Should Washington D.C. be retroceded bacy to Maryland?

[Tigermike 4,266]

A bill (H.R.1015) has been introduced by Rep. Louis Gohmert (R-TX, 1st Dist.) to retrocede D.C. back to Maryland. Funny how this bill hasn’t received any news attention.

Text of H.R.1015 as Introduced in House

To provide for the retrocession of the District of Columbia to Maryland, and for other purposes.

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the ‘District of Columbia-Maryland Reunion Act’.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

Congress finds the following:CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(1) Residents of Washington, DC pay Federal income tax, but do not have voting members in the United States Congress.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(2) Article I, section 2, clause 1 of the United States Constitution states that the ‘House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several states.’.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(3) The Founding Fathers did not consider the proposed district that would become Washington, DC a State under the Constitution, as evidenced when Alexander Hamilton offered an amendment to the Constitution during the New York ratification to provide full congressional representation to Washington, DC, but the convention rejected the amendment on July 22, 1788. Thomas Tredwell stated at the same convention that the plan for Washington, DC ‘departs from every principle of freedom’ because it did not give residents full representation in Congress.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(4) Chief Justice Marshall held in Hepburn v. Ellzey in 1805 that the term ‘states’ in article I, section 2, clause 1 of the Constitution does not include Washington, DC for representation purposes.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(5) Seven Supreme Court Justices affirmed Chief Justice Marshall’s Hepburn reasoning in National Mut. Ins. Co. of Dist. of Col. v. Tidewater Transfer Co. in 1949.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(6) A Democrat-controlled Congress in 1978 attempted to amend the Constitution to provide Washington, DC with full congressional representation. The Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives reported the resolution and stated that granting congressional representation to the District of Columbia as it is presently constituted would require a constitutional amendment, because ‘statutory action alone will not suffice’.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(7) Proposals to grant Washington, DC congressional representation will inevitably be challenged in court, calling into question the validity of any narrowly passed legislation that a Washington, DC member votes on and leaving Washington, DC residents in a continued state of flux over their status.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(8) Amending the Constitution requires two-thirds approval by each house of Congress and ratification by three-fourths of the States. In 1978, there was success in obtaining a favorable vote from two-thirds of both the House and the Senate on a constitutional amendment to provide Washington, DC with full congressional representation, but the requirement for ratification by three-fourths of the States could not be obtained.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(9) An alternative to a potentially lengthy and difficult constitutional amendment process is ceding Washington, DC back to Maryland, just as an area of 31 square miles that was originally ceded by Virginia was returned to that State by Federal legislation in 1847, thereby ensuring that the portion of Washington, DC in Virginia would have Senate and House representation.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(10) In 1847, there was a desire to allow the District of Columbia land on the west side of the Potomac River that was not being used by the Federal Government to have its own proper representation in Congress.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(11) Obtaining the desired representation for this portion of Washington, DC would have required a constitutional amendment unless the land were given back to Virginia.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(12) Instead of trying to pass a constitutional amendment, Congress in 1847 legislatively ceded back to Virginia from the District of Columbia the non-Federal land composed of 31 square miles on the west side of the Potomac River.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

(13) Accordingly, the District of Columbia would clearly and constitutionally have 2 Senators and a Representative with full voting rights by ceding the District of Columbia to Maryland after Maryland’s acceptance of such retrocession, while maintaining the exclusive legislative authority and control of Congress over the National Capital Service Area in the District of Columbia.CommentsClose CommentsPermalink

Read it all here.

What do you think? Good or no good? Right or wrong?

[Justin5 20]

I don't think Maryland would be very happy about adding DC to their budget.

[Tigermike 4,266]

I don't think Maryland would be very happy about adding DC to their budget.

That would seem to bring up the dims bill.

H.R. 157:

111st Congress

This is a bill in the U.S. Congress originating in the House of Representatives ("H.R."). A bill must be passed by both the House and Senate and then be signed by the President before it becomes law.

Bill numbers restart from 1 every two years. Each two-year cycle is called a session of Congress. This bill was created in the 111st Congress, in 2009-2010.

The titles of bills are written by the bill's sponsor and are a part of the legislation itself. GovTrack does not editorialize bill summaries.

2009-2010 District of Columbia House Voting Rights Act of 2009

To provide for the treatment of the District of Columbia as a Congressional district for purposes of representation in the House of Representatives, and for other purposes.

Sponsor: Del. Eleanor Norton [D-DC]

This bill is in the first step in the legislative process. Introduced bills and resolutions first go to committees that deliberate, investigate, and revise them before they go to general debate. The majority of bills and resolutions never make it out of committee. [Last Updated: Feb 24, 2009 12:18PM]

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-157

From what I have read this bill is unconstitutional. What’s even worse, Congress is already well aware of that fact. The Congressional Research Service, the legislative analysis advisors to Congress, concluded the following about H.R. 328 (the most recent precursor to current D.C. voting rights bill): link

… it is difficult to identify either constitutional text or existing case law that would directly support the allocation by statute of the power to vote in the full House to the District of Columbia Delegate. Further, that case law that does exist would seem to indicate that not only is the District of Columbia not a “state” for purposes of representation, but that congressional power over the District of Columbia does not represent a sufficient power to grant congressional representation.

In particular, at least six of the Justices who participated in what appears to be the most relevant Supreme Court case on this issue, National Mutual Insurance Co. of the District of Columbia v. Tidewater Transfer Co., authored opinions rejecting the proposition that Congress’s power under the District Clause was sufficient to effectuate structural changes to the federal government. Further, the remaining three judges, who found that the Congress could grant diversity jurisdiction to District of Columbia citizens despite the lack of such jurisdiction in Article III, specifically limited their opinion to instances where the legislation in question did not involve the extension of fundamental rights. To the extent that the representation in Congress would be seen as such a right, all nine Justices in Tidewater Transfer Co. would arguably have found the instant proposal to be unconstitutional.

http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL33824_20070124.pdf

I'm not a lawyer but I would have to ask why would congress try to push this through all the while knowing it was unconstitutional?

If the people of Washington D.C. want and need representation then it would be only right (and constitutional) to retrocede D.C. back to Maryland.

If the people of Washington D.C. want and need representation they should be more than happy to fall back under the benevolence of Maryland.