Thanks.................PEACE............Scott
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Human Rights Advocacy Worldwide
The Honorable Nancy Pelosi
Office of the Majority Leader
Dear Speaker Pelosi:
As long-time DC statehood and equal voting rights activists, we write to respectfully request you reconsider your support for the D.C. House Voting Rights Act (H.R. 157), which would grant D.C. residents a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives.
We have serious reservations about its viability, both as congressional legislation and as a matter of political principle. We believe that it is unconstitutional and unworthy of D.C. residents. In light of over 200 years of disenfranchisement, we should not be expected to settle for anything less than equal rights. And the Democratic Party should never be seen supporting legislation that would grant anything less than equality to fellow Americans. In our opinion, an endorsement by the Party of that questionable proposition—one-third voting rights in Congress for U.S. citizens who bear the full responsibilities of citizenship—is anathema to the fine tradition of political and economic equality that the Democratic Party has long championed. The contradiction cannot be reconciled.
We maintain that the D.C. Voting Rights Act (the Act) is fatally flawed. We submit the legislation is constitutionally suspect, preservative of embarrassing international human rights violations that will not be remedied by the passage of the Act, politically corrosive to the general cause of achieving equal rights, and, as noted above, subversive of core Democratic principles that should never be sold short.
1) The D.C. Voting Rights Act will likely be deemed unconstitutional.
While the Constitution’s District clause is a preeminent metropolitan power over the nation’s capital, it is doubtful courts will interpret it to be a federal power to modify the architecture of Congress. For a withering analysis of the bill’s legal infirmities, we recommend Jonathan Turley’s George Washington Law Review article, Too Clever by Half: The Unconstitutionality of Partial Representation of the District of Columbia in Congress.[1] Moreover, the Congressional Research Service cautions the legislation is “likely unconstitutional.” Even the bill’s chief supporters concede the bill faces an uphill legal battle. The plain language of the constitution is difficult to overturn, especially without ample precedent.
www.world-rights.org
Should the Act pass, our elected representative is still unlikely to be seated.
While the House is the final arbiter of the qualifications of its members, a federal court may grant a preliminary injunction should it determine: 1) plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits, (2) they are likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary relief, (3) the balance of equities tips in their favor, and (4) the injunction is in the public interest. Plaintiffs seem likely to succeed on the merits. Irreparable harm would ensue if the new representatives were found unconstitutional, since it would question the validity of the laws they voted for. Defendants would suffer little harm by waiting until appeals were resolved. The public interest in maintaining the integrity of Congress could far outweigh a short delay.
2) The D.C. Voting Rights Act will fail to remedy existing human rights violations.
Should the Act became law, it would nevertheless fail to remedy the existing human rights violations taking place in the
Unlike the residents of the federal enclaves of
3) The D.C. Voting Rights Act is politically corrosive and is not a “steppingstone” to anywhere but political stalemate and the preservation of a single House vote, perhaps in perpetuity.
D.C. Delegate Norton and others maintain that the Act is a “steppingstone” to D.C. equal representation or eventually D.C. statehood. We couldn’t disagree more. Given the history of our struggle, we maintain that should the legislation pass and be upheld by the courts that it will be used by opponents of statehood and equal voting rights to fend off any further advancement toward that end. Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats will argue that the District is a city—not a state—and that it is therefore unreasonable to grant them anything more than House representation; they will contend that if the District seeks Senate representation it should do so through retrocession to the state of Maryland and not through D.C. statehood. In our opinion, the Act likely will be the first step toward retrocession, even though neither the District nor
4) The D.C. House Voting Rights Act is subversive of core democratic principles.
Representation that makes divisible rights conceived of as being indivisible under the U.S. Constitution sets a dangerous precedent because it undermines one of the most sacred of all legal principles: The right to equality before the law for all. That Democrats would endorse a bill that continues to deprive D.C. residents of the right to have a voice in treaty-making, the selection of cabinet officers and federal officials, Supreme Court justices, federal and D.C. judges who rule on every aspect of our lives, as well as the power to preside over impeachment proceedings and participate in cloture votes, is, in our opinion, incomprehensible. The integrity of our core democratic principles should remain intact. Equality is equality. D.C. residents should never be asked to settle for less.
And surely it is not too much to ask for. After enduring two hundred years of disenfranchisement, we should not be made to endure a token one-third vote in Congress, especially now that Democrats have come back—a change of circumstances that many thought impossible only a few years ago, and was used by proponents of this bill to justify it in a Congress dominated by Republicans. But now is not then. Democrats must not be seen legitimizing the questionable status of D.C. residents as one-third Americans for voting purposes any more than the U.S. Constitution should have ever defined male African-Americans as three-fifth citizens for voting purposes so many years long ago.
With Democrats at long last in charge, and with American’s first African-American president having won the White House, the time has come for the principle of political equality to return to the light of day—for us and for our posterity.
We therefore respectfully request that you withdraw your support for the D.C. House Voting Rights Act and stand with us—for us—for equal rights and equal representation in Congress.
Sincerely,
Mr. Timothy Cooper, Executive Director, Worldrights
Mr.
