The District of Columbia may soon be able to be represented among the statues representing all states in the union inside the halls of the Capitol.
Rep. Dan Lungren (R-Calif.), chairman of the Committee on House Administration, introduced a bill yesterday joining forces with Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) to have D.C.’s Frederick Douglass statue moved into the Capitol’s Emancipation Hall.
The statue, which has been on display at One Judiciary Square, would represent the District while honoring a great American civil rights hero, Norton said.
“I am grateful to Chairman Lungren for proposing this bill,” she said. “…Having a statue to represent the District in the Capitol has been one of my longstanding priorities, and I am pleased to be an original co-sponsor of legislation designed to make that priority a reality.”
The bill is similar to a resolution introduced in June by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), chairman of the Committee on Rules and Administration.
“With the chairmen of both the House and Senate committees with jurisdiction over the Capitol building supporting this measure, I believe we have a good chance of making this happen during this session of Congress,” Norton said.
Why not Marion Berry doing a line of coke? Not as dignified, but more in keeping with the spirit of the District.
And what criminal politician from your state would you like?
Aspiration is worthwhile. More Douglas than Barry, that’s what the statue is for.
Don’t be an ass. Mr. Douglas is a genuine hero, who rose far above the lot in live he was given. I’m not politically correct by any stretch of imagination, but you sir, are a a cad.
Wasn’t douglas a slave owner?
Only in the sense that his friends bought his freedom, when his owner/father caused him (a runaway) legal trouble, so he eventually owned himself.
Wasn’t douglas a slave owner?
No.
I am glad Representative Norton has such a signal success on one of her “longstanding priorities” to anticipate.
She might instead have turned her attention to fixing her district’s notoriously failing school system, improving her district’s notoriously failing municipal services, maintaining her district’s notoriously failing infrastructure, or addressing her district’s notoriously failing civic culture.
But none of that would not result in a statue in the Capitol.
And people wonder why so many oppose amending the Constitution to give the DC Representative full voting power in the House.
Douglass was a great man, and a great American. (Recent Hollywood mentions him in films like “Glory” 1989, but does not get his due.)
And a great Republican.
Douglass was prominently used to attack Lincoln by that other Douglas, Stephen (who never used anything but the N-word) and his fellow Democrats. The depth of racism of the Democrats of that era cannot be underestimated.
Otto – Douglass was the child of a slave and a white man. He ran away from his owner as young man. After escaping to the north, he began speaking in public about the evils of slavery and in favor of abolition. He never owned slaves. He did raise a regiment of black soldiers to fight for the Union during the Civil War. He was a great man.
Surprised that people aren’t more familiar with Douglass. Here’s one of his more famous speeches: http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=162
Douglass is a conservative hero. His pictures are up all over the place at Hillsdale College.
Thank God we don’t have any major problems like unemployment, Huge Deficits or a Humongous Debt. It gives our representatives a chance to work on important stuff like location of statues, obesity problems etc. etc. How did we wind up with this bunch of Morons in Washington DC? Oh wait, It is that bunch of morons that keep voting them into power. Sheesh.
We can solve the problem of the deficit, and eventually the debt, by reducing the federal government functions to those given it by the constitution. That would eliminate most of the departments of Agriculture, Education, Labor, Energy, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services.
It is interesting that the federal government can take even the taxing power and lose money on it. They justified Social Security with the taxing power, and now the SS administration is out of money. They also justify the Obamacare law with the taxing power, and it will never come close to breaking even. They have a 200 year head start on Fed Ex and can’t compete. What does that say?
Better to restrict the government to the essential duty of being ready and able to kill people and break things.
Douglass’ life was heroic; the narrtive of his life is one of the best written and most thoughtful autobiographies ever written. The description of how we define ourselves is as important a theme as the second one, the evils of slavery. Daniel Walker Howe, in Making the American Self, compares Lincoln & Douglass’s path to self-consciousness and maturity – both as remarkable examples of the way the nineteenth century looked at personal responsibility. Douglass’s most requested lecture was “The Self-Made Man.” He is certainly a model that many in Washington, D.C. could use – as could the rest of us. Each of us might identify in a different way (no one reading is likely to identify as a slave, but all of us can identify as people struggling to define who we are).
Second point: Not only didn’t Douglass own slaves, he was an extremely effective advocate of abolition, Irish emancipation, and women’s rights. His descendents today run an anti-slavery society, attempting to end slavery in the many places it still exists.
Two great Douglass quotes:
“I am a Republican, a black, dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress”
and
“I recognize the Republican party as the anchor of the colored man’s political hopes and the ark of his safety”
I’m sure that one of those quotes will adorn the plaque on the statue. NOT!
But I suspect this is what Dan is thinking of, Douglass the Republican.