November 18, 2021 • 42 mins
The residents of Washington, D.C., the capital of the oldest democracy in the world, are not allowed to pass their own laws without the federal government agreeing with them first. That’s because DC is not a state, something DC residents want to change.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of I
Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh
Clark and there's Charles w Chuck Bryant and it's just
the two of us. And that's okay because we are
here and we are ready to do this thing and
(00:23):
it's gonna be good stuff. You should not. That's right.
Waiting into political waters yep, no way around it, no
way around it. What does that DC license plates say?
Taxation without representation? That says it all, it really does.
I love it because it's so subversive, you know. That's right.
We're talking about DC statehood and why the District of
(00:44):
Columbia it's not a state when they have seven hundred
thousand roughly people living there, about two hundred and fifty
thousand of which were born and raised there. Uh, and
yet they don't get the benefits of statehood we'll talk
about for reasons that are kind oft I think. So. Um, yeah,
(01:09):
if you aren't aware, if you live in d C.
You you have some voting rights, but mostly, um, you
are very much limited or restricted as far as like
what you're allowed to do to participate in democracy, at
least compared to other states, right, and all of this
(01:29):
was like because of a layer, layer after layer after
layer of rules and laws and regulations that basically prevent
DC residents from voting or participating like other other residents
of other states. Um. And so this idea that like, wait,
this isn't right has been something that people have been
(01:50):
talking about for a very long time, and yet we
still can't reach this finish line to make d C
the fifty first state, um, which a lot of people is,
including most the people who live in d C want
they want to become the fifty first state. They want
to be a state, they want to be treated like
a state, and they just can't quite get it to
the finish line. But it's possible, Chuck, that we're close,
(02:13):
closer than ever, actually closer than ever, but still not
too close. If he asked me, well, we'll we'll we'll see.
I think we'll see. Yeah, we'll see. So let's talk
about how DC was even established and why all of
this is is like this hodgepodge of weird laws and
rules and where it came from. Yeah, so we didn't
(02:33):
have a capital as a country at first? Uh for
about um, I guess from seventeen seventy six to eighty nine,
the Continental Congress met in different places. They met in Philly,
of course, they met in Maryland. Some they met New
York City. Some they even met in New Jersey some
believe it or not. And in sev seven and the
(02:54):
Philadelphia Convention, they wrote the Constitution and said, you know,
that's really kind of beefed up the oral government, and
said we need someplace that's like clearly ours that we
will meet, that is permanent. And it was written right
there in the Constitution, Article one, Section eight, Class seventeen. Yes,
(03:15):
and um. Exactly where they were going to put this
new capital was a huge debate, Like everybody just presumed
it would be someplace like New York or Philadelphia, where
it was already you know, the populations were very established
and large, and where they had already written the Constitution,
and where a lot of the early founding fathers were from. Um.
But the Southern States said, hey, man, we don't want
(03:37):
the capitol all the way up there in New York
or in Pennsylvania. We need it somewhere that's a little
closer to the middle of this country. This string of
thirteen colonies along the eastern seaboard. So they came up
with what's called the Compromise of seventy, which said, Okay,
we'll place this capital further south towards you guys, but
you have to say that the colonial um debts obligations
(04:00):
that were accrued during the Revolutionary War, we get to
move those over to them to the federal government's responsibility,
because we these northern colonies are swimming in debt and
we just can't pay them off. So one of the
first things we have to do when we established this
country is laden it with revolutionary war debt, right. Uh.
And with the Residents Act, they said, you know, we
(04:22):
literally need land, like physical space, So Maryland, Virginia, pony up.
You've got to give up each a little bit, uh
to create this area. And um, I think they eventually not.
I think I know they eventually got back Alexandria Virginia
in eighty six, But initially that was a part of
the uh, the tranche of land and sort of the
(04:43):
very I think from the very beginning they weren't a
state because of something that happened that kind of feels
a little more contemporary of the past couple of recent years.
The the Pennsylvania Mutiny of seventeen eighty three when these veterans,
(05:04):
hundreds of veterans, stormed Congress and said, you know, this
is what we want. They were angry, we want back Bay,
we want this and that, and the Pennsylvania Executive Council
would not send the state militia to protect Congress and
they had to move to New Jersey temporarily. And so
they were like, this is not good. We need to
(05:24):
be able to be in charge of our own um
defense really, and so we need a federal land that
is not a state so we can have our own uh,
our own defense system, our own soldiers system. They just
saw that if it ever came down to, you know,
a federal versus a state kind of situation again, that
they couldn't rely on a state militia, so that capital
(05:46):
couldn't be associated or affiliated with the state, had to
be a stateless capital that was its own territory. It
made sense, It definitely did um and and it was
all because of that Pennsylvania Mutiny of seventeen eighty three,
because war veterans were oh back pay and they were
mad about it, and we're chasing Congress all over the country.
For it. So, um, so that's why d C was
(06:09):
stateless to begin with, like that, so that the federal
government could have its own jurisdiction over this this area,
over the capital, that's right. And uh in eighteen hundred
Congress set up there in Washington, d C. And like
I said, Alexandria is part of it. First Georgetown was
and still is, and they were you know, there were
port towns, so there was a lot going on there.
(06:30):
But for the first um several decades, d C was
pretty rural, uh, and didn't really start growing a lot,
and we have some population breakdowns, but it was really
post Civil War is when the population boom happened there.
I think in eighteen hundred there was eight thousand people there,
eighteen sixty seventy thousand, eighteen eighty a hundred and seventy
(06:54):
five thousand. That's a big jump. Yeah. And these are
you know, people that work for the government, and these
are also uh, free people now that came up from
the South set up presidents there and so d C
for many many years had a majority black population and
kind of right away, Uh, the federal government was like,
well that won't do either, yes, And so the reason
(07:17):
that they were not okay with it was because well,
at first, so people in DC have been agitating for, um,
what's called home rule, which is just basically, you're allowed
to self determine your own government. You can elect your
own officials. They can pass laws other people can't, like
out other people in the country can't tell you that
(07:39):
your laws are invalid. Um just basically the right to
sovereignty that any state holds right. So people have been
interested in that in d C since the outset. But
as you said earlier, it was a really rural and
small population for a while, so it didn't really matter
as much because it affected so few people. But as
(08:00):
the population grew it became more and more of a
pressing issue until um, they finally said, and I think
eighteen sixty seven, you know what you're you're you're totally right,
like we should we should let d C residents vote,
And they passed an act that said everybody in DC
can vote. And by saying everybody in d C, or
(08:23):
I should say every man in DC can vote, Um,
they were for the first time in American history, enfranchising
black men to vote. Like there had never been a
law that allow black men to vote in the history
of the country to that point, and that was the
first one that was ever passed. And so starting in
eighteen sixty seven, uh for a full three long years, UM,
(08:46):
black men were allowed to vote in d C for
things like federal federal federal government positions like the president
and vice president. Right. And when I said that won't
do that's what I was talking about, they uh quit
realized that you have a large city or you know,
a larger city now that is being controlled. You know,
there's a lot of political power with black people for
(09:08):
the first time, and this alarmed them. And so they said,
all right, we're going to replace this with a federally
appointed commission. And they did that really quickly, and it
was exactly for that reason. It was to read disenfranchise
black people. Yeah. There's a famous quote from a senator
named John Tyler Morgan who was describing it years later.
(09:30):
Why why they repealed that law and appointed that that
federal commission to rule the city? He said, And I'm
sorry for this, everybody. After the Negroes came into the district,
it became necessary to deny the right of suffrage entirely
to every human being, to burn down the barn to
get rid of the rats. The rats being the Negro
(09:51):
population and the barn being the government of the District
of Columbia. So what do you said? He said it
out loud, he did, and wrote it down like it's
in quote there. So he Um, what he's saying is
is that to keep black people from voting in d C,
they had to remove the voting rights of everybody. Um.
And that's what they did. And what's crazy is that's
(10:13):
how it has generally remained for hundred and fifty years
now for basically the same reason. Unfortunately. Yeah, it was
from the eighteen hundreds until nineteen seventy three, like I
was born and alive, when Washington, d C. Was still
(10:33):
a territory that had a governor and a ruling counsel
that the president appointed. Uh, they did have a single
delegate to Congress. Uh, and but that they were not
given a congressional vote. So there was a delegate that
could do the things that delegates do. Uh, they can
even introduce articles, but they can't even vote on their
(10:56):
own articles. No, no, they can. They can beyond can
middies and all that, like almost everything that a House
member can do as congressional member could do, but just
not vote. It's a non voting delegate. And so in
that way, like, yes, you had somebody who could advocate
for d C, but the the people of d C
couldn't elect somebody who could go vote on their behalf
(11:18):
in the House of Representatives. And that's just the house.
