Importing Constituents: Prisoners and Political Clout in New York

by Peter Wagner
April 22, 2002

This report was the first district-by-district analysis of prison-based gerrymandering.

• Press release
• Main Report



• Figure 7. 2000 Population by County
• Figure 8. Current Senate Districts, 2000 population.
• Figure 9. Current Assembly Districts, 2000 population.
• Figure 10. New Senate Districts, April 22, 2002.
• Figure 11. New Assembly Districts, April 22, 2002.
• Figure 12. Regional population analysis
• Figure 13. Additional detailed analysis of Senate district demographics.
• Figure 14. Additional detailed analysis of county demographics.
• Figure 15. Additional detailed analysis of Assembly district demographics.
• Further research and methodology discussion

Note: The legislature amended its proposed districts the same day this report was released, so this report was subsequently revised on May 20, 2002 to reflect those new proposed districts. The report discusses these proposed districts which were later passed into law. In January 2005, for the benefit of other researchers adapting this report to their own work, we prepared a further research and methodology discussion and reprocessed the original data was to create Figures 12, 13, 14 and 15.

Factsheets in PDF format

• Diluting democracy: Census quirk fuels prison expansion, [PDF], 1 page factsheet, October 2002,

Followup research

• PrisonersoftheCensus.org: An entire website of followup research and advocacy about the harm to democracy in New York and nationally from the U.S. Census counting prisoners as residents of the prison towns instead of their homes.
• Graphical briefing based on Chapter VI of Importing Constituents: Gerrymandering and relying on the miscount of prisoners combine to violate the U.S. Constitution in New York. (February, 2004)