The state court, by a vote of 4-3, invalidated the state's plan for reapportionment of House and Senate seats. With the clock ticking for candidates to file their nominating petitions, justices suggested that the state might have to revert to its old maps, drawn up in 2001, for the time being.
The Pileggi suit, in which House Majority Leader Mike Turzai (R., Allegheny) is also a plaintiff, seeks an injunction to block the state from holding any election using the old maps. They say the U.S. Supreme Court's one-person, one-vote ruling requires a remapping after every decennial census so that all districts are about the same size in population.
A hearing is set for Monday.
The state Supreme Court ruling does not affect the redistricting of U.S. House districts, a separate process that has not been challenged. Congressional seats will also be on the April 24 ballot.
Meanwhile, the state Supreme Court on Friday issued an 87-page opinion - with several dissents from disappointed justices - explaining its decision to throw out the maps drawn up by the Legislative Reapportionment Commission.
It said the commission, in trying to give districts equal population, ran roughshod over other state constitutional requirements that districts be compact and that counties, municipalities, and even Philadelphia wards not be broken up unless "absolutely necessary."
It cited several examples of gerrymandering, including a proposal for the Third Senatorial District, which it said looked like a wishbone running "from the Far Northeast section of Philadelphia down into North Philadelphia, and then up again into the Roxborough/Chestnut Hill area."
