When the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled against the legislative district lines proposed by the Legislative Reapportionment Commission last month, it was unexpected news. To many, however, it was welcome news.

The court ruled that the legislative districts redrawn by Republicans in Harrisburg are “contrary to law.”

However, the court did not offer details about what changes would be needed for the redrawn district lines to pass muster. And to make matters more confusing, almost immediately after the ruling, most of the justices took off for a professional association meeting in Puerto Rico.

By rejecting the redrawn lines, the state’s highest court has focused attention on one of the least-understood and most-abused aspects of democracy in the United States.

Every 10 years, following the national census, federal and state laws require that legislative districts be redrawn to reflect population shifts and to ensure that ratios of lawmakers to citizens remain essentially equal. But for more than a century, lawmakers have abused the system to create so-called safe districts, in which one party or the other continues to hold power by virtue of lopsided party registration or voting patterns.

Redistricting abuse, also known as gerrymandering, runs contrary to voters choosing their elected officials. With gerrymandering, politicians choose their voters.

Tim Potts, co-founder of Democracy Rising PA, said of the plan’s rejection by the high court: “This gives Pennsylvania a chance to have legislative districts that are designed with citizens in mind rather than partisan political leadership.”

Further guidance from the court will be necessary for the Legislative Reapportionment Commission to redraw the districts in a way that the court will approve. Most observers speculate that the primary objection of the court was the higher-than-usual number of municipalities divided into different districts.

Under the plan, Butler County would be carved into seven different legislative districts.

The court’s decision is creating a crisis for the upcoming primary election, by introducing uncertainty over which districts will remain as drawn and which will change. In some cases, it is not known whether some people seeking a seat in the Legislature will be able to do so because they might not live in the district they intend to represent, depending on how some lines are eventually redrawn.

But beyond the downside of the court-created crisis for the next election, the rejection of the redistricting plan is positive in suggesting that the court finally sees a problem with gerrymandering.

The best solution would be a constitutional convention or constitutional amendment to take redistricting out of the hands of politicians and have the work done by a nonpartisan commission. A handful of other states already have done this.

The most recent shift away from lawmakers redrawing lines is in California. There, voters fed up with noncompetitive districts passed a referendum creating a 14-member Citizens Redistricting Commission. The redistricting plan proposed by the commission created a map that is not based primarily on incumbent protection.

Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court created problems by the timing of its ruling and by not providing more details with its rejection of the proposed redistricting plan. But over the longer term, the court will have done Pennsylvanians a favor by making sure that the new district lines based on the 2010 census are fairer.

If the court decision leads to removal of redistricting from the partisan state Legislature and places it under the control of a nonpartisan commission, it could lead to more competitive legislative races, less incumbent protection, more accountability, less partisanship — and better democracy.