They have nobody and never have had a single representative
in the Senate. So the only representation that DC has
has is a single non voting member of the House
of Representatives. And that's it. Yeah, like constituents without a
real say at the end of the day. It gets
(11:39):
even far far worse than that, you know, because I'm
sure people are like, well, come on, you know, how
much does that affect these people? Really? Um, Well, we're
gonna explain exactly how it affects him. But one of
the big ways, if it stands out to me, is
that when um, the Home Rule Act was passed in
ninety three that said, okay, you guys can elect your
own mayor and you an electoral own city council. Bully
(12:03):
for you. There's this thing that we have to to
tell you about. Though it's not all you know, great,
every single law that gets passed by you in your
town is subject to Congressional review. It doesn't actually become
law until Congress says that your laws that you came
up with in past yourselves are okay. And that means
(12:26):
that any congress person, any House member from anywhere in
the country, who is offended by one of your laws,
who takes an issue with one of your laws, can
strike that law down basically single handedly by attaching a
rider to your annual budget. And so if you don't
like that writer, well then you you can do without it,
(12:46):
but you have to do without the money that makes
up about your operating budget every year. That's the kind
of like a drag Toonian rule that Congress holds over
d C to this day. Yeah, and this is why.
And you know, unfortunately this does wait into politics, and
we'll get into that more later. But like it is
kind of purely for partisan politics why d C is
(13:07):
not a state at this point. Uh. And it's the
ironies are pretty rich here in that. UM. Generally Republicans
do not want d C to become a state. UM.
But they're also the same party who decries government overreach
in states states rights. And I guess they'll say well, yeah,
but it's not a state. But it is certainly government
(13:29):
overreach when you have the local people of a terror
of a district voting there for their own laws that
their constituents want, but the federal government can override those.
And again you might say, like, what laws, who cares? What?
What's the problem? How are these people actually really harmed
with that? Well, there's actually like a lot of laws
that DC has passed that Congress has either dragged its
(13:49):
feet on or overturned that have actually harmed people. Um
d C had a needle exchange program to try to
slow the spread of HIV um and it was overturned
by Congress in and was not allowed to happen again
until two thousand seven. And it turns out that when
(14:09):
that was finally allowed to start up again, the HIV
infection rates in the city and by the way, d
C had one of the highest rates of HIV. After
its needle exchange program was was banned by Congress, um
it's HIV rates dropped by sev and an estimated hundred
and twenty people were prevented from being infective with HIV
in just two years after the needle program was allowed
(14:33):
to to start up again in two thousand seven. There's
also ones on abortion access COVID nineteen they got the
short end of the stick as far as funds go. Um.
And then there's another one where, uh, they tried to
repeal their sodomy law, which outlawed sex between men back
in one and Congress didn't let it actually go through
until there's just been a lot of stuff where basically,
(14:57):
if you have somebody in Congress who does and like
the idea of d C, the people of d C
having um legalized marijuana or being able to use taxpayer
money for abortions, like DC doesn't get to do that
because the writer gets attached to their budget and they
have to they have to take it. And that COVID
thing you were talking about, they um, every US state
(15:18):
got one point to five billion dollars in aid, but
Congress cut that in half for d C even though
they had Well, first of all, they're like, well, we're
bigger than Vermont, uh and like one one other state too, right,
And they're almost the same size as Alaska, UM, North Dakota,
South Dakota, and Delaware population wise. Yeah, and they were
(15:41):
I think had more confirmed COVID cases at the time
than nineteen other states, yet they got half the aid
just just because. Yes, so it's it's my numbing and
crazy and if you like, just put yourself in the
position of somebody who's a like interested in the political
process and lives in d C and the idea that
your city can pass a law huge like with huge support.
(16:05):
I think they're marijuana legalization, UM law passed with supportive voters,
and somebody from Arizona could come along and be like, Nope,
you're not doing that. That law doesn't go through. I'm
attaching that as a writer to your your annual budget.
How outrage inducing would that be? You know, how how
frustrating would it be at the very least. So, yes,
(16:26):
it actually is harmful um to the to the democracy
of Washington, d C. And their their self determination and
their ability for home rule. UM. The situation as it
stands right now, all right, well, let's take a break.
I think it's pretty clear where we stand here, and
we'll talk about the electoral College, just that little thing
(16:46):
right after this. Alright, So, uh, people have been allowed
(17:19):
to vote in Washington, d C. For elections for presidential
national elections for a long time now, uh. In nineteen
sixty one, they Radifford, that Radifford ratified the twenty three
Amendment to the Constitution that was specifically for d C
electoral College votes in the presidential election. That was when
they started to be able to vote for president vote
(17:42):
at all. That's right. So, so sixty sixty years is
how long the residents of DC have been able to vote. Yeah,
I mean when I said quite a while, it didn't
mean on the like the beginning of time scale, just
sort of oh, I didn't know if you're being facetious
or not. No, no no, no, I mean for many decades now,
but not Yeah, it's a guess. In that context, it's
it's an outrage for sure. And so that that that
(18:04):
twenty three amendment. That's the whole purpose of the twenty
three Amendment is to basically say, yes, DC can now
vote in presidential elections, and they can contribute electors, um,
but they can never have more electors than the number
of electors that the least populous state in the United
States has. It doesn't matter how many people DC could
(18:25):
swell to. It probably couldn't handle it, but it could
swell to the size of a two million population and
it doesn't matter. You get your three electors, right, and
it's always going to be three at the minimum because
you're a number of electors are based on the representation
you have in the in the House and the Senate,
so you always every state has two senators and every
(18:46):
state has at least one congress person, and d C
probably would always still have one congress person anyway, that's
how many Alaska has, in Vermont and Delaware like these are,
it's just based on population, so they will probably always
have three electors UM. And so those electors ever since
the I believe the nineteen sixty four election, the first
(19:09):
time DC ever contributed electors to the Electoral College UM,
those those electors almost invariably go towards the Democratic candidate,
right Like DC is one of the first states that
gets called on like those electoral maps during every presidential election,
(19:29):
and they go towards the Democrat. So if you've made
DC a state that's not gonna be a huge change,
like nothing's going to change, You're they're still going to
have their three electoral votes and they're probably going to
go towards the Democratic candidate for president. They're only going
to have one congress person, and that one congress person
will probably be a Democrat. But it's kind of a
(19:50):
drop on the bucket when you're talking about like four
hundred and thirty or sixty I can't remember however many
are in the House right now. But when you talk
about the Senate, now we get to the problem, the
partisan political problem with why DC is not a state,
because d C is and has been for a very
long time, majority black as far as the population goes,
(20:13):
in as far as their voting base goes, traditionally, Black
voters lean Democrat. That's as far as voting history goes.
That's typically the case for the last several decades at least.
And if you have to new senators that just did
not exist before, the Senate would go from a hundred
senators to a hundred two senators, and those two senators
(20:34):
were almost guaranteed to be Democratic senators. Will imagine what
two extra Democrats senators would do right now if you
had two more Democrats in the Senate than what we
have right now. Now we've reached exactly now, we've reached
the reason why DC is not being allowed to be
a state and why it's a partisan political matter. Right,
(20:56):
and here is where you're going to get into. UM,
to me, some very disingenuous arguments. Uh, that are just
it would be so much easier if they just talked
about what the reality was instead of disingenuous arguments that
everybody knows isn't the real reason. Uh, it's just that
(21:17):
That's the stuff I hate about politics in this country
is no one's talking about the what the real situation is. UM.
You know, some people they'll try and call it out,
but they So there are sort of two avenues that
have been bandied about over the years. Is basically the
two two main paths for uh, making DC estate. And
(21:38):
one is what you what we need to do? Is
the idea is that what we need to do is
shrink what is called the federal district to only the
buildings that are under federal control, like the White House,
in the Capitol Building and you know kind of everything there.
D c all the all the government buildings basically and
just make it that. Um. But no, no one lives
(22:00):
is there except for you. No one lives in these buildings.
