[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 144 (Tuesday, September 10, 2019)]
[House]
[Pages H7592-H7594]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         SUPPORT D.C. STATEHOOD

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2019, the Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from the District 
of Columbia (Ms. Norton) for 30 minutes.
  Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, I come to the floor this afternoon because 
of the importance of a coming date. It will be known as a historic date 
in the Congress of the United States, Thursday, September 19, which is 
the day that, prerequisite to coming to the floor, the Committee on 
Oversight and Reform will hold the first hearing on D.C. statehood, 
H.R. 51, in 26 years. That will be a historic hearing.
  This is not an informational hearing to let us know about statehood. 
It is a jurisdictional hearing, the prerequisite to going to the House 
floor.
  The residents of the District of Columbia, who are number one--mark 
that fact--number one in taxes paid to support the Government of the 
United States, do not have full rights, the same rights, as other 
Americans.
  Yes, I can come to the House floor to speak any time I want to, and 
yes, with Democrats in power, I have reclaimed the Committee of the 
Whole vote, which means that when the committee is gathered here in the 
House voting on at least some matters, I get to vote. But, Madam 
Speaker, on final votes, I cannot vote, even though, as you have heard, 
the people I represent contribute more Federal taxes than any people in 
the United States, more per capita than New York and California and 
Florida. You name the State, you will be talking about a State where, 
per capita, its residents contribute less to support the very 
government that is ours and theirs than the people of the District of 
Columbia.
  So, yes, I have introduced the D.C. statehood bill.
  Let me predict right now that that bill will pass. It has virtually 
enough cosponsors to pass. Most bills come to this House floor without 
many cosponsors, and yet we know they will pass. Well, when you have 
almost enough cosponsors to pass the bill, Madam Speaker, I say to my 
good friends who are not on the bill, this is the time to get on the 
bill so that they will be part of history. I do believe this bill will, 
in fact, pass the House of Representatives.
  There has already been a forecast that that will happen. That 
forecast was in H.R. 1, which has already passed the House. Every 
Democratic Member voted for H.R. 1.
  H.R. 1 contains findings for D.C. statehood. It found that District 
residents pay the highest taxes per capita, that residents of your 
Nation's Capital have fulfilled all the obligations of statehood, 
fighting in all of the Nation's wars, including the war that gave rise 
to the United States of America itself.
  It found that there were no historical, constitutional, financial, or 
economic reasons why the 700,000 residents of your Nation's Capital 
should not become part of a state.
  These are findings in H.R. 1 that every Democrat has already voted 
for. These were findings for statehood for the District of Columbia.
  It found that the District is in one of the strongest fiscal 
positions in the United States: a $14.6 billion budget, a surplus of 
$2.8 billion, total personal income higher than that of seven States, 
per capita personal consumption expenditures higher than those of any 
State, and total personal consumption expenditures greater than those 
of seven States.
  We are not talking about an entity not worthy of statehood. The 
qualifications are clear, and there are qualifications to become a 
state.
  How do you become a state? You get voted a state by a majority vote 
in this House. It is hard to become a state, but those qualifications 
have been met.
  Let us compare the District of Columbia to States that are already 
States. Let's take two States of the Union, Vermont and Wyoming. I 
begrudge them nothing, except to say

[[Page H7593]]

they have voting Members of the House and the Senate, yet they don't 
have as many residents as the District of Columbia. This graph goes 
only to 600,000. Now, we are at 700,000 D.C. residents.
  Moreover, it should be said that there are seven States in the Union 
about the same size, less than a million voters, yet they have two 
Senators and a voting Member of the House.
  There just is no reason to deny that same right to the residents of 
your Nation's Capital.
  The authorities that indicate that our bill is constitutional are the 
ones we always look to, to find out whether a bill is constitutional. 
Congressional Research Service has found that H.R. 51 is 
constitutional. The American Civil Liberties Union, the foremost 
authority on constitutional rights, has done a study and has found that 
H.R. 51 is constitutional. Importantly, Viet Dinh, a conservative legal 
scholar who served as the highest ranking Justice Department official 
in the George W. Bush administration, because he was Assistant Attorney 
General for Legal Policy, Viet Dinh has done a study and found that 
H.R. 51 is constitutional.
  Do note that 51, that has real meaning, because the District would 
become the 51st state.
  The findings mean that this House has already voted for H.R. 51 
because it has voted for all the findings that are necessary for the 
District to become a state.
  There is a Senate version of H.R. 1, but the Senate version doesn't 
have all the many propositions that H.R. 1 has.
  H.R. 1, yes, has findings saying essentially that the District should 
be the 51st state, but H.R. 1 has a lot of other things in it. H.R. 1 
says that to enhance democracy--and that is what it is, it is an 
omnibus democracy-enhancing bill. That is why our findings for D.C. 
statehood are in that bill, but it has things in it, like it wants 
paper ballots to protect the infrastructure, which sometimes goes down 
if there is, for example, a cyberattack; it has donor disclosure 
requirements; expanding early voting; no gerrymandering; the President 
and Vice President would have to disclose their tax returns.

