DC statehood Megathread (pg 33 - Manchin questioning constitutionality)

[Former President tack50]

No current US territories meet the requirements to become a state in my opinion.

PR is too different, a very small percentage of its population can actually speak English. If the average Puerto Rican can’t communicate with the average North Carolinian, then that’s a problem, because citizens of the same country need to be able to communicate. Additionally, Puerto Rico is corrupt, and I feel like they just want the feds to bail them out.

DC is too small territorially. That’s a problem because then it will be compromised of only a single city. That leads to issues with separations of powers- I’m not comfortable with allowing an entire state to be controlled by one city. Not to mention there’s an explicit reason the founders were opposed to this.

All other territories have too small populations, among other issues.

Not to mention that these are being done for political reasons. If they voted differently, we all know most Atlasians would be completely opposed to this.

Regarding Puerto Rico, it's not like the country immediately north of the US is also a federalized country, with one of its constituent units speaking a different language to all the others right? Oh wait! (Quebec)

Now, I can agree that admitting PR as a state could create some frictions, much like how Quebec creates them in Canada. But PR secessionism is even deader than Quebec separatism. I can agree with an argument along the lines of "Statehood is permanent, PR is very different from the rest of the US and it doesn't have a strong enough mandate on the island"; but a purely cultural argument is nonsense. Canada handles Quebec fairly well and I am confident the US would handle PR just as well, especialy since PR will be way smaller than QC is in Canada.

As for DC being too small, there are lots of federal countries where the capital city is small, yet it is also its own constituent unit: Berlin, Brasilia, CABA, etc. Why should Washington DC be any different?

Finally, I am pretty sure Atlasia admitted DC as a state a long time ago (and PR and the rest of the territories).

[Former President tack50]

That would certainly make statehood more palatable for me, but if we’re being honest, that will never happen.

There are already 8 wards in DC anyways, which is more than the 5 counties that exist in RI. It would be far from impossible to convert those 8 wards into counties and leave it at that. They wouldn't even be that much smaller than the actual real county of Kalawao, HI!

There are also already 131 neighbourhoods in DC, and while I don't know if they have any sort of self-government, it's not impossible to give it to them either.

[Former President tack50]

Republicans could admit Guam or the Northern Marianas I suppose (whether jointly or as separate states).

But outside those 2 (and the US Virgin Islands, which would almost certainly vote titanium D), there aren't any other territories to give statehood to.

The only other options to get new states at that point would be:

a) Splitting existing states. The question here is, what kind of state legislature will genuinely vote in favour of a part of the state seceding from the other?

b) Admitting foreign countries into the US. There is some historical precedent for this but I don't think there is any country out there right now which would want to be admitted to the US as a state.

"Israel and Taiwan statehood" is a Hillgoose meme, not a realistic possibility

[Former President tack50]

You’re from Spain, you know what cultural divisions can do to a country. I’m not saying PR statehood can never happen, I’m just saying there needs to a discussion about this because PR is unlike any other US state that we’ve ever admitted before.

Oh I agree that cultural divisions can be a source of headaches (indeed Spain is such an example*, as well as Canada and others).

I would even agree that admitting PR as a state now is a bad idea because of the incredibly weak mandate and lack of a pro-statehood majority in the legislature. I do not think Dems should be pursuing PR statehood just yet; maybe in the 2030s the majority will be enough.

But I am saying that cultural differences should not be enough to stop statehood. If PR eventually gives a very clear mandate in favour of statehood (say, a referendum going 65-35, a pro-statehood governor and clear pro statehood majorities in both chambers of the PR legislature) I think statehood can and should be done

_{*: For the record I will note that Catalonia in particular did support the Spanish constitution by huge margins back in 1978; 95% yes with 67% turnout. At least the Basques have the excuse that the referendum was boycotted and saw low turnout: 75% yes, 45% turnout}

[Former President tack50]

Tbf also Morrisey was a very weak candidate

Democrats in Clinton +>40 states (or Clinton +>3 states, for that matter) don’t send Republicans to the Senate just because the Democrat is a 'weak candidate.' Maybe red state voters should get their priorities straight.

