Go Home Already: Shouts and Murmurs
Man Stops Traffic at 17th and K to Demand $200 Million
Compromise Uncertain on Same-Sex Marriage Law
Fire at 17th and L NW Forces Evacuations
Judge Throws Out WTU Suit Over Teacher Layoffs
After yesterday's announcement that House leaders were shelving legislation that would grant the District a single vote in Congress, the measure appeared to be all but dead. Activists and proponents of the legislation disagreed with that assessment, though, arguing that it wasn't the proposal that was at fault -- it was merely the timing. They'd get the legislation, which would also grant Utah an additional seat in the House (at least until the next Census), back on the floor soon enough.
But will they? The legislation has been floating around since 2006, when it was originally introduced by now retired Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.) and D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton as the perfect pragmatic compromise -- one seat for Democratic D.C., one for Republican Utah. Since then, activists and residents have hitched their wagons to the hope that the bill -- though only a small step toward full representation -- would get the District further in the fight than it had ever been. Opponents, led by the Statehood Green Party, derisively noted that the legislation would grant nothing more than "Taxation with One-Third Representation."
Three years and various setbacks later, District residents find themselves with a bill that has been repeatedly hijacked by various members of Congress and loaded with amendments that would grant a voting seat at the expense of home rule, most especially on a significant public safety issue -- guns. Frustration isn't in short supply, and patience with Congress has all but evaporated.
Worse yet, the deadline underpinning the legislation's grand compromise is fast approaching. The 2010 Census and congressional reapportionment will grant Utah the additional seat they would have gotten through the voting rights legislation, thus denying the District the main point of leverage they may have had over Republicans.
There are still six months left in 2009 to work on the measure, but considering the raft of other issues Congress faces and the fact that much of the summer is spent in recess, time isn't something this bill has a lot of. In a Post article on the recent defeat, Council member Jack Evans (D-Ward 2) all but admitted that the legislation wouldn't have a second shot this year. "Now people are going to move onto other things," he said.
And not just on the Hill. Local activists -- especially those who have long pushed for statehood -- are likely to use the legislation's defeat as evidence that a step-by-step approach to voting rights just can't work. In the same Post article, Council member Michael A. Brown (I-At Large), chair of the council's new Special Committee on Statehood and Self-Determination, argued that new options will have to be considered. "We have to put everything back on the table," he stated.
What that means and how long it will take is of course the remaining unanswered question. Nothing in D.C. voting rights happens quickly, and short of a miracle (or presidential intervention) we're once again looking at months of debate over direction, strategy and tactics.
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
tweet this
post to facebook
Gotta love the statehood green party: "We have failed spectacularly in our quest for statehood, so continue to refuse to accept anything but statehood."
The gun amendment will be attached to something else and it will pass. I've been opposed to the gun amendment but am so ticked off at the way DC chuckleheads have handled this, I am now thinking "go for it."
"Nothing in D.C. voting rights happens quickly"
Correction, nothing in DC voting rights happens at all!!!
Let's remember that the Greens are the same principled folks who handed the election to Dubya on a platter in '00, arguing there was no substantive difference between Democrats and Republicans.
Clearly you haven't read about the thousands of names that were removed from Florida's voter registry before the 2000 election. People that still blame the Green Party for Florida need to read up on their history.
Let's create a second federal capital out of eastern Idaho and western Wyoming, and admit both capitals as states to preserve party balance.
Oh, and there should be a voting rights mascot that gives candy to children on election day. Something like Emma the Enfranchisement Emu.
Hmm, this reminds me quite a bit of a BBC miniseries I watched last year, The Amazing Mrs. Pritchard. Grocery store manager gets fed up with politics, runs for MP, somehow forms a national party in a few weeks, wins and becomes PM. She had the idea to move government from Westminster to Bradford, the British equivalent of Idaho, I suppose.
The bill will never pass as long as republicans are alive. That's just the truth.
Now, if all members of congress were required to live (rent or buy) within the district during their terms of service, the situation might change.
I don't understand why the obvious solution (to me) is rejected out-of-hand. Why can't the residential portions of DC be ceded back to Maryland? Then we'd be a large city within a state; we'd have two Senators and a Representative; presumably MD would get an additional rep; and we all wouldn't have to serve on jury duty every two years like clockwork (i.e. a CITY wouldn't have to recreate government services that a STATE normally provides: courts, DMV, etc.) After all, the Virginia portions elected to go back in short order once they realized they didn't have elected representatives.
Maryland doesn't want it. It would upset the balance of political power in that state. Baltimore would have to share their metro big-dog glory, and eastern shore folks would feel even more disenfranchised.
I think we should take stronger action than the step-by-step process. I'll take it if it's all I can get, but as long as we pay federal taxes, send soldiers to war and have opinions and needs, we should be normally, 100% represented in the government (Two senators and a proportional house representation). I know a constitutional amendments failed in the past, but that's what we really need.
and to IHeartDC:
DC isn't Maryland, and I'm not sure that solution is any simpler than any of the other ones (see NewHCE's comment). Retroceding into Maryland would provide representatives, but Wyoming (a state with fewer citizens than DC) runs a government and has two senators and proportional representation, so I don't think size is relevant. Besides, we have our own culture, social and political, joining Maryland would diminish our personality and that's sort of why we have a bicameral legislature - proportional representation to give bigger states more pull and equal representation to give small states some pull.
promoteourvote.wordpress.com
Seems like there won't be any voting rights until the city comes up with a less laughable gun registration scheme than the one that was recently put in place. Until the city shows some movement on that issue, there's no reason to expect the House to get enough Dems to go along with the vote.