District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment

The District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment was a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution. It has officially expired and, therefore, is no longer subject to possible ratification by the state legislatures.

Text of the Amendment

The full text of the District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment reads:

Section 1- For purposes of representation in the Congress, election of the President and Vice President, and article V of this Constitution, the District constituting the seat of government of the United States shall be treated as though it were a State.

Section 2- The exercise of the rights and powers conferred under this article shall be by the people of the District constituting the seat of government, and as shall be provided by the Congress.

Section 3- The twenty-third article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.

Section 4- This article shall be inoperative, unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission.

History in Congress

The District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment was presented to the state legislatures for consideration by the 95th Congress in the form of House Joint Resolution No. 554, offered by California Democrat Don Edwards.

Representative Edwards' joint resolution was approved by the United States House of Representatives on March 2, 1978, with a vote of 289 yeas, 127 nays and 18 "not voting" (124 Congressional Record 5272-5273). It was then approved by the United States Senate on August 22, 1978, with a vote of 67 yeas, 32 nays and 1 "not voting" (124 Congressional Record 27260). And with that, the District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment was offered to the state legislatures for consideration, as prescribed by Article V of the Constitution. In accordance with the United States Supreme Court's ruling in the 1921 case of Dillon v. Gloss (256 U.S. 368), Congress chose to place a seven-year deadline upon the measure's consideration by the state legislatures.

Ultimately, the District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment failed because it was not ratified by the legislatures of at least 38 U.S. states when the August 22, 1985, deadline—specified in the text of the proposed Amendment itself (fourth and final section)—had arrived.

Effect of the Amendment had it been ratified

Had it succeeded, the District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment would have repealed the 23rd Amendment. The 23rd Amendment does not allow the District of Columbia to have more electoral votes "than the least populous State"; nor does it grant Washington, D.C. an official role in the unusual scenario of an election of a President by the House of Representative (or that of Vice-President in the Senate). The District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment, by contrast, would have granted to the District of Columbia the full voting rights of a state. Specifically, it would have given Washington, D.C. full representation in both Houses of the United States Congress in addition to full participation in the Electoral College. The proposed amendment would have also allowed the Washington D.C. City Council, the Congress, or the people of Washington D.C. (depending on how this proposed amendment would have been interpreted) to decide whether to ratify any proposed amendment to the Constitution on an equal footing as a State's legislature pursuant to Article V of the Constitution or to apply to Congress for a national convention to propose amending the Constitution.

Other attempts to alter the political status of the nation's capital

In 1980, voters in the District of Columbia approved a call for a local constitutional convention to be prepared for a new state, to be called New Columbia. The product of that convention—the statehood constitution—was adopted by the city's voters in 1982. Provisions of the statehood constitution are still upheld in the electing of an unofficial "shadow" United States Senator to lobby Congress on behalf of interests of importance to Washington, D.C.

Response of the state legislatures

Requiring the approvals of lawmakers in at least 38 of the 50 states, the District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment was ratified by the legislatures of only the following 16 states:

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Text of the Amendment

History in Congress

Effect of the Amendment had it been ratified

Other attempts to alter the political status of the nation's capital

Response of the state legislatures

See also