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Nation's Lawyers Back Norton's House Vote
| Source: |
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DCist.com |
| Date: |
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Thursday, February 17, 2011 |
| Author: |
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Martin Austermuhle |
When D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton lost her vote in the House of Representatives in January, she loudly argued that the precedent of allowing her to vote on House matters was legally and constitutionally sound. Now she's got a whole bunch of lawyers agreeing with her.
This week, the American Bar Association passed a resolution backing Norton's claim to a vote in the Committee of the Whole, a parliamentary term for when the entire House gathers as a committee to consider legislation and amendments. "The American Bar Association urges the United States House of Representatives to restore the right of D.C. citizens to have their elected Congresswoman vote on proposed legislation considered by the House in Committee of the Whole," reads the resolution.
The resolution also calls on the House to restore House voting rights to the representatives from American Samoa, the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. All six non-state representatives gained the vote when Democrats took control of the House in 2007; Republicans had similarly yanked those voting privileges in 1995.
Ahead of the January vote, Norton, Mayor Vince Gray and D.C. voting rights activists lobbied the new Republican majority to reconsider its decision. When it didn't, Norton proposed legislation that would have called on a bipartisan commission to look into the matter further; that idea was shot down on a party-line vote, 225-188. In a November 2010 press release, Norton stressed that in 1994, a federal court found that allowing non-state representatives to vote in the Committee of the Whole was perfectly constitutional.
The resolution passed by the ABA was proposed by Annamaria Steward, president of the Bar Association of the District of Columbia. Since 1999, the ABA has supported the District's calls for full voting representation in the House.
"It is particularly unfortunate for D.C. citizens that their right to be represented in the House Committee of the Whole has apparently been made to depend on which political party controls the House of Representatives, and writes its Rules, in any given session," wrote Steward in a document laying out the resolution's rationale.
"There should be a bipartisan commitment to confer a continuing right of representation for the tax-paying citizens of the District of Columbia, regardless of which national party has won a majority of seats in the most recent congressional elections," Steward added.
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