                              {time}  1645

  Those are seen as democracy enhancing, and I fully endorse them. But 
compare that to the findings endorsing statehood, which would mean that 
700,000 American citizens would have the same rights as every other 
citizen, and you will see why H.R. 1 is very important to the District 
of Columbia and why we predict that H.R. 51, the D.C. statehood bill, 
will pass the Congress, the House of Representatives.
  I do want to stress the full qualifications, and one of the most 
important is service in the Armed Forces. Not only do the residents of 
the District of Columbia pay the highest taxes per capita in the United 
States--Federal taxes--but the residents of the Nation's Capital have 
served in every war, including the war that gave rise to the Nation 
itself.
  This is a particularly poignant poster because it shows the major 
wars, the World War wars. And notice what the losses have been of 
residents of the Nation's Capital who fought and died for their country 
without the same rights as others in their country:
  World War I, 635 casualties from the District, more than from three 
States;
  The Korean war, more casualties than from eight States;
  World War II, more casualties than from four States;
  And, of course, Vietnam, more casualties than from 10 States.
  The casualties of war perhaps speak loudest to our struggle for 
equality. There is a war memorial, the only war memorial on The Mall, 
and it is there because the District lost so many men, and it didn't 
have home rule at all.
  What is home rule? Home rule is simply a government with a 
legislature and an executive.
  The District was ruled from this place, from the Capitol. So to 
commemorate our war dead after World War I, the Congress placed a 
pristine, beautiful monument, the only monument to a single 
jurisdiction you will find on The Mall.
  People sometimes go there to get married. They go there because it is 
beautiful and not terribly elaborate.
  It is called the D.C. War Memorial. There are 400 or so names of men 
and women who died in World War I actually carved out in that memorial. 
That is why our service in the armed services is so important to bring 
before the House today.
  There is something that I think the average person also doesn't know. 
This was a segregated city, and Congress did not allow it to denounce 
and get rid of racial segregation. Buses and streetcars weren't 
segregated, but public accommodations were segregated.
  And yet, during the very years of segregation, we have some very 
distinguished members of the Armed Forces who were African Americans 
who stand out, still, in American history:
  The first African American general, born and raised in the District 
of Columbia;
  The first African American Air Force general, this is in the entire 
country, born and raised in the District of Columbia;
  The first African American Naval Academy graduate, born and raised in 
the District of Columbia;
  The first African American Air Force graduate, born and raised in the 
District of Columbia.
  What a history of distinguished citizens, particularly these citizens 
who served so illustriously in our Armed Forces, reaching the highest 
ranks but, nevertheless, who came home with fewer rights or far fewer 
rights than any other Americans.
  If there is to be a statehood provision that, as I have predicted, 
will become law in this House and make its way to the Senate, will 
there still be a Capital?
  I should indicate some of the issues that may occur to the average 
citizen.
  Yes, because our bill preserves Federal control over the national 
capital area, and that is the Federal enclave. That is right here. That 
is where the so-called Federal complex, the Federal monuments, the 
Federal buildings, The National Mall, all that Federal jurisdiction is 
maintained.
  The 51st State gives the District control only over the neighborhoods 
where the residents and the businesses are to be found. So there is not 
much that is upset or will appear very different, frankly, when 
visitors come to what is now known as Washington, D.C.
  By the way, it will still be called Washington, D.C., but D.C. will 
stand for Douglass Commonwealth.
  Where did D.C. get that notion? That notion comes from Frederick 
Douglass' own home here in the District of Columbia, that icon of 
American history.
  It should be noted that, while he is remembered foremost for his work 
against slavery in the United States, he was a very energetic proponent 
of full equality for all the residents of the District of Columbia.
  To this day, we have been able, through a bill I got passed in this 
House, to have a statue of Frederick Douglass. We are the only city--
that is what we are at the moment--that has a statue.
  Each State has two statues. We expect to get another statue, although 
I won't say that until it is announced formally, but then we will be 
the only non-State to have two statues.
  The statue of Frederick Douglass can be seen right here in the 
Capitol, and it acknowledges that it was contributed by the residents 
of the District of Columbia.
  Now, as ardent as we have been in pursuing statehood, we are 
determined to get full equality any way we can. So I have 
simultaneously introduced a bill that uses another strategy, and that 
is because the District doesn't even have full, what we call, home rule 
to make sure, at the very same time that we are pursuing statehood--
because it will take us a little more time to get through the Senate--
that we pursue a strategy that would enhance our home rule so that we 
would get many of the same authorities that would come through our 
statehood bill.
  Those are on a dual track, and let me indicate what some of them are.
  For example, every bill that the D.C. Council passes has to come over 
here. It is never touched. So it has to lie over here for 30 days. What 
nonsense is that? One of the home rule bills to enhance home rule would 
simply get rid of that.
  You don't need to be a State to have a local prosecutor. Why is the 
U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, the street crimes here in 
the District of Columbia, appointed by the President of the United 
States? Virtually all of

