We know the way -- we only need the will. (emphasis added)

"I believe that a civil rights program, as we must practice it today, involves not so much the protection of the people against the government, but the protection of the people by the government. And for this reason we must make the federal government a friendly, vigilant defender of the rights and equalities of all Americans; and that every man should be free to live his life as he wishes. He should be limited only by his responsibility to his fellow man."

"I believe that we should remove the last barriers which stand between millions of our people and their birthright. There can be no justifiable reason for discrimination because of ancestry, or religion, or race, or color." [or ZIP CODE?]

"I believe that to inspire the people of the world whose freedom is in jeopardy, and to restore hope to those who have already lost their civil liberties, we must correct the remaining imperfections in our own democracy."

"We know the way -- we only need the will."

Who said this? See below....

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4555422

But it's a very good thing, I'm sure of it.

Quote: "Although volume upon volume is written to prove slavery a very good thing, we never hear of the man who wishes to take the good of it by being a slave himself" -- Abraham Lincoln

Nor do we hear of any offers by Americans outside of DC to permanently relinquish their Congressman and Senators; neither do we hear any offers to "lend" the representation of a Congressman or Senator entirely to the interests of the unrepresented denizens of DC for an extended period.

But it MUST be a good thing for DC to go unrepresented, though, because it says so in the Constitution, right? So why examine the idea critically by weighing the pros and cons, or by examining the motivations of those who created the situation, or by considering the moral consequences of egregiously violating the very "first principles" upon which the nation is founded ?

Denizens of the District

DC: Separate and unequal since 1801; where America commemorates and preserves past societal injustices by continuing to impose them anew on the daily lives of some few of their countrymen trapped in this small and anachronistic corner of today’s society.

Equal justice under law is the motto inscribed above the entrance to the Supreme Court.

Word games? Equal justice under law. Does that mean the GOAL is equal justice, provided by and resulting from a system of law? OR,instead, (as more often seems the case in a legal system preoccupied by complying with every legal technicality rather than delivering justice), does it imply that the objective of rendering equal justice is only an occasional secondary outcome, “under" (that is, subordinate to) the primary goal of meeting every possible technicality of the law? And then, of course, calling the result, by definition, “equal justice?” The answer depends on what “under” means: does it mean “resulting from” or “subordinate to”?

As the Founding Fathers noted, in a legal system truly dedicated to equal justice under (“resulting from”) law, careful consideration of the “first principles” on which the system was founded ought to trump laws, and even constitutional provisions. These first principles include, among others, such concepts as “all men are created equal” and “just power derives from the consent of the governed”. Under such a system, when the “justices” noted discrepancies between provisions of the laws and the fundamental desired outcome, equal justice, it would be their right, it would be their duty, to point out such discrepancies, and to promote their correction by ordering a modification of the system of laws that led to the deficiency. And it would be equally the duty and right of those governmental representatives entrusted with making, executing, and enforcing the laws (that is, the legislative and executive branches) to then propose, implement, execute and enforce such changes to the laws as will most surely result in the desired outcome – equal justice.

Failing that, it is the right and the duty of the People themselves to make such changes in the system, as to them shall seem most likely to effect the primary goal – equal justice.

Slave, or indentured Servant?

Indentured servants are bound to do their masters’ bidding “in all cases whatsoever,”
during the term of their servitude. So are slaves.

A primary difference between a slave and an indentured servant is that the term of servitude of an indentured servant is fixed and finite, whereas a slave’s term of servitude is indefinite and, in effect, infinite, until and unless his master chooses to set him free.

So, consider now the more than half-a million denizens of DC. Bound by the overwhelming might of their masters and countrymen, as embodied in the nation’s Constitution, they are to be ruled indefinitely, “in all cases whatsoever;” to be forced forever to do their countrymen’s bidding, without any real say whatsoever of their own, in either national or local affairs. Should they be considered indentured servants, or slaves? Clearly, one thing they are not is a free people. They cannot be free until set free (if ever) by the “noblesse oblige” (q.v.) of their masters and countrymen, the American people.

This, we call “democracy.” Surely the Founding Fathers would agree.

Proposition

All citizens in good standing of a democracy ought to be permitted to exercise their inherent right to vote, ought to be conceded their inalienable right to equal representation at the national level, and ought to be allowed to manage their own affairs via locally elected government.

Corollary

Elected officials in a democracy who do not support the above proposition are by definition unfit for elective office.

Plowing

"Let me give you a word of the philosophy of reform. The whole history of the progress of human liberty shows that all concessions yet made to her august claims, have been born of earnest struggle. The conflict has been exciting, agitating, all-absorbing, and for the time being, putting all other tumults to silence. It must do this or it does nothing. If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters."