Tbh an interesting but probably not talked enough about phenomenon is how Republican states are more comfortable than Democratic states sending Dem senators to Washington; while for governors it is the exact opposite, and it's Democratic states the ones that seem more comfortable sending Republican governors to their state capitol

Though maybe this is a wrong impression

[Former President tack50]

Having a distinct capital area with different functions than other provinces/administrative areas is very common. That is what DC is. Now, they should definitely be represented in the House. The Senate, however, exists specifically for the states. Admitting them as a state and ensuring senate representation is a different matter. I'm not sure the capital area should be in any specific state, and thus have Senate representation, although they should be represented in the House

I agree with the PR criticism, and even with the fact that DC statehood is, at least in part, partisanly motivated (it's not like there are no non-partisan reasons to admit DC though, like you yourself admit)

However the bolded part is factually wrong. Yes, it is very common for the capital city of many countries to be a separate part from all the constituent entities. However, no country other than the US (to my knowledge) fully deprives said "capital region" from representation in the upper chamber.

The closest you can get is Australia, where the regular states get 12 Senators, while Canberra (and the Northern Territory) only get 2 Senators each. That's a very heavy difference, but 2 isn't quite 0.

And other than Australia, I can't think of any place where the capital region even gets deliberately less representation than it should.

> The German Bundesrat gives Berlin representation like every other state (partially, but not fully based on population), though it is worth noting Berlin (alongside Hamburg and Bremen) are city-states equal to the standard states
> The Austrian Bundesrat operates similar to the German one, giving Vienna the amount of representation it deserves though much like in Germany, Vienna is a city state equal to all the others

> The Brazilian Senate gives the Federal District (Brasilia) 3 Senators just like every other state
> The Argentine Senate gives CABA (Buenos Aires city) 3 Senators just like every other state
> The Mexican Senate is somewhat more complicated, but it still gives DF (Mexico City) equal representation. 3 Senators get elected in each state and in DF for a total of 96 (2 for the largest party, 1 for the runner up); and then there is a separate national list worth 32 Senators

What this would do is to copy the German/Austrian model, and make DC into a proper state like any other. Of course it could also get solved with a constitutional amendment but why shouldn't the citizens of DC have equal representation to all other Americans?

[Former President tack50]

The arguments against DC I can certainly understand.  It's kind of silly to make a state out of our capital city, when it's so small.  But then again, it's kind of silly that DC is what it is in the first place.  Why is it its own thing and not part of any state?  Why does it get electoral votes, but no representation in Congress?  The whole thing doesn't really make any sense.  DC is more populous than Vermont and Wyoming, but those states get 7 congressmen making laws, yet the people of DC have no control over the laws of their own country.  Makes no sense.

That said, there is no cohesive argument against making Puerto Rico a state.  It's a large enough state population-wise that it would have 6 congressmen, same as Iowa, and in terms of area it is 80x bigger than DC and about the same size as Connecticut.  Puerto Ricans are at the mercy of U.S. rule, as we found out so painfully during Hurricane Maria.  They absolutely deserve representation.

If you want to argue against DC being a state, that's fine, but as soon as someone starts arguing against Puerto Rico being a state, you know it's just bad-faith with political motivations.

I'd actually argue the exact opposite.

In DC the people inequivocally want it (the referendum was what, 77-23?) and there is no reason why a bunch of Americans should go unrepresented

As for PR however there just plain isn't a mandate in favour of statehood. Yes, the referendum (narrowly) passed. But there is no mandate to actually implement statehood. PR did elect a pro statehood governor sure; but that was in an election with tons of candidates where the winner got under 1/3 of the vote.

And like I always mention when talking about PR, the anti-statehood parties have majorities in both chambers of the territorial legislature. If the US Congress makes PR a state against PR's will, don't be surprised then PR just refuses to write a state constitution, setting up a constitutional crisis

[Former President tack50]

request changing the name of the thread to "DC Statehood Megathread".

