following the completion of the U.S. Census for Congress, state legislators, and many local offices. But not always for elected state boards and commissions.
And that’s a problem, says Yeargain.
“I argue that the omission of state boards from redistricting litigation and conversations represents not just a serious neglect of the one-person, one-vote standard, but a missed opportunity for racial justice and equity.
“The mismatch between districts and representation has resulted in gerrymandered boards setting policies in important areas—with little claim to democratic legitimacy. At a time when public schools are in the crosshairs of culture wars, and when communities of color are demanding environmental justice, the unaccountability of the state institutions responsible for setting educational and environmental policies is problematic,” Yeargain writes in his recently published article, “Shadow Districts”, in the Cardozo Law Review.
As a new MSU Law faculty member and one of two 1855 Professors of the Law of Democracy, Yeargain intends to shine a spotlight on this common omission in his law classes this fall.
The 1855 Professorship initiative was named for the year MSU was founded and to underscore the university’s commitment address issues that matter to people’s lives and livelihoods today. MSU Law’s proposal was one of 13 proposals selected from a pool of 76 submitted by colleges across the campus aligning with the university’s 2030 DEI strategic theme.
With extensive historical research on redistricting, Yeargain has created comprehensive databases revealing the inequities between levels of representation among states.
Consider the differences between Michigan and Mississippi.
Every 10 years, Michigan redraws its district lines for Congress, the state senate, and the state souse, and in doing so, invites voters into the process—especially following the passage of Proposal 2, which created an independent redistricting commission in 2018.
By contrast, Mississippi has no operational process for how districts for its elected state Supreme Court, Public Service Commission, and Transportation Commission are to be redrawn, Yeargain said.
Redrawn districts are not without problems—and can be challenged in court on a variety of grounds. When districts are redrawn to limit the ability of communities of color to be represented by candidates of their choice, they can challenged in court for running afoul of the Voting Rights Act. When they contain unequal populations, they might violate the Equal Protection Clause’s “one person, one vote” requirement. And in some states, districts drawn to advantage one political party over another might violate a state constitutional protection against partisan gerrymandering.
“Some states in the south have elections where the incumbent legislators are never going to lose power. They’ve drawn themselves safe districts, and the voters are almost immaterial,” Yeargain said.
“The more that districts are drawn to provide fairness in partisan representation and equity in representation of communities with shared interests, the more that we will have governments that are truly representative of the people that they serve.”
Prior to joining Michigan State University College of Law, Yeargain was an assistant professor of law at the Widener University Commonwealth Law School in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Yeargain graduated from the Emory University School of Law with High Honors and as a Robert W. Woodruff Fellow, serving as executive online editor of the Emory Law Journal and as executive editor of the Emory Law Supreme Court Advocacy Program.
After graduation, Yeargain clerked for Judge Lanier Anderson on the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Macon, Georgia. Yeargain also served as associate director of the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy and was a lecturer at the Yale School of the Environment in the Spring 2022 semester.
Yeargain’s work has been published in top-ranked law journals, including the Yale Law and Policy Review, UC Davis Law Review, Cardozo Law Review, Missouri Law Review, Texas A&M Law Review, and Ohio State Law Journal, and has recently been cited by the Idaho Supreme Court and Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
Yeargain has joined amicus briefs in cases involving questions of state constitutional law and has advised voting-rights groups and plaintiffs as a consultant in redistricting litigation. Additionally, Yeargain is a regular contributor to Bolts Magazine and the Brennan Center’s State Court Report, and regularly appears in the media commenting on topical issues in constitutional and election law.