Today, as we're all aware, is tax day.
Like everyone else in the continental United States, Hawai'i, and Alaska, I paid my federal income tax. (I actually paid it a couple of months ago, but that's beside the point.)
Unlike everyone else in the continental United States, however, I and my neighbors don't have representation in either house of Congress.
Yes, I'm one of the 600,000 disenfranchised residents of the District of Columbia. And I demand justice.
As many of my neighbors are painfully aware of today, we DC residents pay taxes like American citizens. We have the same tax brackets as everyone else on the continent. We pay taxes at exactly the same rate.
As any man who turns 18 within the border of the District knows, we DC residents can be drafted like American citizens. Residents of the District of Columbia have fought, bled, and died in every war this country has ever fought.*
And yet, we DC residents still don't get the full and equal representation we're entitled to as American citizens. We get a non-voting Delegate in the House of Representatives - the honorable and incredible Eleanor Holmes Norton - and absolutely no representation of any kind in the Senate.
We DC residents are also subject to the additional indignity of having every single one of our laws subject to a Congressional veto. At any time, Congress can just swoop in, add or subtract laws from our books, and we have absolutely no recourse or say in the matter. Congress isn't accountable to us.
This is an untenable state of affairs. Anyone who calls him- or herself a progressive - nay, anyone who calls him- or herself an American - should find the systematic denial of the civil rights of DC residents absolutely inexcusable.
Unfortunately, we in DC can't do anything about this situation. The thing about being disenfranchised is that you can't vote for leaders who will change your situation. We need allies - people who do have the franchise who are willing to go to bat for our interests.
All of this adds up to one thing, in my mind: It is the responsibility of progressives in the 50 enfranchised states to make the civil rights of DC residents a priority.
So what are the possible solutions?
Adding a voting representative by law won't work. Congress is reviving a bill that would give DC's delegate a vote, and add another representative in Utah to balance it out. (Why the vote of 600,000 Americans who have previously gone unrepresented should require "balancing out" isn't addressed.) But this solution is almost certainly unconstitutional - and doesn't resolve the whole problem. It doesn't acknowledge our right to full and equal representation in the Senate, and it doesn't acknowledge our right to make our own laws.
Retrocession to Maryland is an insult to DC residents. DC has been a separate entity from Maryland for longer than 36 of the 50 states have been in existence. To ask residents of DC to join Maryland is like asking residents of Wyoming (which has a population 50,000 fewer than DC) to join Montana or Colorado. If you present retrocession as a viable option, I ask you this: what other Americans you think only deserve civil rights in exchange for their political identity? (Not to mention that, at the moment, Maryland doesn't particularly want DC back.)
A constitutional amendment giving a representative, Senators, and home rule to DC residents is unlikely to succeed. Do you really think we could get eight Republican Senators, 70-some Republican Representatives and the legislatures of 38 states to sign on to what would almost certainly be two more strong progressive Democratic Senators and one more strong progressive Democratic House member?
There's only one option left. It would require nothing more than the same majority vote to pass Congress that's required for any other bill. It would ensure that DC residents not only got the representation we're entitled to as Americans and the right to make our own laws, but also that these rights couldn't be taken away from us again should Congress change. Full statehood for DC is the only true option for progressives. DC should be admitted into the Union as the 51st state, with all the rights and privileges thereof.
So what can progressives do? What must progressives do? I ask five things:
- Call your Representative and Senators today and demand action on DC statehood. If they won't commit to act on DC statehood, you can't commit to supporting them. Civil rights should be a dealbreaker for any progressive voter.
- Call your local Democratic campaigns for Representative and Senator and ask where they stand on DC statehood. Ask that they put a statement pledging action on DC statehood on the "issues" page of their campaign website.
- Whenever a candidate posts here, ask them pointblank about DC statehood - particularly if you're a constituent. If DC residents are the only ones who bring up our civil rights, nothing will ever happen, because we don't have any power.
- Whenever you see a diary here on dailykos asking people to call their Representative or Senators, bring up DC voting rights. Kindly point out that there are 600,000 Americans whose basic right to a full vote in Congress is being denied, and ask the diarist to put in an action item for DC statehood. If you write a diary asking people to call their Representative or Senators, please make sure to include that action item.
- Particularly on this tax day, make sure your friends and family know that there are 600,000 Americans who paid their taxes today, and yet are subject to the tyranny of taxation without representation. Urge them to take action for DC statehood.
It is imperative that progressives in the 50 enfranchised states take action to ensure that 600,000 Americans - now considered second-class citizens - realize the full benefits of citizenship, since they bear the full costs of citizenship. It is imperative that you take action.
What are you waiting for?
* with the technical exception of the Revolutionary War, as there was no District of Columbia in 1776, but people from the place that would be DC fought in that war.