That one already exists a couple pages back. This was supposed to be for frivolous posts about new states, but the mods started putting the serious DC stuff here instead of the real DC megathread for whatever reason.

Not sure if this is a popular or an unpopular take, but I think DC statehood and (possible) PR statehood should be 2 separate threads

1. Why isn’t PR just lumped in with this?
2. Why haven’t we heard reporting on how high on the priority list this is for leadership?
3. And Sinema/Manchin.....? Anything?

If the stimulus bill is going to take weeks of wrangling then this should be up on the priority list

The PR governor and representative are working on it, but this stuff takes a little more than a week:

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/535909-puerto-rico-officials-hopeful-of-progress-on-statehood

Pierluisi and Jennifer González are from the pro-statehood party in PR, so no surprises there. The people you should really be paying attention to is the PR legislature, which has anti-statehood majorities in both chambers.

If legislative leaders in PR do start supporting statehood (or even just letting it slide); then statehood will easily happen. If not, it is a lot tougher to say.

[Former President tack50]

“No taxation without representation”

Not the same thing as DC statehood.

Yeah, this is the most dishonest aspect of Democrats' whole "DC statehood" charade.

Congress could pass legislation allowing D.C. to have voting representation in the House and Senate without revoking Congressional control over the District.  Such control is necessary to ensure the Federal government doesn't have to operate under the undue influence of any state, which is a noble enough reason to oppose D.C. statehood on its merits.

As I have said before:

snip

Ok, then why aren't Republicans offering DC 2 Senators and a House Rep with genuine voting rights? (or better yet, a constitutional amendment for that purpose; though both routes could be done simultaneously)

As for the argument, somehow every federal country in the world aside from the US (and Australia) manages to have their seat of government as part of one state without any issues, from Buenos Aires city in Argentina to Ottawa in Canada to Land Berlin in Germany.

[Former President tack50]

And 0 senators. The taxpaying American citizens who live in DC (as is the case in any other part of America) deserve to have their interests represented in both Houses of Congress, and anything less than that is a non-starter. We should not have any second class citizens.

This is another funny thing about this debate.  Many Democrats (including this particular red avatar) will talk out of both sides of their head about how the Senate is an undemocratic body that flagrantly violates the "one man, one vote" principle while simultaneously arguing that a small, unpopulated exclave should be thrown into the mix to only further exacerbate this inequality.   

Having one underpopulated state counteract another only exacerbates the inequality in the academic sense (i.e. there are now 50 states whose residents effectively have more power in the Senate than Californian voters as opposed to 49), but I suspect that that's not a priority for most people and it's not even really a concern for me, to be honest. The Senate's unique place in Article Five means that it might be impossible to reform even with a constitutional amendment, so I suspect it's sticking around until the proletarian revolution comes to pass, and consequently there will always be population imbalances between states. Like I said, this makes the institution undemocratic in a theoretical sense, but if there's nothing to be done about it short of revolution there's no point even really talking about it. The undemocratic aspects of the Senate I am more concerned about is A. that many Americans don't have a say in it at all and B. that California and New York are functionally Democratic vote sinks which make it very hard for Democratic voters to have their voices heard in the Senate. DC statehood would lessen both of those issues, so I support it.

If I am not mistaken, while the apportionment of the Senate is "set in stone and perpetuity"; its functions are not.

So in theory a "standard" constitutional amendment would be enough to turn the Senate into an American version of the House of Lords (or other similar useless upper chambers like say, the Canadian Senate), a completely powerless institution that can be easily overruled by the House.

[Former President tack50]

Terms or no terms - the people voted for statehood. They didn’t vote for “statehood if the terms are right”. They voted for statehood. And that’s what they should get. Period. Or at minimum have the state be pre-accepted dependent on once the statehood ratified a constitution or whatever they have to do. The point is to pass the congressional/presidential hurdle asap so it’s a done deal when ready.

Like I always remember people (and statehood hacks fail to mention) is that the very same day Puerto Rico voted in favour of statehood, they voted in anti-statehood majorities to both houses of their territorial legislature!