These are office buildings except for the White House where
the president and first family live and maybe some of
the staff So one of the disingenuous arguments that comes
up is, well, we can't have a situation where there's
only three or four people, like let's say, living in
these places that get this kind of representation. Yeah, that's
(22:25):
completely disingenuous. Sure, and especially if that that president is
an incumbent running for election again, then that incumbent president
would have three electoral votes to cast for themselves. Right.
So so on paper, you're like, oh, yeah, I could
see that being a problem. Let's just give up because
of the twenty three Amendment and that cork that it attributed, right,
(22:46):
But there are a lot of like workarounds too that
people are like, no, that's that's a ridiculous argument, right,
Like the president could in fact usually does vote uh
absentee from their own home state. That's that's one. Then,
so if no electoral votes are cast, or if no
votes are actually cast in the district of Columbia, then
(23:07):
you there's no electors to be given, right, so you'd
have those three electors that just never didn't go to anybody.
That's one. That's one solution. Um. Another one is to
just take those three electors and give them to whoever
wins the popular vote regardless. Yeah, and then a lot
of people are like, no, you just repeal the twenty
three amendment if you make to see a state like
it's a one two punch, like they that's just how
(23:29):
it has to be. That's right. And we'll talk more
about some some disingenuous arguments and deconstruct him as we go,
but that's the one that seems to be bandied about
most most commonly. Right. Yeah, and you know, we've talked
a little bit about why it matters to begin with. Um,
we mentioned at the very beginning their license plate taxation
without representation, and you know, that's a little bit of
(23:52):
a snide license plate, but it's very true. They pay
federal income tax and like really high federal income tax,
so much that they contribute more than they received from
the federal government. One thing I saw, Chuck is like
I was like, well, wait a minute, can DC like
even handle being a state? You know, how much does
it get from the federal government? And apparently it is not,
(24:13):
in any way, shape or form, the the state that
or the area that receives the most federal funding. I
guess that honor goes to Mississippi. Of Mississippi state and
local budget is made up of federal funds thirty percent
for Louisiana, New Mexico, and South Dakota, pent DC is
twent so just a quarter of all of the money
(24:36):
that DC uses to operate comes from the federal government.
The rest is from local taxes. And DC apparently has
a little bonnet, a little flower in its bonnet, and
that it typically has a balanced budget every year too.
Oh really, so we could do just fine without um
being a state. It would be like, yeah, we should
(24:56):
still get the federal funding because other states get federal
funding too. But even if you kept it at the
federal funding they get now, they would be doing just
fine as far as federal law is concerned. They are
treated as a state. Yeah, they're not a state with
representation like a state. We already talked about congressional representation. Uh.
They you know, they can't vote on bills. It's uh,
(25:19):
it's really weird that you can introduce a bill and
write the bill, but not vote in that bill. Yeah.
And because constitutional amendments are typically what's thrown around about
making DC a state or not, or has been up
until recently. Um, it's kind of ironic that D c
wouldn't be able to vote on its own ratification like
its own statehood, like, because it cannot vote on constitutional
(25:41):
amendments because it's not a state. So it would basically
DC has to rely on everybody else to go to
bat for it because it doesn't have self determination. That's right.
You want to take another break and then talk about
some of the arguments for and against. Yeah, okay, well
we're gonna do just that, everybody, George, all right, So
(26:28):
we've you know, made our position clear that most of
the arguments against statehood are and these aren't our arguments.
I mean, like I said, any honest person will tell
you that it is strictly partisan political issue. It's because
they don't want two more Democratic senators in there. They
just don't. And um, you know, uh, that's their right
(26:50):
to fight against that, I guess, uh, and they and
they do. But it's disingenuous and it's an anti social
sentiment like there how somebody or some group of people
are expected to vote has like nothing to do with
whether they should have the right to vote or not.
You can't just keep people from voting because you don't
(27:10):
like the way they're going to vote. That is an
anti social act anti democratic. Yeah, it's both, and you did.
That's exactly what's going on right now. That is that's it.
They boil it down, I mean, get mad at us,
just like you did our gerrymandering episode or our voter
suppression episode. It's still the case. That's just how it
(27:30):
is right now. It's one of those political fictions that
it's anything but that. That's right. Um. The one of
the arguments is that it's unconstitutional to begin with. That's
why you said that. Up until recently, most of the
attempts to make DC a state have tried to come
via constitutional amendments. And here's the thing though, like there's
(27:52):
nothing specifically prohibiting d C from becoming a state in
the constitution. No, you had mentioned that, like some some
people are like, let's shrink d C the capital down
to just the federal buildings. Basically as ed who helps
us out with this one? UM puts it like tourists
d C, right, and that everything else commercial and residential
(28:14):
DC that would become the state and then that federal
district would become the capital. And people are like no, no no, no,
you can't do that. There's like a size requirement in
the in the Constitution can't change something like that. And
and people are saying, well, actually, there is a size requirement.
It's a maximum, not a minimum. It doesn't say how
small it can be, it says how big it can be.
(28:35):
It can't be more than ten miles square. Yeah, I
think ten square mouths sare mouth So yes, you totally
could shrink it. So just shut down that argument. But
but one more thing, chuck about that. One of the
reasons why they have abandoned a constitutional amendment making DC
estate is twofold one. That's a huge hurdle to jump over.
(28:58):
I think you have to have two thirds of the
state to ratify account. So first of all, you have
to get it through both houses of Congress, which is
an impossibility to begin with. And then you have to
have two thirds of the state, many of which are
controlled by Republican legislatures, to ratify that amendment to make
DC a state. So it's just too huge of uh
an obstacle to this amount. But also it's really disingenuous
(29:21):
to require a constitutional amendment to make DC estate because
since the Constitution itself was ratified in not a single
state that was admitted into the Union from that time
had had was was admitted through a constitutional amendment. There
are no constitutional amendments that that have admitted states. They've
(29:42):
all come in through congressional decree instead. That's right, and
well we'll talk about that in just a second more detail.
But another one of the paths that has been bandied
about a little bit is um well, not past the
statehood but passed to making it not a state and
ensuring it never become the state, saying well, why don't
we just make it part of Virginia or Maryland like
(30:04):
it used to be. Give it back to them and
nobody you know, you know who doesn't want that, d C,
Virginia and Maryland. Yeah, none of them want it. Maryland
doesn't want to assume those seven hundred thousand people. Virginia
doesn't want it. DC doesn't want to be a part
of either one of those. Like, the only people that
want that are are frankly Republicans who don't want it
(30:24):
to become state. Yes, because it might add a few
more electoral votes to Maryland or Virginia, but it would
not add a single extra senator. You can't have more
than two senators no matter what your population size. Again
the crux to the matter. Um. Another one is that
the idea that the city can't take care of that
federal property. And I don't think anybody who's a pro
(30:46):
statehood advocate says, oh yeah, yeah they can, that's just
not true. But they say, well, we wouldn't be taking
care of most of that property. It would be shrunk
down to be the capital, so it'd still be the
federal government's jurisdiction. People said, well, there's other federal buildings
outside of this little tourist area. How what are you
gonna do about those? And d C says, do you
(31:07):
know how many states and cities have federal buildings in
them that the state in the city takes care of
in conjunction with the federal government and with funding from
the federal government. Totally not a problem. I think disingenuinuity
is that a word? It is now, Buddy, is one
of my least favorite things to witness. It is because
(31:28):
it's just it's just dishonest. It's just a bunch of garbage,
like acting a certain like just call it what it is.
Is so frustrating, it's almost almost disingenuous. Um. So we
you mentioned earlier that no other state needed a Congressional
or i'm sorry, a constitutional amendment to become a state. Um,
(31:52):
the Tennessee model is sort of where DC has tried
to go more recently. The Tennessee Plan in se when
Tennessee as an a state yet, and they said, you
know what, we're tired of waiting around for Congress to
do anything about it. So we're gonna hold our own referendum.
We're gonna vote to become a state. And we passed it,
and then we're gonna write and approve our own state
(32:12):
constitution and how we're going to administer that and kind
of this is how we would do things. And they
did that, and then Congress is sort of like everyone
sort of sitting sitting there twiddling their thumbs staring at
Congress like we're all ready to go. Just unlocked the
door and we could become a state. And it worked,
and it also worked in Michigan, Iowa, California, Oregon, Kansas
(32:32):
and Alaska and so d C recently I think about
five years ago, said maybe let's try this Tennessee plan
forget constitutional amendments, let's just have a referendum. And it
passed by and they said great, let's draft a constitution.
