Photo by Erin Kelly.
A D.C. attorney and former ACLU official plans to file a lawsuit to keep the FBI headquarters in the city if Republican leaders in Congress do not sign on to a statehood bill.
In the suit, Johnny Barnes — who served as chief of staff to home rule advocate, Del. Walter Fauntroy — says the the Organic Act of 1801 has been violated since 1938, when federal agencies began moving their headquarters out of the District. The act made D.C. the seat of government and placed it under Congressional control, leaving residents without representation.
“By moving these federal headquarters agencies outside the District, the federal government
breached its compact with the residents of the District of Columbia,” Barnes writes in a draft of the lawsuit.
“The effect of the 1801 agreement was to take our rights away,” Barnes said by phone. The violation of the act began in 1938, when the National Institutes of Health moved to Bethesda and continued when the Pentagon was built in Arlington. Now the FBI plans to leave the District for Maryland or Virginia.
“Since then, we’ve been like willows in the wind, just letting it happen,” he said. “Well, we’re drawing the line with the FBI. We’re saying, ‘We’ve been upholding our part of the deal for more than 200 years, surrendering our rights. It’s time for you, Congress, to uphold your end of the deal.'”
To Barnes, that means Congress is left with two options: Mandate the FBI stay in D.C. or give the District statehood. Under this reasoning, Barnes said it can be argued that any federal headquarters outside D.C. should be returned.
“We’re tired about the talk of giving us rights,” he said. “We’re no longer willing to wait.”
When asked why the city hasn’t used this argument before, Barnes simply said he hopes officials will join him in the cause. “As a retired country lawyer, I shouldn’t have to bring this lawsuit,” Barnes said. “The city officials should be bringing this lawsuit, but they’re not.”
While this approach to statehood is untested, Barnes, who has been studying the issue for 40 years and has written extensively on it, said, “I really deeply and sincerely believe this lawsuit has legs. … This lawsuit is a credible lawsuit.”
The second count of the lawsuit alleges that the U.S. is in violation of international treaties that provide for self-determination, voting rights and full representation.
“Every country in the world does that,” Barnes said. “But they don’t do it in the United States where we try to impose democracy on other countries.”
“You could have been living in the compound of Osama bin Laden — could have been living right there with the man — but if you were American, you have the right to vote in our national elections,” Barnes added. “You could be in Russia right now, and if you’re an American, you can vote by absentee ballot in the United States. You could conspiring with ISIS, and if you’re an American, your right to vote is upheld.
“We pay taxes, like everybody else. More taxes than the citizens of any other state. We fight and die in wars. I was a combat engineer officer. Always say my job was to build bridges and blow them up. Back then, as a young person I preferred to blow bridges up. But today we’re trying to build a bridge to the Republicans and say, ‘Do the right thing. Give us our rights back. That’s all we want'”
Barnes will present his lawsuit Thursday to Speaker of the House John Boehner. “We’re good citizens,” he said, adding that if Boehner or another prominent D.C. Republican will co-sponsor the statehood bill “in good faith,” there’s no reason to bring the suit.
But if not, Barnes said he’s prepared to go to federal court. “Hopefully the court battle will be the spark that kindles the fire that gets this thing going.”
