Absence of House Voting Rule Measure Disappoints Norton
By Mary Beth Sheridan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 5, 2007
Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) was sworn in yesterday for a ninth term in Congress, pledging to work for quick passage of a bill granting the District a full vote in the House of Representatives.
Adrian M. Fenty, the District's new mayor, joined Norton at the ceremony in the Capitol. He told her that he will organize a large march next month down Pennsylvania Avenue to Congress to press for a vote for the city.
"I'm very optimistic," declared Fenty (D).
No date for the march has been set.
Despite their buoyancy, it was not clear how much of a priority the D.C. voting rights issue will be for the new Congress. In fact, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) did not even give Norton the rules change she had proposed after November's elections, which would make it possible for the D.C. delegate to vote on amendments to legislation on the House floor.
A Pelosi spokeswoman, Jennifer Crider, said the speaker remains committed to providing Norton the broader voting power even though it was not included in the rules package the House considered yesterday as Pelosi initially predicted.
"The plan right now is to do that after the first 100 hours," said Crider, referring to the initial burst of congressional activity in which Democrats have promised to pass several key bills.
Norton said the change probably wouldn't be voted on until next month.
"I'm disappointed," she said. "But I've got to move on now to what we really want" -- a full House vote for the District.
Currently, Norton is permitted to vote only in House committees, not on the floor.
Norton was sworn in with the rest of the House members yesterday. Then, dressed in a bright blue suit, she and other representatives took the oath again in a series of nonofficial ceremonies presided over by Pelosi. Norton was joined for her swearing-in by Fenty, D.C. Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray (D), and several colleagues and relatives.
Norton said afterward that Pelosi had singled her out yesterday morning at a Congressional Black Caucus event, telling those assembled that "it is way past time for residents of D.C. to have their vote."
In fact, Pelosi is a co-sponsor of a bill, championed last year by Norton and Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.), that would create two additional House seats -- one for the District, which is overwhelmingly Democratic, and one for heavily Republican Utah.
Davis and Norton expect to reintroduce that measure in the next few days.
The bill got significant bipartisan support in the last Congress but never moved far enough along for a full vote. Many political observers believe Pelosi and some other Democrats are cool toward the measure, because it would almost certainly add another Republican to Congress as well as another electoral vote for Utah.
Norton said Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.), the new House majority leader, has promised to offer a resolution in the next few weeks changing the House rules to give her slightly expanded voting powers.
The rule change would allow her to vote in the "committee of the whole," which handles most major House votes -- except on the final passage of legislation. Norton had such voting power from 1993 to 1995, when Republicans eliminated it.
The rule change, though, comes with a restriction, as it did the last time Norton won it: If the D.C. delegate casts the deciding vote, other legislators can nullify the decision and request a new vote, without Norton's participation.
Stacey F. Bernards, a spokeswoman for Hoyer, said that both he and Pelosi support the rule change to benefit the D.C. delegate as well as full voting rights for the District.
"We are working to achieve both of those goals quickly," she said in a statement.
For his part, Fenty was taking no chances. Making the rounds of Congress, he buttonholed Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and as many other legislators as he could find to press for the D.C. vote bill.
"Everyone's here. Everyone's getting sworn in," he smiled. "It's a great opportunity for me."
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