March 24, 2006
U.S. to D.C.: No Statehood For You
There hasn't been much activity on the Post's local politics blog, D.C. Wire, this week, but today we're getting some bad news for the hopes of many a voting rights activist.
In a post titled "D.C. Statehood: Popular as Dirt," Metro reporter Lori Montgomery writes that a recent Post poll of 1,011 adults nationwide found that 58 percent opposed statehood for the District, 22 percent supported it, and 20 percent were undecided. More than that, the poll found that young Democrats living in the Northeast or along the West coast are more likely to support statehood than older Republicans living in the Midwest.
We asked Kevin Kiger, communications director for D.C. Vote, for a response. He wasn't as pessimistic as we would have thought, citing another poll indicating that the more people know about the denial of voting rights for District residents, the more likely they are to support them:
The results are not surprising given what past polls have shown about the general public’s support for statehood. If – as we know from polling – most Americans don’t understand D.C.’s denial of congressional representation, it stands to reason that statehood would be more misunderstood.Kiger noted that a January 2005 nationwide poll found that 82 percent of Americans support full voting representation for the District, while 71 percent support full budgetary autonomy for the city. But more importantly, roughly 80 percent of Americans expressed some level of ignorance towards the District's second-class status, and were more likely to support voting rights when made aware of it.
Of course, statehood is a bigger issue, so Americans may be slower to come around to the idea. But as Kiger notes, the key is education -- the more people know about the District's historic injustice, the more likely it is that they will support changing it.
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My own anecdotal poll of relations in Texas reveals that people are fundamentally opposed to the notion of having 51 states, independent of the claim at hand. Seriously. It's aesthetic—people don't want to give up the nice, round number.
(well, relations in Texas don't, anyhow)
Thanks for picking this up. I think that for pragmatic reasons our elected officials cannot press this issue as strongly as necessary. They do, after all, need to maintain good very working relations with the Federal Government and MD and VA, especially, in order to get what yearly Federal hand-out they can.
If we want change, if we want some modest level of self-determination, we will need a grass-roots campaign dedicated to letting the broader US population know that, while we pay taxes, die in wars, etc, we have no voice in our government.
Just out of curiosity, has this been fully challenged in the courts? If so, can you give a link to some of the cases (or even a citation)
"Of course, statehood is a bigger issue, so Americans may be slower to come around to the idea. But as Kiger notes, the key is education -- the more people know about the District's historic injustice, the more likely it is that they will support changing it."
It's not that people can't wrap their head around the statehood issue, it's that they don't want to give 500k people two senators. That poll shows that even Democrats are against statehood, that does not bode well. You can point to Wyoming all you want, but giving Wyoming statehood isn't the issue right now. And besides, "fairness" has never been a huge factor in who gets to be a state or not.
You can keep trying to conflate representation and statehood, but all that does is guarantee that we won't get anything except a perpetual victim-complex, which is something we have way too much of as it is.
Jonny - I think that since the US Constitution sets aside a special place for the District, the courts can't rule in favor of DC's situation against "the seat of government" on strict Constitutional grounds. Section 8.
http://www.archives.gov/national-archives-experience/charters/constitution_transcript.html
Well, I'm against bass boats and "blood sports," but my opinion doesn't mean dick to anyone outside of my comfortable little east/west coast urban archipelago. It's a little surprising that more people out there aren't mindful of the local component, i.e. that people who have nothing whatsoever to do with the federal government live and work in DC.
The courts rout has basically come up short as the Supreme Court itself has ruled that the constitution does not give us any representation.
http://www.dcvote.org/trellis/section.cfm?trellisID=11
As Kevin at DC Vote points out the question the Post used is never going to get good numbers for statehood but the fact remains that a vast majority of the country do support us having equal representation.
I live in DC and I don't support statehood. We're too small for two Senators. I do support voting rights and there are a lot of ways to get them without Statehood. The 51 states thing is bigger than you might think. Maybe we can reunite Virginia and West Virginia. If East Germany and West Germany could do it, so could they.
