Words Have Meaning

For example:

"Governments...[derive] their just powers from the consent of the governed..."

Those words meant something when the colonists spoke them to their British countrymen. They still mean something when DC denizens speak them today to their American countrymen. Compare the Declaratory Act of 1766 with the District Clause of 1789. Each asserted the unwarranted absolute authority (in eerily similar language, i.e., "in all cases whatsoever") of the national legislature over an un-represented minority of the national population.

Legitimate power depends on the consent of the governed. The opportunity to grant or withhold such consent (via regular free and fair elections) has been denied residents of the District for over 200 years. That omission of any opportunity to grant or withold consent, of any opportunity to be counted when consensus is sought, undermines the justice and even the very legitimacy of the Congress, the Courts and the Constitution itself in exercising power over the District.

Voting in the affairs of one’s native country is an inalienable right. “Inalienable” means something like innate, or inherent or intrinsic. One cannot sell it or give it away, and no one can take it away.

So it really is irrelevant whether someone would like to trade voting rights for the absence of taxation: it can't be done.

Whether taxed or not, DC denizens HAVE an inalienable right to vote. It is innate, inherent, intrinsic to their unarguable identity: citizens of the nation, part of the posterity of the original colonists.

It is the OTHER citizens of the nation who must at some point come to respect and recognize that inherent right of their fellow citizens in DC, stemming from their equal membership in the nation.