Rev. Graylan Hagler, Pastor,
Dr. Mark David-Richards, PhD, sociologist
Ms. Anise Jenkins, President, Stand Up for Democracy in
Mr. Malcolm Wiseman, Stand Up for Democracy in
Ms. Vanessa Dixon, Stand Up for Democracy in
[1] http://docs.law.gwu.edu/stdg/gwlr/issues/pdf/76_2_Turley.pdf
[2] On December 30, 2003, the Organization of American States’ (OAS) Inter-American Commission on Human Rights issued Report No. 98/03 in Case 11.204—Statehood Solidarity Committee v. United States. That report read in part: “The Commission hereby concludes that the State is responsible for violations of the Petitioners’ rights under Articles II and XX of the American Declaration by denying them an effective opportunity to participate in their federal legislature…” The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights recommended to the United States that it “[p]rovide the Petitioners with an effective remedy, which includes adopting the legislative or other measures necessary to guarantee to the Petitioners the effective right to participate, directly or through freely chosen representatives and in general conditions of equality, in their national legislature.” The full report may be found at:
https://www.cidh.oas.org/annualrep/2003eng/USA.11204.htm
Moreover, the Organization for Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), both the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODHIR) and the Parliamentary Assembly call “on the Congress of the United States to adopt such legislation as may be necessary to grant the residents of Washington, D.C. equal voting rights in their national legislature in accordance with its human dimension commitments.” The full text of the OSCE resolution and ODIHR report may be found at: www.world-rights.org
Timeline on 209 Years of the
1801 Congress passes the Organic Act of 1801. D.C. residents lose their national representation and local self-determination.
1846 Congress, the Virginia Legislature and the City of
1850 Congress ends the slave trade in D.C.
1862 Congress abolishes slavery in D.C. (nine months before the Emancipation Proclamation is issued) and establishes a school system for black residents.
1871 Congress creates the Territory of the District of Columbia with Senate confirmation of a Presidentially appointed Governor, upper house of the legislature, and Board of Public Works and a popularly elected 22 seat lower House of Delegates and nonvoting Delegate to the House of Representatives.
1874 Congress removes all elected officials, including the nonvoting Delegate in Congress, and temporarily replaces the territorial government with three Presidentially appointed commissioners.
1878 Congress passes a new Organic Act making the three commissioner form of government permanent.
1888 Conservative newspaperman Theodore Noyes of the Washington Star launches campaign for congressional representation and strongly opposes real democracy. Noyes writes, "National representation for the capital community is not in the slightest degree inconsistent with control of the capital by the nation through Congress." Sen. Henry Blair of
1899 A political scientist describes the Board of Trade—which supports a congressional vote only—as providing DC with the ideal form of local government through a "representative aristocracy."
1919 The Board of Trade and the Chamber of Commerce advocate congressional representation and oppose home rule. Labor unions urge elected officials.
1935 The
1940 Congress allows District residents the same access to federal courts as that available to residents of the states.
1943 Board of Trade appears before Senate Committee to support representation in Congress but opposes local self-government.
1960's Segregationist Rep. John McMillan favors a DC vote for president and vice president, says a struggle for home rule will cripple the national vote. McMillan thinks the national vote should "satisfy" DC residents "at least for a while."
1961 23rd Amendment to the Constitution that gives D.C. a vote in the electoral college is ratified.
1964 D.C. voters vote for the first time in U.S. Presidential Elections.
1968 Congress authorizes an elected school board and D.C. residents vote for school board for first time. This is their first vote for any local body since 1874 when the territorial government was dissolved.
1970 Congress passes a law authorizing a nonvoting delegate in House of Representatives for D.C. (the first since D.C. lost its nonvoting delegate in 1874).
1971 D.C. voters elect a nonvoting Delegate to House of Representatives.
1973 Congress passes the D.C. Home Rule Act providing for an elected Mayor, Council and Advisory Neighborhood Commissions and delegating certain powers to the new government, subject to Congressional oversight and veto.
1974 D.C. voters elect a Mayor and Council.
1978 Congress passes a Constitutional amendment to give D.C. full Congressional voting rights (two Senators and Representatives).
1979 An initiative to hold a Statehood Constitutional Convention is filed. Congress rejects the Council's bill on the location of chanceries.
1980 D.C. voters overwhelmingly approve initiative for Statehood Constitutional Convention.
1981 Voters elect delegates to the Statehood Constitutional Convention. Congress rejects the Council's revision to the D.C. sexual assault law.
1982 Voters approve a statehood constitution, including the election of Statehood Senators and a Representative to promote statehood (the latter not implemented until 1990).
1983 A petition for statehood, including the constitution ratified by the voters, is sent to Congress.
1985 The voting rights amendment dies after only 16 states ratify it.
1990 D.C. residents elect their first statehood senators and representative. The positions were first authorized in 1982 when the statehood constitution was approved.
1992 The House grants a limited vote in the Committee of the Whole to the D.C. Delegate.
1993 The House District Committee favorably reports a statehood bill out of committee; in first full House vote on statehood ever, statehood fails (153 to 277).
1995 The D.C. Delegate's vote in the House Committee of the Whole is revoked. Congress authorizes the President to appoint the first Control Board which replaces the elected school board with an appointed board. The law also create the Office of Chief Financial Officer for D.C.
1997 Congress strengthens the Control Board by giving it total control over D.C.'s courts, prisons and pension liabilities (much of that unfunded liabilities from the pre-Home Rule era), increased control over Medicaid and removes various D.C. agencies from under the Mayor's authority.
2001 The Control Board officially suspends its operations and transfers home rule authority back to the elected Mayor and Council (although upon certain conditions occurring, the Control Board can be reactivated in the future).
2003 The InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights issues a report finding that the United States Government violates District residents' rights by denying them participation in their federal legislature.
2006 The UN Human Rights Committee finds that D.C.’s lack of voting representation in Congress violated the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, a treaty ratified by more than 160 countries, including the
2009 Congress considers granting D.C. a vote in the House of Representatives; extraneous gun rights amendments threaten to kill the bill.
“It is time DC residents had statehood and the same rights as all Americans.”
—Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH)
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