“DC and Utah Lose Bids for House Seats”

Source:  Breitbart – 9/18/2007

Thoughts:  If you have ever been to Washington, DC I’m sure you have seen the “Taxation Without Representation” license plates on the cars.  The complaint is that the city does not have a voice in Congress that is capable of casting a valid vote on the issues.  Where the problem generates from is the fact that the city is only a Federal District.  Like territories, a Federal District does not have some of the rights reserved for the states under the Constitution, which includes representation in the Congress.  If this bill was passed, I do not believe it would hold up in the Supreme Court, since it would require an Amendment and ratification by the states. 

The easy answer to all of this is that the residents of Washington, DC are there at their own free will.  Just as US Citizens living in territories have to pay taxes without Congressional representation, so do those living in the District.  If Congressional representation is that important to an individual, they are capable of relocating a few miles into Maryland or Virginia to obtain representation while maintaining their jobs in the District.  If that does not interest those living in DC, another option would be for the Federal government to retrocede portions of the District back to Maryland, much as it did with Arlington to Virginia.  I find that to be unlikely however.

Article:  “DC and Utah Lose Bids for House Seats”

WASHINGTON (AP) – A bill that would have given District of Columbia residents their first-ever member of Congress died in the Senate on Tuesday, dashing hopes of finally gaining full voting rights after a 206-year wait.

(Article continues.)

Senators voted 57-42, just three votes short of the 60 needed to move the measure forward. The bill would have created two new House seats: One for the city of about 600,000 people and one for Utah, which narrowly missed out on a fourth seat after the last census.

The procedural vote effectively killed the best chance in decades to win the District a full-fledged House member. The city has been denied voting rights in Congress since 1801, making it the only major capital city in the world where citizens are denied a vote in the nation’s representative body of government.

Advocates had hoped to resolve what they call a “national disgrace” and the most important civil rights issue of the era.

 

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