And they did that and it was approved, and they said,
the mayor is going to become the governor's city council
(32:53):
will become the legislature, and here we go, Congress, let's
get this done. We're ready to roll. Yeah. And I
So this was in two thousand and sixteen that that
referendum passed and they started to adopt the Tennessee Plan.
And what sucks, Chuck, is that means that they were
distracted by that idea that they had to become a
state through constitutional amendment for decades, like they if they
(33:14):
had taken up this Tennessee Plan decades ago, who knows
where they would be now. They might be a state
by now. It's just so it's just it's really sad
to think like that that that work, that boondogg will work,
that they needed for years. Yeah, basically, so that's why
I'm like, I don't know, we might actually see it's
possible we could see d C a state. Um, because
(33:38):
this referendum and the plan that they followed where they
basically made themselves an instant state, like just ad Congress
kind of thing. Um. It came in just the last
five years. So for the first time ever in the
history of the District of Columbia, UM, a bill passed
that says DC is a state. Please go ahead and
(34:02):
m past this bill Senate, it past the House. Everything
else has been like, we're the House of Representatives and
we think DC should be a state, not a It's
just a like a resolution and support of DC being
a state. It's not an actual law. This is an
actual law that passed the House of Representatives. Of course,
it died in the Senate because, um, it was while
Mitch McConnell was a majority leader and he didn't even
(34:23):
let it come up for a vote. I I can't
believe it even made it onto his desk before catching fire.
But but the fact is that it did pass the
House at least once. And that is brand new. That
is definitely new. Yeah, it's amazing. And uh, it's amazing
that we have a situation in our on our modern
(34:43):
day government where one person can say no, we're not
gonna vote on this two party system does not work.
It's broken, it doesn't work. Yeah, it was reintroduced in
one just this year past the House again. UM. Well,
sadly in this case, it's probably not gonna happen because
(35:04):
Democrats can't agree on anything within their own portable irony
of the whole thing in it. Yes, it really is.
You mentioned two people earlier, probably would be the same
two people. That's what happen. Yeah. The only other question
mark is Mark Kelly no Angus King from Maine, and
(35:25):
he may be retired now, but yes, it is. From
what I saw, it would come down to Kristen Cinema
and Joe Manchin and UM both have not supported previous
like DC statehood stuff before. Other people who have not
actually didn't actually co sponsor that bill in the Senate,
UM have supported other stuff, so they would be expected
(35:47):
to vote yes. So it could come down to two
people again, both of whom Democrats, that would keep d
C from becoming a state. Now it's pretty interesting stuff.
What would uh different names bandied about over the years
that it did become a state. I knew that New
Columbia was what they were gonna call it for a
long time, but then you know, uh, in more recent years,
(36:11):
Christopher Columbus has become less favorable in in the eyes
of history, so they're saying maybe New Columbia is not
the right the right name after all. No, and I
didn't know this, but they they are. They plan as
part of that referendum, um draft constitution that was passed, Uh,
they would change the name. They would keep it as
Washington d C, but d C would stand for Douglas Commonwealth,
(36:34):
after Frederick Douglas, the abolitionist former. S I like it
in that neat yeah, d C. You know, I think
people they go to towards d C, which is a
lot of fun. We both done that that thing a
lot of times. Um, it is that. But d C
is a rich city with a rich history, uh in
and of itself, a rich history of music and culture
(36:56):
and black culture and great food and like there's a
there's a lot to d C besides the mall area.
Um And every time I go there, I try to
check out different areas and do different things, and uh,
it's it's awesome. We have a great, great time when
we do live shows in d C. It's one of
my favorite places. When we go to uh what is
(37:17):
it Lincoln and they give us us Lincoln logs. The pastry,
where did those come from? What do you mean where
they come from? What's what's the bakery that does those?
Do you know, I don't know. I think it's I
don't always just sitting there backstage and they're so delicious
and we always eat like ten each of them. They're
(37:38):
they're like Swiss cake rolls, but like the bakery version
of a Swiss cake roll. Yeah. So before we go, Chuck,
I feel like we have to talk about how some
recent events like really kind of have brought the idea
of DC not being a state to the four um
both of which occurred in actually, oh, like the storming
(37:59):
of the capital. That's that's one of them for sure. Yeah,
and I think that kind of harkens back to the
mutiny of seventeen eighty three and that uh there there
are some people who think it could it would have
gone down a lot differently if um, we had been able,
if if the government had been able to call on
the state national Guard like super quickly. Yeah, because the
(38:20):
national Guard, the d C National Guard is not under
control of d C, just like any other states national
guard would be under the state's control, which is why
that that's what Congress wanted it to be, Like, they
wanted DC's National Guard to be under control of the
federal government. Because of that that Mutiny of seventeen eighty three,
But the exact opposite thing happened on January six, because
(38:43):
d C and the Capital wanted the d C National
Guard and definitely would have activated them and brought him
out hours before, but the federal government at the time
kept them from doing that because they were under federal control.
So that was one that really just kind of pointed out, like, oh, well,
this is harmful, this is not good. UM. The other
(39:03):
way that it was pointed out was kind of the
opposite of that, where during the Black Lives Matter protests
in the summer of after the murder of George Floyd
UM and people took to the streets in d C.
They were um, they were basically beating out of the streets,
harassed out of the streets, used tear gas on um
by the DC National Guard that was deployed by the
(39:25):
federal government. Whereas you can pretty much guess that if
Muriel Bowser had been the governor of the state of
DC rather than just the mayor and had the power
over the National Guard, those National Guard troops would not
have been deployed against those protesters. So both of those
events just in within months of one another, um, so
(39:45):
the protests were in the insurrection was in the beginning
of one. Yeah, that was this year. It's nuts, I think, really,
I thought seems longer. This year has been a long
decade him. But both of those, both of those events
have pointed out like because of that mutiny of three,
(40:07):
those things were able to happen the way that they did.
Really really interesting. Yeah it is so now you guys
know DC statehood. You make up your own mind about it.
But them's the facts, just the facts. And since I
said them's the facts, it's time of course everybody for
listener mail. I'm gonna call this baby shout out. You
(40:32):
don't do a lot of shout outs, but this is
kind of special, I think, because this is a future
shout out. I've been a long time listener and in
January I had a baby. Who is your youngest listener.
While I was pregnant, I worked as an assistant manager
local horse boarding facility near Augusta, Georgia, And every morning
when I fed the horses, I put my phone uh
(40:52):
in my phone belt and turned on stuff. You should know,
babies can hear nearby sounds in the womb. So Clara
has been listening as long as she has been able
to hear. Uh. Now we listen to stuff you should
know during our afternoon walks together. If an episode finishes
before it's over, Clara will sign and ask for more.
You know that little toddler sign like which is the best?
(41:12):
I know? It's adorable. I didn't realize it was the thing.
And then one of you's best friends, Um taught her kids,
and I was like, oh, that's really cool. Yeah. We
did some basic stuff. We didn't get too involved, but
there was a little bit of that early on. Man,
kids are so neat these days. They're so neat. Uh
not like us. We were just dummies. They're like, here,
here's oatmeal and a television we've played with the stick
in a wheel. Back to the mail. I would love
(41:35):
for her to have a shout out on an episode,
so one day we can go back and listen to
her episode. So, uh, Clara, your episode is on DC Statehood.
Maybe things will be different then? Yeah, wouldn't that be something?
That would be something? But this is from Karas Texador
and she just says, thanks for all we do. We
really helped build the long arms of COVID shutdown at
(41:56):
home with an infant and for helping making learning new
things fun. That is Carris Texadore. Great name. That's awesome.
Thanks Kris, definitely a great name. You sound like the
last Starfighter or something that's right. And hello little Carla.
I hope you keep listening in. Uh, I hope by
the time your twenty we're still doing this show. No,
maybe not by then recently retired. Yeah, I will be seventy. Yeah, yeah,
(42:21):
I guess that's right. Yeah. So yeah, thank you very
much for writing in. Carris and Carla. Best wishes to
you on a fantastic life. And if you want to
get in touch with this, like Harris and Carla did,
you can send us an email to Stuff podcast at
iHeart radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a
(42:43):
production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio,
visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.
Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of I
Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh
Clark and there's Charles w Chuck Bryant and it's just
the two of us. And that's okay because we are
here and we are ready to do this thing and
(00:23):
it's gonna be good stuff. You should not. That's right.
Waiting into political waters yep, no way around it, no
way around it. What does that DC license plates say?
Taxation without representation? That says it all, it really does.
I love it because it's so subversive, you know. That's right.
We're talking about DC statehood and why the District of
(00:44):
Columbia it's not a state when they have seven hundred
thousand roughly people living there, about two hundred and fifty
thousand of which were born and raised there. Uh, and
yet they don't get the benefits of statehood we'll talk
about for reasons that are kind oft I think. So. Um, yeah,
(01:09):
if you aren't aware, if you live in d C.
You you have some voting rights, but mostly, um, you
are very much limited or restricted as far as like
what you're allowed to do to participate in democracy, at
least compared to other states, right, and all of this
(01:29):
was like because of a layer, layer after layer after
layer of rules and laws and regulations that basically prevent
DC residents from voting or participating like other other residents
of other states. Um. And so this idea that like, wait,
this isn't right has been something that people have been
(01:50):
talking about for a very long time, and yet we
still can't reach this finish line to make d C
the fifty first state, um, which a lot of people is,
including most the people who live in d C want
they want to become the fifty first state. They want
to be a state, they want to be treated like
a state, and they just can't quite get it to
the finish line. But it's possible, Chuck, that we're close,
(02:13):
closer than ever, actually closer than ever, but still not
too close. If he asked me, well, we'll we'll we'll see.
I think we'll see. Yeah, we'll see. So let's talk
about how DC was even established and why all of
this is is like this hodgepodge of weird laws and
rules and where it came from. Yeah, so we didn't
(02:33):
have a capital as a country at first? Uh for
about um, I guess from seventeen seventy six to eighty nine,
the Continental Congress met in different places. They met in Philly,
of course, they met in Maryland. Some they met New
York City. Some they even met in New Jersey some
believe it or not. And in sev seven and the
(02:54):
Philadelphia Convention, they wrote the Constitution and said, you know,
that's really kind of beefed up the oral government, and
said we need someplace that's like clearly ours that we
will meet, that is permanent. And it was written right
there in the Constitution, Article one, Section eight, Class seventeen. Yes,
(03:15):
and um. Exactly where they were going to put this
new capital was a huge debate, Like everybody just presumed
it would be someplace like New York or Philadelphia, where
it was already you know, the populations were very established
and large, and where they had already written the Constitution,
and where a lot of the early founding fathers were from. Um.
But the Southern States said, hey, man, we don't want
(03:37):
the capitol all the way up there in New York
or in Pennsylvania. We need it somewhere that's a little
closer to the middle of this country. This string of
thirteen colonies along the eastern seaboard. So they came up
with what's called the Compromise of seventy, which said, Okay,
we'll place this capital further south towards you guys, but
you have to say that the colonial um debts obligations
(04:00):
that were accrued during the Revolutionary War, we get to
move those over to them to the federal government's responsibility,
because we these northern colonies are swimming in debt and
we just can't pay them off. So one of the
first things we have to do when we established this
country is laden it with revolutionary war debt, right. Uh.
And with the Residents Act, they said, you know, we
(04:22):
literally need land, like physical space, So Maryland, Virginia, pony up.
You've got to give up each a little bit, uh
to create this area. And um, I think they eventually not.
I think I know they eventually got back Alexandria Virginia
in eighty six, But initially that was a part of
the uh, the tranche of land and sort of the
(04:43):
very I think from the very beginning they weren't a
state because of something that happened that kind of feels
a little more contemporary of the past couple of recent years.
The the Pennsylvania Mutiny of seventeen eighty three when these veterans,
(05:04):
hundreds of veterans, stormed Congress and said, you know, this
is what we want. They were angry, we want back Bay,
we want this and that, and the Pennsylvania Executive Council
would not send the state militia to protect Congress and
they had to move to New Jersey temporarily. And so
they were like, this is not good. We need to
(05:24):
be able to be in charge of our own um
defense really, and so we need a federal land that
is not a state so we can have our own uh,
our own defense system, our own soldiers system. They just
saw that if it ever came down to, you know,
a federal versus a state kind of situation again, that
they couldn't rely on a state militia, so that capital
(05:46):
couldn't be associated or affiliated with the state, had to
be a stateless capital that was its own territory. It
made sense, It definitely did um and and it was
all because of that Pennsylvania Mutiny of seventeen eighty three,
because war veterans were oh back pay and they were
mad about it, and we're chasing Congress all over the country.
For it. So, um, so that's why d C was
(06:09):
stateless to begin with, like that, so that the federal
government could have its own jurisdiction over this this area,
over the capital, that's right. And uh in eighteen hundred
Congress set up there in Washington, d C. And like
I said, Alexandria is part of it. First Georgetown was
and still is, and they were you know, there were
port towns, so there was a lot going on there.
(06:30):
But for the first um several decades, d C was
pretty rural, uh, and didn't really start growing a lot,
and we have some population breakdowns, but it was really
post Civil War is when the population boom happened there.
I think in eighteen hundred there was eight thousand people there,
eighteen sixty seventy thousand, eighteen eighty a hundred and seventy
(06:54):
five thousand. That's a big jump. Yeah. And these are
you know, people that work for the government, and these
are also uh, free people now that came up from
the South set up presidents there and so d C
for many many years had a majority black population and
kind of right away, Uh, the federal government was like,
well that won't do either, yes, And so the reason
(07:17):
that they were not okay with it was because well,
at first, so people in DC have been agitating for, um,
what's called home rule, which is just basically, you're allowed
to self determine your own government. You can elect your
own officials. They can pass laws other people can't, like
out other people in the country can't tell you that
(07:39):
your laws are invalid. Um just basically the right to
sovereignty that any state holds right. So people have been
interested in that in d C since the outset. But
as you said earlier, it was a really rural and
small population for a while, so it didn't really matter
as much because it affected so few people. But as
(08:00):
the population grew it became more and more of a
pressing issue until um, they finally said, and I think
eighteen sixty seven, you know what you're you're you're totally right,
like we should we should let d C residents vote,
And they passed an act that said everybody in DC
can vote. And by saying everybody in d C, or
(08:23):
I should say every man in DC can vote, Um,
they were for the first time in American history, enfranchising
black men to vote. Like there had never been a
law that allow black men to vote in the history
of the country to that point, and that was the
first one that was ever passed. And so starting in
eighteen sixty seven, uh for a full three long years, UM,
(08:46):
black men were allowed to vote in d C for
things like federal federal federal government positions like the president
and vice president. Right. And when I said that won't
do that's what I was talking about, they uh quit
realized that you have a large city or you know,
a larger city now that is being controlled. You know,
there's a lot of political power with black people for
(09:08):
the first time, and this alarmed them. And so they said,
all right, we're going to replace this with a federally
appointed commission. And they did that really quickly, and it
was exactly for that reason. It was to read disenfranchise
black people. Yeah. There's a famous quote from a senator
named John Tyler Morgan who was describing it years later.
(09:30):
Why why they repealed that law and appointed that that
federal commission to rule the city? He said, And I'm
sorry for this, everybody. After the Negroes came into the district,
it became necessary to deny the right of suffrage entirely
to every human being, to burn down the barn to
get rid of the rats. The rats being the Negro
(09:51):
population and the barn being the government of the District
of Columbia. So what do you said? He said it
out loud, he did, and wrote it down like it's
in quote there. So he Um, what he's saying is
is that to keep black people from voting in d C,
they had to remove the voting rights of everybody. Um.
And that's what they did. And what's crazy is that's
(10:13):
how it has generally remained for hundred and fifty years
now for basically the same reason. Unfortunately. Yeah, it was
from the eighteen hundreds until nineteen seventy three, like I
was born and alive, when Washington, d C. Was still
(10:33):
a territory that had a governor and a ruling counsel
that the president appointed. Uh, they did have a single
delegate to Congress. Uh, and but that they were not
given a congressional vote. So there was a delegate that
could do the things that delegates do. Uh, they can
even introduce articles, but they can't even vote on their
(10:56):
own articles. No, no, they can. They can beyond can
middies and all that, like almost everything that a House
member can do as congressional member could do, but just
not vote. It's a non voting delegate. And so in
that way, like, yes, you had somebody who could advocate
for d C, but the the people of d C
couldn't elect somebody who could go vote on their behalf
(11:18):
in the House of Representatives. And that's just the house.
