The hearing began with the showing of excerpts from two films. D.C. human rights activist Timothy Cooper introduced an excerpt from the film, "The Last Colony," produced by D.C. filmmaker Rebecca Kingsley.  Kirk Mangels and Brad Mendelsohn introduced an excerpt from their film "Un-Natural State."

They were followed by Professor Kenneth R. Bowling, Adjunct Associate Professor of History at George Washington University who discussed the early history of the new national capital (1779-1801) with emphasis on the origins of the District Clause to the Constitution and Congress's passage of the Organic Act of 1801 through which it asserted total Congressional control of the new seat of the government. This act was passed by a lame duck Federalist Congress in an effort to assert total federal control over the seat of government before Thomas Jefferson and his Democratic-Republican party took power.  Professor Bowling said that it was not the intent of the Revolutionary generation to deny D.C. residents voting rights in Congress. He noted that when we had a strong President who was interested in D.C., Congress would take action.  He said the time to take action is now.  He suggested that we seek the repeal of the Organic Act of 1801 and the creation of a territory.

Professor Bowling was followed by C.R. Gibbs, historian, author, Smithsonian Institution Scholar, and founder of the African History and Culture Lecture Series. Mr. Gibbs discussed the mayoral period (1802-1871) in which there were varying forms of local suffrage within the different jurisdictions in the federal district; the retrocession of the Virginia portion of D.C. back to the Commonwealth of Virginia; the creation of a territorial government (1871-1874) and the election of a non-voting delegate to Congress, at which time the remaining separate jurisdictions in the Maryland portion of D.C. were combined into one government; and the replacement of the territorial government with three Presidentially appointed commissioners (1874-1963). He mentioned that Emancipation Day, when the slaves in the District of Columbia were freed, was seen at the time as a transformative event that would lead to the end of slavery in the United States.

Samuel Jordan, D.C. human rights lawyer and former chairman of the D.C. Statehood Party, discussed the civil rights era (1961-1973) and highlighted the role race has played in the District's history. He discussed some of the major non-violent demonstrations in the D.C. such as the 1966 SNCC boycott of D.C. Transit led by Marion Barry and the Emergency Committee on the Transportation Crisis's fight against freeways in 1967 which helped unify D.C. and metropolitan activists and led to the establishment of the D.C. Statehood Party.  Mr. Jordan also mentioned the importance of District residents working to defeat their southern overlords in the Congress, such as Rep. John McMillan of South Carolina who chaired the District Committee for many years.

Dr. Natwar Gandhi, D.C. Chief Financial Officer who was originally hired by the D.C. Financial Control Board, discussed the Control Board (1995-2001) and the impact of the District of Columbia Financial Responsibility and Management Assistance Authority Act on the District's financial situation.  He noted that under federal law, the Control Board is only dormant and can be resurrected if certain financial situations occur.  He proudly said that D.C. more quickly and completely recovered from its financial problems than other major cities that have gone through a similar situation and that D.C. has had 12 consecutive balanced budgets.

Michael Fauntroy, a professor of public policy at George Mason University and a nephew of former D.C. Delegate Walter Fauntroy, discussed Congress's limited delegation of authority to the District in the form of the home rule government (1973-present).  He noted that Rep. McMillan's defeat for renomination to Congress helped open the way to Congressional approval of a home rule bill for the District of Columbia.

Charles Cassell, architect, civil rights activist, member of the first elected D.C. school board and chair of the D.C. Statehood Constitutional Convention, discussed the initiative to hold a constitutional convention overwhelmingly approved by D.C. voters in 1980, the election of 45 delegates to the convention, the drafting of a constitution in 3 months, its approval by the voters in November 1982, and the constitution's submission to Congress with a petition for statehood in September 1983.  Besides noting the D.C. is colony without the right to elect its own government, free of control by those we cannot elect, he lamented that the United States is the only nation in the western world of democracies that finds a pretext for denying the citizens in its national capitol the right to voting representation in its national legislature. He noted with some passion that the statehood movement has been "too polite and patient" and that "that's not the way Dr. Martin Luther King and Thurgood Marshall functioned."  He said " I will be angry until I get my rights back." He suggested that we should complain to the United Nations about being the only capital in the world whose people are denied representation in their national legislature. He concluded saying "we have to engender some basic anger at our rights being stolen from us."

Statehood Senator Michael D. Brown discussed the history of the use of statehood or "shadow senators."  The first shadow Congressional delegation was elected in 1796 to lobby Congress to admit Tennessee as a state.  There have been a number of famous shadow senators over the years, including John C. Freemont, who was a shadow senator from California. D.C.'s shadow delegation are the only offices created by a mandate from the voters of the District of Columbia.  The positions were authorized by the statehood convention in 1982, but no elections were held until 1991 when Jesse Jackson and Florence Pendleton were elected our first shadow senators and Charles Moreland was elected as our first shadow U.S. representative. Senator Brown noted that the D.C. Voting Rights Act is stalled in House with the untenable gun amendment added by Senator Ensign of Nevada. Senator Brown found it unconscionable that a plane could be forced down for flying over the edge of the District but that Congress was about to let anyone have an automatic weapon and live across from the White House.  He noted that the D.C. statehood movement is growing and our time is now.  The Congressional riders that prohibited the District Government from supporting statehood have been removed, we are about to erect a memorial on the Mall to honor our greatest civil rights agent and we have a president who personally told him and D.C. Senator Paul Strauss that he agrees with statehood for D.C.

The hearing concluded with testimony from five young scholars, all students at D.C. high schools.  They were Ms. Lisa Femia, a junior at Woodrow Wilson Senior High School, Pricilla Lyle, a senior at Hyde Public Charter School, Hayley Miles McLean and Miya Brown, seniors at the School Without Walls, and Jameelah Morris, a senior at Benjamin Banneker High School.

Ms. McLean strongly supported D.C. becoming a state. Ms. Lyle said it makes her angry that Congress does not give D.C. citizens the same rights and respect as are enjoyed by all other American citizens. Ms. Morris found it constitutionally unethical to limit the democratic rights of District residents when we have more people than Wyoming and it is a state.  "It is time to end this virtual representation and make D.C. an official state of the United States of America." Ms. Brown called D.C. statehood an equity issue.  "We're drafted, taxed without our consent, can't make our own laws or spend our own money without Congressional action." Ms. Femia concluded the hearing by noting, "Yet, as I got older, I began to realize that ... Washington D.C ... isn’t really a part of the Union, just owned by it.  In this city, we are surrounded by symbols of the democracy that we are only partially offered. ... I have learned one thing from the addition of the gun amendment to this DC voting rights legislation: you don’t really have any rights until you have all your rights.  Until then, all you get are favors.  What they give, they can take away."

You can view the hearing at:

http://oct.dc.gov/services/on_demand_video/on_demand_may_2009_week_3.shtm