May 22, 2007
Senate Judiciary Hearing on Voting Rights Tomorrow
After passing the House and getting a hearing in the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee last week, The D.C. Voting Rights Act moves to the Senate Judiciary Committee tomorrow. The committee has scheduled a full hearing on Wednesday called “Ending Taxation Without Representation: The Constitutionality of S.1257,” which will address, natch, the constitutionality of the bill. Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, is a supporter of the bill and will preside over the hearing.
Tomorrow's hearing is scheduled to begin at 1:30 p.m. in room 226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building – which means if you're willing to take a late lunch, you could be there to lend your support for the legislation that would grant a full voting member in the House to the District of Columbia, and an additional member for Utah. There's a long list of witnesses set to testify: Rep. Chris Cannon (R-UT), D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, Mark Shurtleff, Attorney General of the State of Utah, Richard Bress, an attorney at Latham & Watkins, John Elwood, Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel for DOJ, Charles J. Ogletree, Harvard Law School professor, Kenneth R. Thomas from Congressional Research Service, Jonathan Turley, George Washington University Law School professor, and Patricia Wald, a Former Chief Judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.
Sounds like a pretty long hearing. Once again, we'll do our best to post updates on the testimony tomorrow afternoon for those of you who can't make it to the hearing. Word is that the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee could take action in June on the D.C. Voting Rights Act, and hopefully we'll have more details on the Judiciary Committee's plans for the bill after tomorrow's hearing.
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where can we get the tshirt pictured in the article? I don't see it in the store for dcvote dcvote. any thoughts?
UA, I tried looking high and low for that t-shirt after DCist used it a couple of weeks ago for a DC voting story. Appears as if that shirt might have been one they gave out at a fundraiser/rally and never printed again. A shame, because it's a great shirt.
If anyone knows where we can get one, though, please send on the info.
Eventually, I'll stop being lazy and just make my own.
Oh yeah. That will get DC the vote. More T-shirts.
I'm sure your pessimism will put us over the top, Mike.
Aaron: Okay. Tell us how your fashion statement will help with the Senate vote.
Wow Mike, you're a prickly one. By "us", do you mean yourself? Or does it really bother so many DCist readers (I can see the outrage pouring over in this thread!) that I might make a t-shirt one weekend in support of voting rights?
And I'll admit - I never realized that the shirt was so fashionable. Now that I think about it, two or three people did wonder aimlessly on a message board about purchasing something related to a hot-button local issue; it must be another empty trend, right? Damn hipsters.
I suppose I'll just take your blunt, back-handed compliment to my good taste in clothing and move on.
Senate Republicans have objected to allowing the hearing to proceed!!!
Aaron: Move on is a good idea. Move on and contact people who have senators, and get those people to write or call their senators in support of the DC Vote bill. That works better than T-shirts.