"This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress. In the light of these ideas, Negroes will be hunted at the North, and held and flogged at the South so long as they submit to those devilish outrages, and make no resistance, either moral or physical. Men may not get all they pay for in this world; but they must certainly pay for all they get. If we ever get free from the oppressions and wrongs heaped upon us, we must pay for their removal. We must do this by labor, by suffering, by sacrifice, and if needs be, by our lives and the lives of others."

Frederick Douglass, 1857
Source: Douglass, Frederick. [1857] (1985). "The Significance of Emancipation in the West Indies." Speech, Canandaigua, New York, August 3, 1857; collected in pamphlet by author. In The Frederick Douglass Papers. Series One: Speeches, Debates, and Interviews. Volume 3: 1855-63. Edited by John W. Blassingame. New Haven: Yale University Press, p. 204.

Equal Justice 'Under'
(ie, subordinate to?) Law"?

Minor v. Happersett

Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S. 162 (1874) was a United States Supreme Court case appealed from the Supreme Court of Missouri concerning the Missouri law which ordained "Every male citizen of the United States shall be entitled to vote."

Minor, a woman, alleged that the refusal of Happersett, a registrar for the State of Missouri, to allow her to register to vote was an infringement of her civil rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.

Decision

The Supreme Court of Missouri upheld the Missouri voting legislation saying that the proscription of male citizen only was not an infringement of Minor's civil rights.

The Supreme Court affirmed and upheld the lower court's ruling on the basis that the Fourteenth Amendment does not add to the privileges and immunities of a citizen. Since the United States Constitution did not provide suffrage for women, the Fourteenth Amendment did not confer that right. The court's decision had nothing to do with whether women were considered persons or not under the Fourteenth Amendment but rested solely on the lack of provisions within the Constitution for women's suffrage.

Still true today...

"If we are not represented, we are slaves."

James Otis,
American Patriot
c. 1764

If it's true for women, ....?

"That nervous suffragist who wrote to ask if Mrs. Julia Ward Howe had been separated from her husband is a type of a large class of good people, who might be a little better. What they need to tone up their nerves and strengthen the weak knees . . . is a good dose of pure unadultered principle. They call themselves suffragists; but, with every breath of adverse opinion, their faith wavers. . . . All they need is thorough conviction of the right and the justice, not the expediency of woman suffrage. . . ."

"Suppose you try the methods of the mental science people in this matter? Go into a quiet room, sit down, close your eyes, and repeat to yourself: “Taxation without representation is tyranny.” Say it over and over till the idea is fully assimilated. Then, when some one tells you that a woman out in Colorado sold her vote for a piece of chewing gum, or that some other woman does not darn her husband’s stocking, or that Mary A. Livermore never made a loaf of bread in her life, just shut your eyes, ask yourself “What connection is there between this eternal truth and that petty bit of gossip?” If you have half as much sense as you ought to have, you will be able to answer yourself, “None whatever.”"

"If every woman suffragist in the land were divorced from her husband, still “Taxation without representation is tyranny,” and woman suffrage is right. If every woman suffragist were a poor housekeeper and a neglectful mother, still “Taxation without representation is tyranny,” and woman suffrage is right. If all womanly loveliness were embodied in the remonstrants and all womanly unloveliness in the woman suffragist, still “Taxation without representation is tyranny,” and woman suffrage is right. The eternal principles of truth and justice are to be our guides and not the fleeting circumstances that seem to confute these principles. . . ."

--Lida Calvert Obenchain

Source: The Woman’s Journal (February 29, 1896)

Imagine . . .

Just imagine…

that both your state and your local community were completely controlled by outsiders,
from far away….

that any decision your state and local elected leaders made could be vetoed by those same outsiders, from far away…

that your state and local elected leaders couldn’t even spend your own local tax money without those same outsiders’ permission…

that you had no Senators to represent your interests…

that your delegate to congress, alone among the 435 others, was not allowed to vote…

that when decisions were made about national affairs, you, your state, and your community had no voice, and no vote…

that your own state and local leaders were even forbidden, by those same outsiders from far away, from spending your own local money to propose a change to this situation…

and, that those same outsiders from far away could even ABOLISH your own state and local elected leadership, and run things themselves, whenever they chose, without your consent…


Congratulations!

You’ve just imagined how the over half a million ordinary Americans who are day to day residents of Washington DC are forced to live!

But is this really how a democracy should work…?

Should Congress (or anyone else) have the power to rule “in all cases whatsoever” over “free” American citizens, when those “free” Americans have no say whatsoever?

Does “just” power really derive from “the consent of the governed”?

Can you really be called “free” if someone rules over you “in all cases whatsoever”, and you have no say whatsoever?

If someone rules over you “in all cases whatsoever,” isn’t that really called… “slavery”?