Bill Text: HI HCR198 | 2023 | Regular Session | Introduced


Bill Title: Supporting The Admission Of Washington, D.c., Into The Union As A State Of The United States Of America.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 4-0)

Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2023-03-15 - Referred to JHA, referral sheet 20 [HCR198 Detail]

Download: Hawaii-2023-HCR198-Introduced.html

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

H.C.R. NO.

198

THIRTY-SECOND LEGISLATURE, 2023

 

STATE OF HAWAII

 

 

 

 

 

HOUSE CONCURRENT

RESOLUTION

 

 

SUPPORTing the ADMIssion of WASHINGTON, D.C., INTO THE UNION AS A STATE OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

 

 

 


     WHEREAS, the people living on the land that would eventually be designated as the District of Columbia were provided the right to vote for representation in Congress when the United States Constitution was ratified in 1788; and

 

     WHEREAS, the passage of the Organic Act of 1801 placed the District of Columbia under the exclusive authority of the United States Congress and abolished residents' right to vote for members of Congress, President of the United States, and Vice President of the United States; and

 

     WHEREAS, residents of the District of Columbia were granted the right to vote for the President of the United States and Vice President of the United States through passage of the Twenty-Third Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1961; and

 

     WHEREAS, as of 2021, the United States Census Bureau estimates that the District of Columbia's population of approximately 689,545 is comparable to the populations of Wyoming at 576,851, Vermont at 643,077, Alaska at 733,391 and North Dakota at 779,094; and

 

     WHEREAS, residents of the District of Columbia share all the responsibilities of United States citizenship, including paying more federal taxes than residents of twenty-two states, service on federal juries, and defending the United States as members of the United States armed forces in every war since the War for Independence, yet they are denied full representation in Congress; and

 

     WHEREAS, the residents of the District of Columbia themselves have endorsed statehood for the District of Columbia and passed a District-wide referendum on November 8, 2016, which favored statehood by eighty-six percent; and

 

     WHEREAS, no other democratic nation denies the right of self-government, including participation in its national legislature, to the residents of its capital; and

 

     WHEREAS, the residents of the District of Columbia lack full democracy, equality, and citizenship enjoyed by the residents of the fifty states; and

 

     WHEREAS, the United States Congress repeatedly has interfered with the District of Columbia's limited self-government by enacting laws that affect the District of Columbia's expenditure of its locally raised tax revenue, including barring the usage of locally raised revenue, thus violating the fundamental principle that states and local governments are best suited to enact legislation that represents the will of their citizens; and

 

     WHEREAS, although the District of Columbia has passed consecutive balanced budgets since fiscal year 1997, it still faces the possibility of being shut down yearly because of Congressional deliberations over the federal budget; and

 

     WHEREAS, District of Columbia Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton introduced the Washington, D.C. Statehood Act with one hundred sixty-five original cosponsors in the 118th Congress in January 2023, after previously introduced versions of the bill passed the United States House of Representatives in June 2019 for the first time in two hundred twenty years then again in April 2021; and

 

     WHEREAS, the United Nations Human Rights Committee has called on the United States Congress to address the District of Columbia's lack of political equality, and the Organization of American States has declared the disenfranchisement of the District of Columbia residents a violation of its charter agreement, to which the United States is a signatory; now, therefore,

 

     BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Thirty-second Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2023, the Senate concurring, that this body supports the admission of Washington, D.C., into the Union as a state of the United States of America; and

 

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that members of the United States Congress are urged to enact federal legislation granting statehood to the people of Washington, D.C.; and

 

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the President of the United States of America, Vice President of the United States of America, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, President Pro Tempore of the United States Senate, and members of Hawaii's Congressional delegation.

 

 

 

 

OFFERED BY:

_____________________________

 

 

Report Title: 

Washington, D.C.; Statehood

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