Senate Fails to Pass the DC Voting Rights Bill
Feature Story by Tyler Lewis - 9/18/2007
Residents of the District of Columbia will not get their first Congressional vote as the Senate failed to pass a bill that would have given them a vote in the House of Representatives.
"Today is a sad day for American democracy and for the citizens of the District of Columbia," said Wade Henderson, president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights.
The bill, passed by the House of Representatives in April, would have given the District of Columbia and Utah, which missed a seat after the last census, a voting seat in the House.
A small group of Senate Republicans blocked debate of the bill on a procedural vote (57-43). The final vote fell three short of the 60 needed to break the filibuster.
"For the first time in 30 years, we secured the vote of a strong majority of Senators in favor of DC voting rights. We are outraged that a minority of Senators, led by Senators Mitch McConnell and Trent Lott, prevented the majority from voting on our bill," said Ilir Zherka, executive director of DC Vote.
The District has a delegate in the House, Democrat Eleanor Homes Norton, who can vote in committee, but she is not allowed a floor vote. Civil rights groups say that this is unfair because the District's residents pay federal taxes like all U.S. citizens.
Most Americans support full voting representation for D.C. residents. A January 2005 poll by KRC Research found 82 percent of Americans also support full House representation for residents of D.C.
The bill enjoyed strong support on both sides of the isle – including support from Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah and Republican Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania – but was blocked by senators who said the bill was unconstitutional.
"The Senate Republican leadership hid behind the pretext of the Act's unconstitutionality to keep the residents of the nation's capitol from having the same voting rights that they, like other citizens, are fighting to bring to Iraq and Afghanistan," said Nancy Zirkin, vice president of LCCR.
Civil rights groups, including LCCR and DC Vote held a rally with D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty on September 17 to engage D.C. residents and put pressure on the opposition to back down. "Not since segregation has the Senate blocked a voting rights bill," said Mayor Fenty to the crowd.
Civil rights groups said that D.C.'s lack of voting representation in Congress must be rectified. "LCCR remains committed to pursuing voting rights for District of Columbia citizens-- the only residents of any capital in the Western world, who don't have the right to vote -- and it will continue to press to rectify this profound injustice," said Henderson.