They have nobody and never have had a single representative
in the Senate. So the only representation that DC has
has is a single non voting member of the House
of Representatives. And that's it. Yeah, like constituents without a
real say at the end of the day. It gets
(11:39):
even far far worse than that, you know, because I'm
sure people are like, well, come on, you know, how
much does that affect these people? Really? Um, Well, we're
gonna explain exactly how it affects him. But one of
the big ways, if it stands out to me, is
that when um, the Home Rule Act was passed in
ninety three that said, okay, you guys can elect your
own mayor and you an electoral own city council. Bully
(12:03):
for you. There's this thing that we have to to
tell you about. Though it's not all you know, great,
every single law that gets passed by you in your
town is subject to Congressional review. It doesn't actually become
law until Congress says that your laws that you came
up with in past yourselves are okay. And that means
(12:26):
that any congress person, any House member from anywhere in
the country, who is offended by one of your laws,
who takes an issue with one of your laws, can
strike that law down basically single handedly by attaching a
rider to your annual budget. And so if you don't
like that writer, well then you you can do without it,
(12:46):
but you have to do without the money that makes
up about your operating budget every year. That's the kind
of like a drag Toonian rule that Congress holds over
d C to this day. Yeah, and this is why.
And you know, unfortunately this does wait into politics, and
we'll get into that more later. But like it is
kind of purely for partisan politics why d C is
(13:07):
not a state at this point. Uh. And it's the
ironies are pretty rich here in that. UM. Generally Republicans
do not want d C to become a state. UM.
But they're also the same party who decries government overreach
in states states rights. And I guess they'll say well, yeah,
but it's not a state. But it is certainly government
(13:29):
overreach when you have the local people of a terror
of a district voting there for their own laws that
their constituents want, but the federal government can override those.
And again you might say, like, what laws, who cares? What?
What's the problem? How are these people actually really harmed
with that? Well, there's actually like a lot of laws
that DC has passed that Congress has either dragged its
(13:49):
feet on or overturned that have actually harmed people. Um
d C had a needle exchange program to try to
slow the spread of HIV um and it was overturned
by Congress in and was not allowed to happen again
until two thousand seven. And it turns out that when
(14:09):
that was finally allowed to start up again, the HIV
infection rates in the city and by the way, d
C had one of the highest rates of HIV. After
its needle exchange program was was banned by Congress, um
it's HIV rates dropped by sev and an estimated hundred
and twenty people were prevented from being infective with HIV
in just two years after the needle program was allowed
(14:33):
to to start up again in two thousand seven. There's
also ones on abortion access COVID nineteen they got the
short end of the stick as far as funds go. Um.
And then there's another one where, uh, they tried to
repeal their sodomy law, which outlawed sex between men back
in one and Congress didn't let it actually go through
until there's just been a lot of stuff where basically,
(14:57):
if you have somebody in Congress who does and like
the idea of d C, the people of d C
having um legalized marijuana or being able to use taxpayer
money for abortions, like DC doesn't get to do that
because the writer gets attached to their budget and they
have to they have to take it. And that COVID
thing you were talking about, they um, every US state
(15:18):
got one point to five billion dollars in aid, but
Congress cut that in half for d C even though
they had Well, first of all, they're like, well, we're
bigger than Vermont, uh and like one one other state too, right,
And they're almost the same size as Alaska, UM, North Dakota,
South Dakota, and Delaware population wise. Yeah, and they were
(15:41):
I think had more confirmed COVID cases at the time
than nineteen other states, yet they got half the aid
just just because. Yes, so it's it's my numbing and
crazy and if you like, just put yourself in the
position of somebody who's a like interested in the political
process and lives in d C and the idea that
your city can pass a law huge like with huge support.
(16:05):
I think they're marijuana legalization, UM law passed with supportive voters,
and somebody from Arizona could come along and be like, Nope,
you're not doing that. That law doesn't go through. I'm
attaching that as a writer to your your annual budget.
How outrage inducing would that be? You know, how how
frustrating would it be at the very least. So, yes,
(16:26):
it actually is harmful um to the to the democracy
of Washington, d C. And their their self determination and
their ability for home rule. UM. The situation as it
stands right now, all right, well, let's take a break.
I think it's pretty clear where we stand here, and
we'll talk about the electoral College, just that little thing
(16:46):
right after this. Alright, So, uh, people have been allowed
(17:19):
to vote in Washington, d C. For elections for presidential
national elections for a long time now, uh. In nineteen
sixty one, they Radifford, that Radifford ratified the twenty three
Amendment to the Constitution that was specifically for d C
electoral College votes in the presidential election. That was when
they started to be able to vote for president vote
(17:42):
at all. That's right. So, so sixty sixty years is
how long the residents of DC have been able to vote. Yeah,
I mean when I said quite a while, it didn't
mean on the like the beginning of time scale, just
sort of oh, I didn't know if you're being facetious
or not. No, no no, no, I mean for many decades now,
but not Yeah, it's a guess. In that context, it's
it's an outrage for sure. And so that that that
(18:04):
twenty three amendment. That's the whole purpose of the twenty
three Amendment is to basically say, yes, DC can now
vote in presidential elections, and they can contribute electors, um,
but they can never have more electors than the number
of electors that the least populous state in the United
States has. It doesn't matter how many people DC could
(18:25):
swell to. It probably couldn't handle it, but it could
swell to the size of a two million population and
it doesn't matter. You get your three electors, right, and
it's always going to be three at the minimum because
you're a number of electors are based on the representation
you have in the in the House and the Senate,
so you always every state has two senators and every
(18:46):
state has at least one congress person, and d C
probably would always still have one congress person anyway, that's
how many Alaska has, in Vermont and Delaware like these are,
it's just based on population, so they will probably always
have three electors UM. And so those electors ever since
the I believe the nineteen sixty four election, the first
(19:09):
time DC ever contributed electors to the Electoral College UM,
those those electors almost invariably go towards the Democratic candidate,
right Like DC is one of the first states that
gets called on like those electoral maps during every presidential election,
(19:29):
and they go towards the Democrat. So if you've made
DC a state that's not gonna be a huge change,
like nothing's going to change, You're they're still going to
have their three electoral votes and they're probably going to
go towards the Democratic candidate for president. They're only going
to have one congress person, and that one congress person
will probably be a Democrat. But it's kind of a
(19:50):
drop on the bucket when you're talking about like four
hundred and thirty or sixty I can't remember however many
are in the House right now. But when you talk
about the Senate, now we get to the problem, the
partisan political problem with why DC is not a state,
because d C is and has been for a very
long time, majority black as far as the population goes,
(20:13):
in as far as their voting base goes, traditionally, Black
voters lean Democrat. That's as far as voting history goes.
That's typically the case for the last several decades at least.
And if you have to new senators that just did
not exist before, the Senate would go from a hundred
senators to a hundred two senators, and those two senators
(20:34):
were almost guaranteed to be Democratic senators. Will imagine what
two extra Democrats senators would do right now if you
had two more Democrats in the Senate than what we
have right now. Now we've reached exactly now, we've reached
the reason why DC is not being allowed to be
a state and why it's a partisan political matter. Right,
(20:56):
and here is where you're going to get into. UM,
to me, some very disingenuous arguments. Uh, that are just
it would be so much easier if they just talked
about what the reality was instead of disingenuous arguments that
everybody knows isn't the real reason. Uh, it's just that
(21:17):
That's the stuff I hate about politics in this country
is no one's talking about the what the real situation is. UM.
You know, some people they'll try and call it out,
but they So there are sort of two avenues that
have been bandied about over the years. Is basically the
two two main paths for uh, making DC estate. And
(21:38):
one is what you what we need to do? Is
the idea is that what we need to do is
shrink what is called the federal district to only the
buildings that are under federal control, like the White House,
in the Capitol Building and you know kind of everything there.
D c all the all the government buildings basically and
just make it that. Um. But no, no one lives
(22:00):
is there except for you. No one lives in these buildings.