VC, has a point (albeit unrealistic) about VA and WVA. WVA was created to give the Republicans more members in Congress during the Civil War (I believe the WVA statehood movement started in 1861). The extra senators helped keep Radicial Republicans in power after the Civil War so that they could enact their reconstruction policies (although hinedered by Johnson). Although I think it would be great to just join the two states together again, the idea is little more than a pipe dream (like DC statehood). Senator Byrd and other WVA pols will have none of that and, I believe, the Constitution clearly implies you must have the state's consent to abolish it.
I always think about the reality of the situation if DC ever received statehood. The sad fact is that DC, for many reasons, will never be able to sustain itself without help from the federal government. The lack of taxable land and the burden of servicing the feds in various ways are the two that come to mind. I really wish statehood advocates would at least think about pushing for the more realistic movement of joining MD or VA.
I think that DC could support itself, or at least provide decent service levels to non-federal property, if we had the congressional AND senatorial muscle to elbow our way to the bargaining table with MD and VA and demand tax reciprocity. It's no secrete that both neighboring states rely *hugely* on taxes generated in the metro area, a large portion of which are generated in DC itself. That would help, as might reconfiguring property or other taxes. I also think that if we had the ability to and the responsibility for providing for ourselves (without our annual federal hand-out) our citizens and politicians would have to step up and perform.
This is a (crack)pipe-dream. There are perfectly good reasons why the District is separate and special, and just because people don't like them, doesn't mean they aren't compelling.
What annoys is the license plate. The phrase "no taxation without representation" has an historical meaning, which is why it was chosen, but that meaning is different from the DC case and doesn't apply here. The key from the pre-revolutionary war period is that taxes were not being applied equally to all, i.e. the colonists were being required to pay special taxes that did not apply to people in England who WERE represented by the British parliament which passed the taxes. That is not the case here. Federal taxes apply to us exactly the same as to anyone else in the country.
The real problem is that our local taxes are absurdly high. We pay the highest per child cost in the country for education, yet are in last place in achievement. More than $13,000 per child, and how many people won't use the local schools but have to pay again for their children's schools. Why not give each parent a voucher for $10,000 for each school-age child, close all the public schools (implemented in stages over say four years), and sit back and watch the budget situation and the quality of education improve dramatically.
Let's face it: What good has representation done us lately should be the real question?
If none of the above is even comprehensible if not compelling, and instead you want a conspiracy-laden, bare-knuckled reason why this is a hopeless quest, then take a close look at who we elect as our leaders and say no more. It's not that no majority of states is going to vote to give 500K people (us) two senators, but more importantly no majority of states is going to vote to give us two far-left Democratic senators in perpetuity. Many people understand that the local government is a jobs program for the District's overwhelmingly African-American poor, a program that is intended to prevent the repetition of race riots that so badly damaged the city almost forty years ago. It's like asking why there are more police patrols in wealthy neighborhoods: because that's where the tax payers who keep the money rolling in live.
So, everyone outside the district nods their head and says how "surprised" they are to learn the "truth" about our "situation" when the pollsters ask, and then they opine as to how "unfair" that seems to be. Then, as they walk away, they chuckle to themselves at how silly some people can be.
Freddy, you've been spending too much time drinking Heritage Foundation kool-aid.
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What I'd be quite happy to see is the secession of Arlington/Alexandria from the Commonwealth, and unification with the District. Arlington/Alexandria can bring basic constitutional rights to the table, and the District can give Arlington/Alexandria the warm feeling that will come from never having to deal with those idiots in Richmond again.
SJ you place way too much value on Arlingtonians and Alexandrians frustration with Richmond. I'm sure that's present, but it sure as hell ain't worth the thousands of dollars increase in income taxes that would accompany a reapportionment to the District. Nor would they be particularly excited about incorporating their relatively superior public school systems into DC's illiteracy factory.
They may have a beef with Richmond, but I'm sure they don't want to be dragged into DC's problems just to avoid them.
I think DC should have voting representation-- give it back to Maryland. Problem solved.