[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 57 (Tuesday, April 8, 2014)]
[House]
[Page H2994]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton) for 5 minutes.
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, April 16 marks Emancipation Day in the 
District of Columbia, when the slaves who lived in the District of 
Columbia were emancipated.
  I come to the floor this week to discuss a different kind of 
emancipation. Today, I begin, as the Nation began, with taxes without 
representation. If I were to ask you who pays the highest taxes per 
capita in the United States of America, who would you say? What 
jurisdiction would you say? New York? Connecticut? Arizona? Texas?
  It would be the citizens of the Nation's Capital who support the 
Nation without representation in the Congress of the United States, the 
650,000 citizens of the Nation's Capital. That is why you see D.C. 
license plates that say, ``Taxation Without Representation.'' That was 
not the idea of the D.C. government. It was a citizen who came forward 
to suggest that this should be what was on our license plates.
  So, April 16--we in the District commemorate Emancipation Day every 
year because we have the distinction of being the first jurisdiction in 
the United States where the slaves were emancipated 9 months before 
they were emancipated elsewhere. The irony is, we are now the last 
jurisdiction where citizens of every background do not enjoy equal 
rights. All other Americans have at least one voting Representative and 
two Senators. District of Columbia citizens have no vote on this House 
floor and no Senators.
  All other Americans govern themselves without interference from the 
Congress. The District of Columbia must abide the nullification of 
local laws if the Congress sees fit. All other Americans enjoy total 
control of their own taxpayer funds. The District budget, approved by 
and raised by District officials, must be approved in this House and in 
the Senate by people who had nothing to do with raising those funds.
  All other Americans pass any constitutional local law they see fit. 
All local laws of the District of Columbia must lay over here in the 
House to see whether somebody wants to pop up and overturn them, even 
if they are constitutional.
  What is the difference between the people I represent and the people 
my colleagues represent? We do not have statehood rights, and that is 
what any citizen who pays taxes and serves in the armed services for 
the Nation deserves. We seek statehood, the only way to achieve what we 
have sought and still seek: budget autonomy, legislative autonomy, 
freedom from interference into our lives by the Congress of the United 
States.
  The Nation's first principle, the principle that gave rise to 
revolution, is taxation without representation. How would you feel if 
the highest per capita taxes were paid by your citizens and they didn't 
have the same rights as every other citizen?
  District residents pay almost $12,000 per capita; the lowest are 
paid, and I point them out only because they are the lowest, by 
Mississippi, and their taxes are the lowest. I don't go through all the 
States because there is not room. But what is your State? New York? 
$8,737 per person. Compare that to our almost $12,000 per D.C. 
resident, and New York is a large State. California ranks 10th, $8,162 
per capita compared to our $12,000 per capita, my friends, per citizen.
  In our country when England decided to impose taxation without 
representation, the colonies decided they would be colonies no more. 
They passed a resolution saying, ``No taxes ever have been or can be 
constitutionally imposed on them'' by their respective legislatures.
  Look at this graph; it speaks for itself, it speaks for the residents 
of the District of Columbia.

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