These are office buildings except for the White House where
the president and first family live and maybe some of
the staff So one of the disingenuous arguments that comes
up is, well, we can't have a situation where there's
only three or four people, like let's say, living in
these places that get this kind of representation. Yeah, that's
(22:25):
completely disingenuous. Sure, and especially if that that president is
an incumbent running for election again, then that incumbent president
would have three electoral votes to cast for themselves. Right.
So so on paper, you're like, oh, yeah, I could
see that being a problem. Let's just give up because
of the twenty three Amendment and that cork that it attributed, right,
(22:46):
But there are a lot of like workarounds too that
people are like, no, that's that's a ridiculous argument, right,
Like the president could in fact usually does vote uh
absentee from their own home state. That's that's one. Then,
so if no electoral votes are cast, or if no
votes are actually cast in the district of Columbia, then
(23:07):
you there's no electors to be given, right, so you'd
have those three electors that just never didn't go to anybody.
That's one. That's one solution. Um. Another one is to
just take those three electors and give them to whoever
wins the popular vote regardless. Yeah, and then a lot
of people are like, no, you just repeal the twenty
three amendment if you make to see a state like
it's a one two punch, like they that's just how
(23:29):
it has to be. That's right. And we'll talk more
about some some disingenuous arguments and deconstruct him as we go,
but that's the one that seems to be bandied about
most most commonly. Right. Yeah, and you know, we've talked
a little bit about why it matters to begin with. Um,
we mentioned at the very beginning their license plate taxation
without representation, and you know, that's a little bit of
(23:52):
a snide license plate, but it's very true. They pay
federal income tax and like really high federal income tax,
so much that they contribute more than they received from
the federal government. One thing I saw, Chuck is like
I was like, well, wait a minute, can DC like
even handle being a state? You know, how much does
it get from the federal government? And apparently it is not,
(24:13):
in any way, shape or form, the the state that
or the area that receives the most federal funding. I
guess that honor goes to Mississippi. Of Mississippi state and
local budget is made up of federal funds thirty percent
for Louisiana, New Mexico, and South Dakota, pent DC is
twent so just a quarter of all of the money
(24:36):
that DC uses to operate comes from the federal government.
The rest is from local taxes. And DC apparently has
a little bonnet, a little flower in its bonnet, and
that it typically has a balanced budget every year too.
Oh really, so we could do just fine without um
being a state. It would be like, yeah, we should
(24:56):
still get the federal funding because other states get federal
funding too. But even if you kept it at the
federal funding they get now, they would be doing just
fine as far as federal law is concerned. They are
treated as a state. Yeah, they're not a state with
representation like a state. We already talked about congressional representation. Uh.
They you know, they can't vote on bills. It's uh,
(25:19):
it's really weird that you can introduce a bill and
write the bill, but not vote in that bill. Yeah.
And because constitutional amendments are typically what's thrown around about
making DC a state or not, or has been up
until recently. Um, it's kind of ironic that D c
wouldn't be able to vote on its own ratification like
its own statehood, like, because it cannot vote on constitutional
(25:41):
amendments because it's not a state. So it would basically
DC has to rely on everybody else to go to
bat for it because it doesn't have self determination. That's right.
You want to take another break and then talk about
some of the arguments for and against. Yeah, okay, well
we're gonna do just that, everybody, George, all right, So
(26:28):
we've you know, made our position clear that most of
the arguments against statehood are and these aren't our arguments.
I mean, like I said, any honest person will tell
you that it is strictly partisan political issue. It's because
they don't want two more Democratic senators in there. They
just don't. And um, you know, uh, that's their right
(26:50):
to fight against that, I guess, uh, and they and
they do. But it's disingenuous and it's an anti social
sentiment like there how somebody or some group of people
are expected to vote has like nothing to do with
whether they should have the right to vote or not.
You can't just keep people from voting because you don't
(27:10):
like the way they're going to vote. That is an
anti social act anti democratic. Yeah, it's both, and you did.
That's exactly what's going on right now. That is that's it.
They boil it down, I mean, get mad at us,
just like you did our gerrymandering episode or our voter
suppression episode. It's still the case. That's just how it
(27:30):
is right now. It's one of those political fictions that
it's anything but that. That's right. Um. The one of
the arguments is that it's unconstitutional to begin with. That's
why you said that. Up until recently, most of the
attempts to make DC a state have tried to come
via constitutional amendments. And here's the thing though, like there's
(27:52):
nothing specifically prohibiting d C from becoming a state in
the constitution. No, you had mentioned that, like some some
people are like, let's shrink d C the capital down
to just the federal buildings. Basically as ed who helps
us out with this one? UM puts it like tourists
d C, right, and that everything else commercial and residential
(28:14):
DC that would become the state and then that federal
district would become the capital. And people are like no, no no, no,
you can't do that. There's like a size requirement in
the in the Constitution can't change something like that. And
and people are saying, well, actually, there is a size requirement.
It's a maximum, not a minimum. It doesn't say how
small it can be, it says how big it can be.
(28:35):
It can't be more than ten miles square. Yeah, I
think ten square mouths sare mouth So yes, you totally
could shrink it. So just shut down that argument. But
but one more thing, chuck about that. One of the
reasons why they have abandoned a constitutional amendment making DC
estate is twofold one. That's a huge hurdle to jump over.
(28:58):
I think you have to have two thirds of the
state to ratify account. So first of all, you have
to get it through both houses of Congress, which is
an impossibility to begin with. And then you have to
have two thirds of the state, many of which are
controlled by Republican legislatures, to ratify that amendment to make
DC a state. So it's just too huge of uh
an obstacle to this amount. But also it's really disingenuous
(29:21):
to require a constitutional amendment to make DC estate because
since the Constitution itself was ratified in not a single
state that was admitted into the Union from that time
had had was was admitted through a constitutional amendment. There
are no constitutional amendments that that have admitted states. They've
(29:42):
all come in through congressional decree instead. That's right, and
well we'll talk about that in just a second more detail.
But another one of the paths that has been bandied
about a little bit is um well, not past the
statehood but passed to making it not a state and
ensuring it never become the state, saying well, why don't
we just make it part of Virginia or Maryland like
(30:04):
it used to be. Give it back to them and
nobody you know, you know who doesn't want that, d C,
Virginia and Maryland. Yeah, none of them want it. Maryland
doesn't want to assume those seven hundred thousand people. Virginia
doesn't want it. DC doesn't want to be a part
of either one of those. Like, the only people that
want that are are frankly Republicans who don't want it
(30:24):
to become state. Yes, because it might add a few
more electoral votes to Maryland or Virginia, but it would
not add a single extra senator. You can't have more
than two senators no matter what your population size. Again
the crux to the matter. Um. Another one is that
the idea that the city can't take care of that
federal property. And I don't think anybody who's a pro
(30:46):
statehood advocate says, oh yeah, yeah they can, that's just
not true. But they say, well, we wouldn't be taking
care of most of that property. It would be shrunk
down to be the capital, so it'd still be the
federal government's jurisdiction. People said, well, there's other federal buildings
outside of this little tourist area. How what are you
gonna do about those? And d C says, do you
(31:07):
know how many states and cities have federal buildings in
them that the state in the city takes care of
in conjunction with the federal government and with funding from
the federal government. Totally not a problem. I think disingenuinuity
is that a word? It is now, Buddy, is one
of my least favorite things to witness. It is because
(31:28):
it's just it's just dishonest. It's just a bunch of garbage,
like acting a certain like just call it what it is.
Is so frustrating, it's almost almost disingenuous. Um. So we
you mentioned earlier that no other state needed a Congressional
or i'm sorry, a constitutional amendment to become a state. Um,
(31:52):
the Tennessee model is sort of where DC has tried
to go more recently. The Tennessee Plan in se when
Tennessee as an a state yet, and they said, you
know what, we're tired of waiting around for Congress to
do anything about it. So we're gonna hold our own referendum.
We're gonna vote to become a state. And we passed it,
and then we're gonna write and approve our own state
(32:12):
constitution and how we're going to administer that and kind
of this is how we would do things. And they
did that, and then Congress is sort of like everyone
sort of sitting sitting there twiddling their thumbs staring at
Congress like we're all ready to go. Just unlocked the
door and we could become a state. And it worked,
and it also worked in Michigan, Iowa, California, Oregon, Kansas
(32:32):
and Alaska and so d C recently I think about
five years ago, said maybe let's try this Tennessee plan
forget constitutional amendments, let's just have a referendum. And it
passed by and they said great, let's draft a constitution.