And while they did elect a pro-statehood governor, his mandate is insanely weak, getting under 1/3 of the vote.

In a worst case scenario, you'd get the US Congress voting in favour of statehood, only for PR's legislature to sit down and do nothing, refusing to write a state constitution, setting up a constitutional crisis.

[Former President tack50]

So far the GOP rhetoric against it has been so ignorant like rising crime despite crime rising everywhere else, population requirements despite already passing two states in population, or the idea that there is no car dealership in which there is one. It clear they have no messaging strategy for the public sphere or in the courts other than "if DC is made a state it will elect Democrats". Right now the only thing Republicans have to hang on to is Manchin. The fact that he hasn't definitely come out against statehood other than joking that he supports adding DC to WV suggests his position is not enough to secure Republicans' nervousness.

No car dealership? What? We would all be much better off if we eliminated the dealership model and just bought directly from the manufacturer and cut out all the scammers and artificial price increases they come with.

Not like having or not having car dealerships should matter, but it took me literally 1 minute to find multiple car dealerships within DC city limits (admittedly I don't know anything about them but they do exist)

[Former President tack50]

It's sole purpose and creation was to become the national capital where all the representatives would meet, why would a district which was specifically created to house Congress... need representation in the Congress ?? ??

Not to mention that it would be immoral. Why would such a tiny city filled with bureaucrats, feds, wealthy people, etc. have so much privilege. And saying that low-population states like Wyoming and Alaska can compared isn't right, because those states are so huge with tremendous resources with diverse cities scattered across it's landscape.

If you really want Senate representation just join Maryland or something.. don't take it out on the rest of us by ruining the balance of power.

I mean, the first problem can easily be solved if it is such a big issue. Just create a new Federal district in the rural expanse between Kansas and Nebraska or something and house the WH+Congress+SC there. (and while we are at it, ban settlement on said federal district to avoid the problem repeating itself).

Though I am pretty sure the proposals for DC statehood already keep a very small "federal district"; a federal district that would still be located between 2 states! (pretty sure the border would get to touch Virginia, or it'd be very close to doing so and extending it would be trivial)

As for the other argument tbh I've always thought that it absolutely reeks of dumb "American exceptionalism" in a way. The US are certainly not exceptional in having a small "federal district" that serves as the capital. In fact most federal countries do that.

What the US are exceptional in is in disenfranchising said federal district. The only country that does something even remotely similar to my knowledge is Australia, which gives Canberra only 2 Senators instead of the usual 12 and with Canberra only having partial home rule.

Every other federation gives full representation to their federal district; places like Brasilia in Brasil, CABA in Argentina, Berlin in Germany or Vienna in Austria are not disenfranchised at all and get the same rights as every other state. Why should the US be exceptional on disenfranchising a bunch of citizens? That's not a category you generally want to be exceptional in

[Former President tack50]

So you’re saying it’s immoral for people you don’t like to vote? Also you are literally ignore the hundreds of thousands of poor black Washingtonians that make the majority of permanent resident whose jobs have little to do with the federal government…

They still vote on presidential elections, it's immoral for them to have senators and reps by any means. WTF was the point of a capital city if they're just going to end up a state. And if you live there and care so much about it, nobody is stopping you from moving somewhere else, it's your choice ultimately.

Also while we're at it, wouldn't DC have a huge advantage politically against the rest of the states since it hosts all the Chambers of Congress and the rest of the institutions?

By the way, DC is not majority black anymore, it's a plurality now by 2-5%, DC is on track to become majority white in the 2020s with people constantly settling in there, almost all of them are exclusively white with good paying jobs provided by the government, so the oppressed card doesn't work.

Every nation in the world has a capital city.  Can you name me a single one that doesn’t have the right to vote in their national elections?

I already answered that one for Woodbury and the answer is "none"

Closest you get is Canberra, which has 1/6 of the representation in the Senate (though 1/6 is not zero) and home rule limitations comparable-ish to those from DC if I am not mistaken (Canberra also does have full representation in the lower chamber, though for DC this is irrelevant as it will likely never qualify for more than 1 seat)