D.C.’s delegate to Congress today introduced a bill to make the district the country’s 51st state: New Columbia.
Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton’s (D-D.C.) bill would create a state from the District’s eight hometown wards, but without jurisdiction over federal buildings and territory in Washington, D.C.
The state of New Columbia would have two senators, and, initially, one member of the House.
Norton’s New Columbia Admission Act got 28 Democratic co-sponsors, but never made it out of committee. The companion Senate bill was introduced by newly retired Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.). and co-sponsored by Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), and Patty Murray (D-Wash.), but likewise didn’t gain traction.
Norton is now “working with her Senate allies” to get help on the bill’s latest incarnation. The bill goes all the way back to the 103rd Congress, when it was the first bill introduced by a newly elected Norton.
In 1993, she got the first and only vote on statehood for the District of Columbia, with 60 percent of Democrats and one Republican voting for the bill in the House, and a hearing on the New Columbia Admission Act in the Senate.
“The residents of our nation’s capital are and always have been citizens of the United States. Yet they are the only taxpaying Americans who are not treated as full and equal citizens. The only way for them to obtain the citizenship rights they are entitled to is through the same statehood used by other Americans,” Norton said on the House floor today.
“The final analysis is that we have no alternative. To be content with less than statehood is to concede the equality of citizenship that is the birthright of our residents as citizens of the United States. It is too late for the residents of the District of Columbia to make such a concession as we approach the 212th year in our fight for equal treatment in our country,” she said.
Opposition to D.C. statehood was added to the GOP platform at the Republican National Convention. The admission of New Columbia would almost ensure two new Democrats in the upper chamber and one in the lower chamber with full voting rights.
The bill’s co-sponsors are Rep.s Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.), Madeline Bordallo (D-Guam), Donna Christensen (D-Virgin Islands), William Lacy Clay (D-Mo.), Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), John Conyers (D-Mich.), Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), Eni Faleomavaega (D-American Samoa), Sam Farr (D-Calif.), Michael Honda (D-Calif.), Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), Grace Napolitano (D-Calif.), Jared Polis (D-Colo.), Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.), and Bobby Rush (D-Ill.).
Don’t you mean 58th state?
No, the 59th. Obama’s full quote was to the effect that he had, “visited 57 states so far and have one more to go.”
“Yet they are the only taxpaying Americans who are not treated as full and equal citizens”
Tell that to Hobby Lobby, and the guys prosecuted by D.C. for the same possession with no intent crime that Dick Gregory skated on.
And as the unequal treatment under D.C. city laws shows (for as has been rightly said here on this site, if it had been Limbaugh or Hannity vice Gregory, the D.C. DA would be “reluctantly” pressing charges even as we speak), we simply cannot have a completely independent government in the national capital.
There is zero repeat zero philosophical reason why D.C. can’t be folded into Maryland for Congressional representation purposes only, and I support this, as there is a geographic and cultural affinity between the two. But pushing for a city of 600,000** to have representation as a state in Congress, when so many of that city are dependent upon the Federal government for livelihood, is offensive; and when it is to be used to label us who oppose as racists–as it will be, by design–it will be one more sign that we might need a national no-fault*** divorce, for irreconcilable differences.
**My home county has 800,000 folks in it, is diverse, and I think I would make a great Senator. Can we be a state too?
***Oh, there’s fault, alright. But why quibble?
A reasonable suggestion!
Either give Virginia and Maryland back the land they donated for the District of Columbia or leave it the way its been since 1790 – controlled (ruled) by congress. This is how the constitution set up our nation’s capital. This push for statehood for DC is nothing more than an attempt by democrats to increase their majority in the senate by two. For the residents of DC who feels they are not properly represented I suggest they move to one of the surrounding states. The ‘lack of representation’ argument is bull-crap.
Virginia already got the land back in 1847. We don’t want any more DC residents in our part of the metro area.
I’m against it. Not until Moosylvania is granted full state rights.
The city of DC needs to go back to Maryland.
Why isn’t Puerto Rico a state? Or Guam? Or Cuba? Or Baja Mexico? Or Quebec? Or Nicaragua? Or West Berlin? Or Iraq?
Oh wait, those are all places that the US held all or parts of since 1790, and have either gone back to self-government or are in some sort of US trust.
None of these places are mentioned in the constitution. DC is.
Maybe DC would like to try some self-government? We could just move whatever is necessary across the river to Virginia, and they can keep some empty office buildings.
DC51 hasn’t got a chance as long as the republicans hold on to one house of congress. The DC electorate are addicted to free stuff, and that translates into two guaranteed now-and-forever democrat senators. What republican will vote for that? And the upside to their constituents back home is…nothing. Oh, and by the way, Maryland doesn’t want DC. Georgetown, maybe. But Kenilworth? Barry Farm? Sorry, we already have Baltimore, thank you very much.
Oh Goody. Between that, Statehood for Puerto Rico and amnesty for 11 million people who believe in the Big Man theroy of government and we’re guaranteed to turn into Venezuela. I can’t wait!
Lifted from AoS:
“How Washington managed this transformation, however, is not a story that the rest of the country might want to hear, because we largely financed it. As the size of the federal budget has ballooned over the past decade, more and more of that money has remained in the District. “We get about 15 cents of every procurement dollar spent by the federal government,” says Stephen Fuller, a professor of public policy at George Mason University and an expert on the region. “There’s great dependence there.” And with dependence comes fragility. About 40 percent of the regional economy, Fuller says, relies on federal spending.”
I refuse to make a state out of a city that gets 15 cents out if every dollar. What do you think their Senator will *always* be foting for?
…to move to a state.
Nobody is forced to live in D.C. Even the President has the option of resigning and going back to the provinces.
Come to think of it, that makes the most sense of all.
The denizens of DC have WAY too much power already.
And their votes will be for bigger and bigger government.