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DC Statehood Green Party |
| D.C. Statehood Greens Challenge Supporters of an Early D.C. Primary Election to Make Statehood the Central Goal. |
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For immediate release: Thursday, March 13, 2003 Contact: Scott McLarty, Media Coordinator 202-518-5624, scottmclarty@yahoo.com Democratic self-government for the District is in danger of being eclipsed by the emphasis on voting rights; Congress's veto power over D.C. and planned imposition of school vouchers will not be affected by D.C. holding voting seats in Congress, say Statehood Greens, who endorsed the plan to change D.C. Primary Day. WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Democracy activists in the D.C. Statehood Green Party are challenging organizers of the D.C. Primary Day proposal to promote statehood, rather than voting representation in Congress. Statehood Greens charge that moving the District's primary election to a date in January, 2004 would defy Congress's veto power over D.C. government, proving that the central issue is democratic self-government rather than representation. "The issue here is political autonomy, not voting seats in Congress," said T.E. Smith, Statehood Green and veteran statehood activist. "Many supporters of this plan are using it to push for representation in Congress. But if Congress overturns the bill passed by Council last week to move D.C. Primary Day, what it really demonstrates is that we need statehood. One or two or three seats in Congress would have no effect on D.C.'s colonial status and wouldn't prevent the federal government from overruling our locally passed laws, policies, and budgets and imposing their own. Yes, we need representation, but democracy must come first." At its February 6, 2003 monthly meeting, the D.C. Statehood Green Party endorsed Team Democracy's plan to make the D.C. primary election the first in the nation in 2004, seeing the proposal as an opportunity to promote statehood. On Tuesday, March 4, City Council unanimously passed emergency legislation movin the District's Presidential primary from the first Tuesday of May to the first Tuesday of January. But the comments of some Council members showed that they consider publicizing D.C.'s lack of voting rights to be the sole motivation behind the legislation they had just passed. Jack Evans (D-Ward 2) said, "The reason DC is going first in the Presidential primary season is because D.C. lacks voting rights in the House and the Senate." Carol Schwartz (R-At Large) said, "I am pleased to support this bill which is foremost about educating the nation about our plight of not having voting rights in Congress." Statehood Green activists note that Republicans in Congress are drafting legislation to impose a school voucher program on the District of Columbia -- whether D.C. residents approve or not. "Congress voided Initiative 59, D.C.'s medical marijuana ballot measure that passed with a 69% majority, and forced mandatory sentencing rules on our courts, canceling judicial discretion," said Michele Tingling-Clemmons, who ran for Council At-Large as a Statehood Green in 2002. "Congress will probably overrule the primary day plan. Now we face a new threat -- school vouchers, which will drain money from our already under-funded public school system, when what our public schools really need is massive repair, lots of textbooks, and other facilities and equipment. This is a crisis of democracy, as well as an affront and an injury to D.C. students and their parents, especially those in poor and working families." "But if we make our goal voting rights in Congress, we're seeking the wrong remedy. We're feeding cold medicine to a car accident victim." Statehood Greens are also concerned that Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, during a March 4 "Urgent Town Meeting to Decide Next Steps on Voting Rights," dismissed statehood as a goal for the immediate future, saying that the District had surrendered many of its state functions. Ms. Norton offered no reason why these functions could not be returned to the District. "Too many people confuse representation with democracy," said Joyce Robinson-Paul, Statehood Green Party steering committee member and a candidate for the 'Shadow' U.S. Senator seat in 2002. "They're not the same thing. There are numerous historical examples of colonies that held seats in legislatures, parliaments, and assemblies, but the people who lived in those colonies were still not free. In many cases, such as Ireland before 1922 and many Asian and African nations, their rights were brutally suppressed. If D.C. gets representation without statehood, we'll be in the same category. Eleanor Holmes Norton will have a vote in Congress, but we'll still be second-class citizens living in what Newt Gingrich once called a 'laboratory experiment' for Republican policies." The D.C. Statehood Green Party supported the '20 Citizens' lawsuit (Adams v. Bush), which challenged the second class citizenship of D.C. residents and proposed a solution in which the borders of the constitutionally mandated federal enclave would be redrawn to include only government properties such as the White House, Capitol, Mall, Supreme Court building, etc. This would free up the rest of the District to determine its own political destiny. Congress has the power to accomplish this by majority vote, 20 Citizens attorney George S. LaRoche has noted, citing as precedent the act of Congress that carved Alexandria out of D.C. and gave it to Virginia. If the citizens of the District chose statehood, they'd also win two Senators and a Representative. For voting rights in Congress to be achieved without statehood, an amendment to the Constitution would be necessary, with ratification by two thirds of the states, a more difficult goal. "When the promoters of the D.C. Primary Day plan tell the public that the goal is voting rights in Congress, they're misleading the public, since voting rights will afford no change in D.C.'s 'last plantation' status," said Ken Sain, another member of the steering committee, referring to the District's nickname in the mid 20th century when the federal government employed thousands of African American D.C. residents who held no political rights. "If we get seats in Congress without statehood, genuine self-governance will be deferred, probably for many decades, and we'll continue to see Congress's worst policies forced on us." MORE INFORMATION
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