[[Page H7594]]

her jurisdiction is on police crime here in the District of Columbia. 
She should be appointed by the Mayor of the District of Columbia. At 
the same time we are going for statehood, we will have a bill on this 
floor for a local prosecutor.
  We will have a bill allowing the Mayor to deploy the National Guard. 
We see what is happening with climate change, and every jurisdiction is 
on the lookout to prepare itself for whatever may come. The D.C. 
National Guard would be our last refuge.
  Unlike the Guard in the States and even in the territories, the 
District's Mayor or chief executive has no authority to call out the 
National Guard if there is a hurricane or if there is a flood, so she 
has got to somehow find her way up the chain of command to the 
President to say: ``Please, Mr. President, can I call out my own 
National Guard?''
  The National Guard of the District of Columbia helps us in a 
multitude of ways; but in the way that could count most, there would be 
a delay because the District doesn't have the authority to call out its 
own National Guard. We want that even before statehood. We want that 
now.
  We don't have control over our local courts. These courts don't have 
anything to do with the Federal Government. That authority should be 
with the D.C. Council.
  There are many more. But to point out the ridiculous nature of not, 
in fact, having even rights that Americans take for granted--leave 
aside, if you will, the right to vote on this House floor, the right to 
Senate representation--but matters about which Congress knows nothing 
and wants to know nothing, like a local prosecutor, like the right to 
deploy members of the National Guard, you can see why I am on dual 
tracks.
  One is statehood, which is absolute and pure equality with other 
Americans, but, in the meantime, we are unwilling to pass up what we 
could get incrementally, and that is simply control over all of our 
local matters, or as many of them as we can.

                              {time}  1700

  There are many reasons why D.C. statehood is ripe. Denying statehood 
to the Nation's Capital is a violation of international law, and that 
has been noted.
  Our country, in 1977--that is before I came to Congress--signed what 
is called the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The 
Human Rights Committee of the United Nations has twice indicated that 
the United States, by denying the residents of its Nation's Capital 
equal rights with other parts of the country, is in violation of 
international law.
  The Human Rights Committee of the United Nations, said that the 
United Nations `` . . . remains concerned that the residents of the 
District of Columbia do not enjoy full representation in Congress, a 
restriction which does not seem to be compatible with article 25 of the 
covenant.''
  That is the article we signed in 1977.
  And, thus, we have been found in violation of international law.
  Madam Speaker, may I inquire how much time I have remaining?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman from the District of 
Columbia has 6 minutes remaining.
  Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, we are very pleased at the large number--
now over 100 organizations--that have endorsed D.C. statehood. That is 
important to us because they themselves have millions of constituents.
  One of our greatest problems has been nationalizing this issue. In 
fact, the residents are frustrated that people come to the Nation's 
Capital and they think that the residents of their capital have the 
same rights they have. We simply don't have a national pulpit every day 
that informs them.
  So these 100-plus national organizations spreading the word, 
cascading it, is very important to us. I am not going to name all 100, 
but to give you an idea of how broad their constituency is, they 
include people like Common Cause, the National Active and Retired 
Federal Employees Association, the Sierra Club, People for the American 
Way, and the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace 
Workers.
  There are unions there. There are good government organizations 
there. There are organizations of every kind, and that is one of the 
reasons that we are sure this bill is ultimately going to pass the 
Senate, as well.
  We draw to the attention of the House that democracy has always been 
an aspiration of our country. Look at who we are. When our country was 
created, only White men could vote. It took 132 years for White women 
to be able to vote. They had to sit down in the streets. They had to go 
to the old Lorton prison, the prison for the District of Columbia. They 
chained themselves to the White House gates.
  If you want to know why we are undaunted when we see that half the 
population had to go through much that we have experienced and finally 
attain the vote, we cannot afford to be pessimistic. But we remind 
those who come to this floor and say how proud they are of what a 
democracy we are; that H.R. 1 has democracy-enhancing provisions 
because we are not a democracy yet.
  The worst blow to democracy is that the Nation's Capital does not 
have full democracy because it does not have the same rights, including 
full voting rights in the Congress itself.
  The Framers understood that they were creating an imperfect 
democracy. Remember, our Constitution is a set of compromises. They had 
to get the Constitution done. They had to abide by three-fifths of a 
man. That was the compromise for not counting the Black slaves. There 
were many who signed the bill who opposed that in every way, but when 
you have a democracy with as many different factions as ours did then, 
and have now, those are the compromises you make. You will be faulted 
only if, over time, you do not correct those inadequacies.
  I am grateful that we had barely come into session--we have been in 
session now only since January with Democrats in control of the House--
that the Speaker issued a very powerful statement endorsing statehood; 
that our Majority Leader Steny Hoyer has endorsed the bill. And, yes, I 
believe that we are coming to the end of an era, an era for 218 years 
where the residents of our Nation's Capital have been second-class 
citizens.
  That is a term normally applied to African Americans, but every 
citizen of the United States will tell you second-class citizen knew no 
color. It meant every resident of the District of Columbia.
  We are closing this era in the House of Representatives during the 
116th Congress. I am predicting, based on the number of cosponsors, 
that this bill will pass the House.
  It will be a historic day. It will buoy this bill to the other side 
of this House so that the District becomes the 51st State of the United 
States.
  I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________