I added a Democrat to Congress but I hope Supreme Court ends partisan gerrymandering: O'Malley I responded to GOP gerrymandering with my own, but I hope the Supreme Court ends partisan redistricting. It's polarizing Congress and America.

Martin O’Malley | USA TODAY

The Supreme Court is now considering challenges from two states on how we draw congressional districts: a Wisconsin map drawn by a Republican governor, and a Maryland map drawn by a Democratic governor — me.

We have historically allowed a partisan motive in redrawing these borders every 10 years to account for population growth and shifts. But now, at a time of deep division and polarization in our national politics, the court is re-examining that. It could end up reining in or maybe even disallowing partisan motives in redistricting.

For the sake of our democracy, I sincerely hope that's what the court does.

I was a re-elected governor of Maryland in 2010 on the eve of national redistricting. It was not a good year for Democrats. We lost governor’s races in quite a few states where Democratic voters actually outnumbered Republicans.

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From Maryland, we watched Republican governors carve Democratic voters into irrelevance in state after state in order to help elect lopsided Republican congressional delegations. We felt an obligation — even a duty — to push back. To provide some check, some balance against what was happening in 30 states that were now Republican controlled. Within legal and constitutional limits, we drew a map that elected an additional Democratic House member to our delegation.

Maryland’s map was considered in a referendum and approved with 64% of the vote. The legality and constitutionality of Maryland’s process and resulting map has survived every lower court challenge up until this point.

And still, I hope the Supreme Court can craft a new theory that removes the partisan motive from the process of drawing legislative districts. We need to attack our problems, not each other. We need to be able to listen to each and find common ground. And we need representative institutions that foster understanding instead of exacerbating divisions.

Gone from the Congress of today are the Rockefeller Republicans and the Blue Dog Democrats. Instead we have fostered a system that drives our representatives apart.

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A system that has wiped out diversity of opinions. A system that digs ideological trenches around incumbents — incumbents whose approval ratings, as a group, have hovered below 20% for nearly a decade.

The great American judge and political scholar, Learned Hand, once asked: “What is the spirit of moderation? It is the temper which does not press a partisan advantage to its bitter end, which can understand and will respect the other side, which feels a unity between all citizens — real and not the factitious product of propaganda — which recognizes their common fate and their common aspirations — in a word, which has faith in the sacredness of the individual.”

Nature understands that balance and stability are achieved through diversity. Ideologues and fundamentalists believe the opposite.

When a political process no longer serves the common good of a democracy, we should change that process.

It is time to rise above partisan redistricting.

The country we carry in our hearts is waiting.

Martin O’Malley was governor of Maryland from 2007 to 2015. Follow him on Twitter: @MartinOMalley.