The 30 | Statehood
Apologies for both the narrowness and length of this newsletter...
If you live outside the U.S. capital, you probably missed history a few days ago. Not to worry. I watched the entire hours-long hearing for you.
At 2:44 p.m. on June 26, members of the U.S. House of Representative (232 to 180) approved of making the District of Columbia the 51st state. This bill will never be discussed in the Senate.
Taxation without representation, a slogan older than our country, still applies to anyone who lives in the capital. The District pays more federal taxes per person than any state, but residents have zero input on the business conducted under the Capitol dome. A quick timeline >>>
pre-1800: Congress meets in eight different cities in four states until DC was established and built
1871: various cities and counties inside the District borders unify under a single government
1964: first time DC residents vote for president
1971: first time DC residents have any representation in the U.S. Congress* (except 1871-74)
Why the asterisk?
Try drawing $$$ on a Post-it note and hand that to the cashier at the ice cream shop. Turns out you don't have dessert. Eleanor Holmes Norton, the current DC delegate, has Post-its. She can't vote on final bills, including last week's legislation that would allow her, and me, and 705,000 neighbors to enjoy the full measure of citizenship ostensibly guaranteed by the Constitution.
“I recognize, of course, that there are no slaves living in the District of Columbia today," Norton said in 2019. "But there is not a single free and equal citizen living in the District of Columbia.”
Yes, this is a racial issue (in many ways).
A political compromise in 1820 admitted Missouri as a slave state with Maine as a counterpart free state. That bargain "set a precedent that states would be admitted in pairs to maintain sectional balance in the Senate."
So representation became an act of political tethering. That legacy has not entirely disappeared.
In 2018, a Democratic senator said that adding one star to the country's flag "does throw off the balance so you get concerns like, who do [Republicans] find, where they can get an offsetting addition to the states.”
Ouch. Shouldn't the only requirement for access to the foundational promises of democracy be a belief in that democracy?
Republican reasons for blocking DC statehood have varied from bizarre (not enough residents work in mining or logging!) to inaccurate (not enough people! ... factcheck: DC out-populates Wyoming and Vermont). Or just offensive.
But the most common justification: statehood requires a Constitutional amendment.
Nope. After our original baker's dozen, the other 37 states joined the republic by an act of Congress.
I'm guessing some of my friends would now remind me of our duty as journalists to avoid any political activities – particularly advocacy – that might compromise our credibility.
I see no dilemma in acting as a champion for the fundamental rights provided to every American under the Constitution. A free press is one. Representation is there, too.
"And then all that has divided us will merge."