The Supreme Court heard arguments on Tuesday over whether congressional district maps in Maryland and North Carolina were unconstitutional partisan gerrymanders — favoring Democrats in Maryland and Republicans in North Carolina.

The arguments reprised parts of a hearing last year on the same Maryland case in which the court often seemed divided on partisan lines over key issues. In the Tuesday session, the court’s newest member, Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, seemed open to crucial arguments from both sides, suggesting to some that he could prove a swing vote on a closely divided issue. Most experts anticipate a ruling in late June.

Here are answers to some common questions about rigged electoral maps and the Revolutionary patriot for whom they are (perhaps unfairly) named.

What is gerrymandering?

The goal of gerrymandering is to draw political boundaries in ways that maximize a governing party’s advantage. Drafters accomplish it mainly through two practices that are commonly called packing and cracking.

A packed district is drawn to include as many members of the opposition party as possible. That helps the governing party capture and hold surrounding districts where the opposition’s strength has been diluted.

Cracking does the opposite: It splits up clusters of opposition voters among two or more districts, so they will be outnumbered by backers of the governing party in each district.

An efficient gerrymandered map doles out just enough support to governing party candidates to let them win and hold seats safely, even in “wave” elections when their opponents do especially well. And it limits the opposition to a minimum number of packed districts that it wins overwhelmingly.

Where is gerrymandering most notable now?

Currently, rigged maps are most prevalent, and most tilted, in states under Republican control. That is in part because Republicans did exceptionally well in the 2010 elections, giving them far wider control of state legislatures, which oversaw the redistricting that followed the 2010 census. The national Republican Party had poured money and expertise into state legislative races with the specific aim of gaining control over redistricting; the Democratic Party had not.

Many political scientists consider the House maps in Republican states like North Carolina, Michigan, Ohio and Texas to have the most pronounced partisan slants. (Pennsylvania was also on the list until its map was redrawn last year.) Among Democratic states, Maryland, Illinois and — among some observers — California are regarded as the most tilted. Illinois is especially notable for its “pizza slice” division of metropolitan Chicago, using generous helpings of urban Democrats to offset the heavily Republican suburbs in district after district.

Perhaps the most notable recent example comes from the Wisconsin State Assembly, whose members are all elected every two years. Wisconsin is a political battleground that swings from Republican to Democratic and back again in statewide elections for governor, United States senator and other offices.

After the Republican majority gerrymandered the Assembly in 2011, the party won a supermajority. Then in 2018, Republicans retained that supermajority, even as Democrats won every statewide office.

Why is the issue before the Supreme Court?

A string of lawsuits dating back decades have argued that partisan gerrymanders violate the Constitution. The Supreme Court has struck down gerrymanders based on race, but never those based on party, largely because the justices could not agree on a legal standard that would let them distinguish illegally partisan maps from acceptable ones.

The current challenges to the House maps in North Carolina and Maryland emphasize new legal arguments against gerrymandering, primarily that it punishes voters for choosing a minority party.

Many people think the cases will be the court’s last opportunity for a generation to break the impasse over partisan maps.

What could happen next?

A ruling against the maps, even if sharply limited in scope, would signal to state legislators that extreme partisan gerrymandering will no longer be tolerated.

But the court could throw up its hands instead, and say that gerrymandered maps are a political problem that the courts cannot solve — or kick the can down the legal road based on technical issues. Either of those choices would probably make the next round of redistricting in 2021 a partisan blood bath in states where one party controls the process.

A decision by the Supreme Court not to outlaw partisan gerrymanders could hasten the efforts already underway to challenge them in state courts — some state constitutions offer more favorable legal grounds than the national Constitution does. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court invalidated the state’s Republican-drawn congressional map last year based solely on the state constitution, and Democrats went on to score major gains in the 2018 House elections in the state.

Such a decision would probably also give new momentum to citizen-led campaigns to take map-drawing away from state politicians and give it to independent redistricting commissions. Ballot initiatives in Ohio, Michigan, Missouri, Colorado and Utah overhauled the redistricting process last year, and advocacy groups are preparing similar campaigns in Virginia and other states.

Where did the name ‘gerrymandering’ come from?

Some historians trace partisan mapmaking to Patrick Henry, who is said to have drawn a Virginia House district in the first congressional election, in 1789, to ensure the defeat of his rival, James Madison (other historians take issue with that claim). But the practice takes its name from Elbridge Gerry, Madison’s vice president.

When he was governor of Massachusetts in 1812, Mr. Gerry signed a bill allowing his party to draw State Senate districts that were meant to favor its candidates over the rival Federalists. One serpentine district looked to some like a salamander; a Boston editorial cartoonist drew it with a head and claws and labeled it the “gerry-mander.”

Some footnotes to that history: The new maps did not wind up thwarting the Federalists. Mr. Gerry may have been unfairly tarred; there is no clear evidence that he supported the maps his party drew.

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