Sometimes things in plain sight are the hardest to see. Voter suppression is a hot topic these days. The spotlight shines on rules and voting procedures in states like Georgia and Wisconsin that surely seem designed to discourage some eligible voters from casting their ballots. Voting is a democratic value (that’s with a small “d”). We in this country claim to be in favor of every citizen being able to cast their ballot. In a sense voting is the most important right of expression our First Amendment should afford us.
Last Friday every Republican U.S. Representative, including our own Cathy McMorris Rodgers, cast a Nay vote, a vote to continue the longest running, most consistent, clearest example of voter suppression in the history of our country. The House of Representative voted 232 Aye-180 Nay, passing H.R. 51: The Washington, D.C. Admission Act, a bill to establish Washington D.C. as the 51st state. Of course, the bill goes to the Senate where it will die–at least until it is taken up again in a new Congress next January.
The current President, the Republican Senate majority, and the Judicial Branch of the federal government represent a minority of the voters over whom they rule. (For a full discussion see Control by the Minority). No Republican wants to dwell on that–and yet it is the argument made by their leader, Mr. Trump, “You mean District of Columbia, a state? Why? So we can have two more Democratic — Democrat senators and five more congressmen? No, thank you. That’ll never happen,” No nod to democratic values. The best Republican argument against granting statehood to D.C. is simple, “We want to maintain our rule by minority.” It is all about power for Republicans, not about citizens being able to vote or to be properly represented.
Republicans, by voting Nay on H.R. 51, are engaging in the longest act of voter suppression in the history of our country. Representation by voting is an American value. Cathy McMorris Rodgers and her Party just voted to continue the suppression of voters in Washington, D.C. Vote her out. Vote them all out. Hers are not my values.
Keep to the high ground,
Jerry
P.S. Residents of the District of Columbia have been protesting their lack of a say in the government that controls them since the District of Columbia was established under Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution. Their disenfranchisement, like so much else in this country’s founding, has its roots in slavery. The District was established in Maryland, then the northernmost slave state (except for New York State which has a complicated history of struggle and gradual abolition). The location was chosen as a compromise based on geography and as a concession to the slave states, slavery being a major source of contention in the formation of the union of states. Voting rights and representation for residents of the District were not addressed in the Constitution. There were more pivotal issues at the time. The history of the centuries-long quest by the citizens of Washington, D.C. for voting representation in the national government that rules them is interesting reading: District of Columbia voting rights in Wikipedia is a good place to start.
The New World Order folks and many Evangelical “Christians” will want to dismiss this, but I thought this was particularly telling (copied from Wikipedia, footnoted):
Since 2006, the United Nations Human Rights Committee report has cited the United States for denying DC residents voting rights in violation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, a treaty the United States ratified in 1992.[37]
In 2015, DC became a member of the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization.[38]
P.S. I don’t know how bill numbering works exactly, but the symbolism of H.R. 51 is not lost on me. It is with particular irony that I note, as a resident of eastern Washington, that local legislators and former legislators Matt Shea, McCaslin Jr., Mike Fagan and others have been agitating for their theocratic 51st State, the “State of Liberty” for years. Stripped of all its trappings, Shea’s and McCaslin’s 51st state would give voters who already have a voting say in their governance two more U.S. Senators. In contrast, their Republican compatriots in the U.S. House of Representatives just voted against offering any representation to those unrepresented people our Constitution failed to even consider..
You will note that apart from the mention of slavery in the history of the establishment of the District of Columbia, I have not brought up race. I don’t need to. Knowing Matt Shea’s ties to the Byrds (the founders of the Marble Community in northern Stevens County), the region’s history with Richard Butler and his Aryan Nations, and Shea’s comrade in arms, ID State Rep Heather Scott’s, waving the Confederate battle flag as a dogwhistle, the underlying message seems painfully obvious.