And they did that and it was approved, and they said,
the mayor is going to become the governor's city council
(32:53):
will become the legislature, and here we go, Congress, let's
get this done. We're ready to roll. Yeah. And I
So this was in two thousand and sixteen that that
referendum passed and they started to adopt the Tennessee Plan.
And what sucks, Chuck, is that means that they were
distracted by that idea that they had to become a
state through constitutional amendment for decades, like they if they
(33:14):
had taken up this Tennessee Plan decades ago, who knows
where they would be now. They might be a state
by now. It's just so it's just it's really sad
to think like that that that work, that boondogg will work,
that they needed for years. Yeah, basically, so that's why
I'm like, I don't know, we might actually see it's
possible we could see d C a state. Um, because
(33:38):
this referendum and the plan that they followed where they
basically made themselves an instant state, like just ad Congress
kind of thing. Um. It came in just the last
five years. So for the first time ever in the
history of the District of Columbia, UM, a bill passed
that says DC is a state. Please go ahead and
(34:02):
m past this bill Senate, it past the House. Everything
else has been like, we're the House of Representatives and
we think DC should be a state, not a It's
just a like a resolution and support of DC being
a state. It's not an actual law. This is an
actual law that passed the House of Representatives. Of course,
it died in the Senate because, um, it was while
Mitch McConnell was a majority leader and he didn't even
(34:23):
let it come up for a vote. I I can't
believe it even made it onto his desk before catching fire.
But but the fact is that it did pass the
House at least once. And that is brand new. That
is definitely new. Yeah, it's amazing. And uh, it's amazing
that we have a situation in our on our modern
(34:43):
day government where one person can say no, we're not
gonna vote on this two party system does not work.
It's broken, it doesn't work. Yeah, it was reintroduced in
one just this year past the House again. UM. Well,
sadly in this case, it's probably not gonna happen because
(35:04):
Democrats can't agree on anything within their own portable irony
of the whole thing in it. Yes, it really is.
You mentioned two people earlier, probably would be the same
two people. That's what happen. Yeah. The only other question
mark is Mark Kelly no Angus King from Maine, and
(35:25):
he may be retired now, but yes, it is. From
what I saw, it would come down to Kristen Cinema
and Joe Manchin and UM both have not supported previous
like DC statehood stuff before. Other people who have not
actually didn't actually co sponsor that bill in the Senate,
UM have supported other stuff, so they would be expected
(35:47):
to vote yes. So it could come down to two
people again, both of whom Democrats, that would keep d
C from becoming a state. Now it's pretty interesting stuff.
What would uh different names bandied about over the years
that it did become a state. I knew that New
Columbia was what they were gonna call it for a
long time, but then you know, uh, in more recent years,
(36:11):
Christopher Columbus has become less favorable in in the eyes
of history, so they're saying maybe New Columbia is not
the right the right name after all. No, and I
didn't know this, but they they are. They plan as
part of that referendum, um draft constitution that was passed, Uh,
they would change the name. They would keep it as
Washington d C, but d C would stand for Douglas Commonwealth,
(36:34):
after Frederick Douglas, the abolitionist former. S I like it
in that neat yeah, d C. You know, I think
people they go to towards d C, which is a
lot of fun. We both done that that thing a
lot of times. Um, it is that. But d C
is a rich city with a rich history, uh in
and of itself, a rich history of music and culture
(36:56):
and black culture and great food and like there's a
there's a lot to d C besides the mall area.
Um And every time I go there, I try to
check out different areas and do different things, and uh,
it's it's awesome. We have a great, great time when
we do live shows in d C. It's one of
my favorite places. When we go to uh what is
(37:17):
it Lincoln and they give us us Lincoln logs. The pastry,
where did those come from? What do you mean where
they come from? What's what's the bakery that does those?
Do you know, I don't know. I think it's I
don't always just sitting there backstage and they're so delicious
and we always eat like ten each of them. They're
(37:38):
they're like Swiss cake rolls, but like the bakery version
of a Swiss cake roll. Yeah. So before we go, Chuck,
I feel like we have to talk about how some
recent events like really kind of have brought the idea
of DC not being a state to the four um
both of which occurred in actually, oh, like the storming
(37:59):
of the capital. That's that's one of them for sure. Yeah,
and I think that kind of harkens back to the
mutiny of seventeen eighty three and that uh there there
are some people who think it could it would have
gone down a lot differently if um, we had been able,
if if the government had been able to call on
the state national Guard like super quickly. Yeah, because the
(38:20):
national Guard, the d C National Guard is not under
control of d C, just like any other states national
guard would be under the state's control, which is why
that that's what Congress wanted it to be, Like, they
wanted DC's National Guard to be under control of the
federal government. Because of that that Mutiny of seventeen eighty three,
But the exact opposite thing happened on January six, because
(38:43):
d C and the Capital wanted the d C National
Guard and definitely would have activated them and brought him
out hours before, but the federal government at the time
kept them from doing that because they were under federal control.
So that was one that really just kind of pointed out, like, oh, well,
this is harmful, this is not good. UM. The other
(39:03):
way that it was pointed out was kind of the
opposite of that, where during the Black Lives Matter protests
in the summer of after the murder of George Floyd
UM and people took to the streets in d C.
They were um, they were basically beating out of the streets,
harassed out of the streets, used tear gas on um
by the DC National Guard that was deployed by the
(39:25):
federal government. Whereas you can pretty much guess that if
Muriel Bowser had been the governor of the state of
DC rather than just the mayor and had the power
over the National Guard, those National Guard troops would not
have been deployed against those protesters. So both of those
events just in within months of one another, um, so
(39:45):
the protests were in the insurrection was in the beginning
of one. Yeah, that was this year. It's nuts, I think, really,
I thought seems longer. This year has been a long
decade him. But both of those, both of those events
have pointed out like because of that mutiny of three,
(40:07):
those things were able to happen the way that they did.
Really really interesting. Yeah it is so now you guys
know DC statehood. You make up your own mind about it.
But them's the facts, just the facts. And since I
said them's the facts, it's time of course everybody for
listener mail. I'm gonna call this baby shout out. You
(40:32):
don't do a lot of shout outs, but this is
kind of special, I think, because this is a future
shout out. I've been a long time listener and in
January I had a baby. Who is your youngest listener.
While I was pregnant, I worked as an assistant manager
local horse boarding facility near Augusta, Georgia, And every morning
when I fed the horses, I put my phone uh
(40:52):
in my phone belt and turned on stuff. You should know,
babies can hear nearby sounds in the womb. So Clara
has been listening as long as she has been able
to hear. Uh. Now we listen to stuff you should
know during our afternoon walks together. If an episode finishes
before it's over, Clara will sign and ask for more.
You know that little toddler sign like which is the best?
(41:12):
I know? It's adorable. I didn't realize it was the thing.
And then one of you's best friends, Um taught her kids,
and I was like, oh, that's really cool. Yeah. We
did some basic stuff. We didn't get too involved, but
there was a little bit of that early on. Man,
kids are so neat these days. They're so neat. Uh
not like us. We were just dummies. They're like, here,
here's oatmeal and a television we've played with the stick
in a wheel. Back to the mail. I would love
(41:35):
for her to have a shout out on an episode,
so one day we can go back and listen to
her episode. So, uh, Clara, your episode is on DC Statehood.
Maybe things will be different then? Yeah, wouldn't that be something?
That would be something? But this is from Karas Texador
and she just says, thanks for all we do. We
really helped build the long arms of COVID shutdown at
(41:56):
home with an infant and for helping making learning new
things fun. That is Carris Texadore. Great name. That's awesome.
Thanks Kris, definitely a great name. You sound like the
last Starfighter or something that's right. And hello little Carla.
I hope you keep listening in. Uh, I hope by
the time your twenty we're still doing this show. No,
maybe not by then recently retired. Yeah, I will be seventy. Yeah, yeah,
(42:21):
I guess that's right. Yeah. So yeah, thank you very
much for writing in. Carris and Carla. Best wishes to
you on a fantastic life. And if you want to
get in touch with this, like Harris and Carla did,
you can send us an email to Stuff podcast at
iHeart radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a
(42:43):
production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio,
visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
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