Norton Buoyed, Not Daunted by Today's Close D.C. House Vote in Senate (9/18/07)
Norton Buoyed, Not Daunted by Today's Close D.C. House Vote in Senate
September 18, 2007
Washington, DC-- Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) issued an optimistic statement and analysis of why she thought the D.C. House vote bill could still pass during the 110th Congress. Her statement follows:
Today the District got 57 votes with another sure vote promised if we had gotten to 59. No one who knows the lopsided, don't-do-it-or-die pressure suffered by four Republicans, who had said they would vote "Yes," can doubt that we are too close to victory to quit now. Too many have done too much to throw in the towel, with one year of this session of Congress still to go and a critical election year ahead in 2008 to work with. The House of Representatives, which alone is affected by S. 1257, has already passed this bill with the outstanding leadership of Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, and Majority Leader Hoyer's strong support and ceaseless effort produced unanimity in the Democratic Caucus. Rep. Tom Davis also was indispensable to this effort. Today's vote would not have happened at all without Majority Leader Harry Reid's dedicated and unyielding support throughout, or without his personal efforts that produced virtual unanimity among the Democrats. We need only two Republican senators to do what eight courageously did today - Senators Bennett, Coleman, Collins, Hatch, Lugar, Snowe, Specter, and Voinovich. We need two senators to understand what "No" means on a voting rights bill for a majority African American district in the 21st century. Had the bill moved forward we would have had more battles and would have lost a few votes on the bill itself, but we would have prevailed with a clear majority. In today's world, a "No" vote on even allowing the bill to be considered is so indefensible and shameful it must be reversed.
After all, the effort for D.C. voting rights in the House of Representatives was always a war. Like the battles that were lost when D.C. residents fought in the nation's first war, however, we are planning right now to see this war through to victory. We believe that like several bills that now are moving forward in the Senate for a second time within a few months after falling short of 60 votes, S. 1257 must and will rise again during the 110th Congress. We did not have the same ammunition that the Republican leadership used to win this first battle. But, we are not without weapons, and they only grow stronger now, especially as 2008 looms on the election horizon, with independents, among our strongest supporters, likely to decide every Republican and Democratic race. Residents and their allies are taking names and gathering resources, already making calls to critical states that we should have had, and did have until the day of the vote. Our allies throughout the country are targeting senators to help make voting for our bill help and voting against it hurt.
Too many have done heroic work to do anything now but keep on and rejoice that we came so close and use the momentum that is still with us, to go the rest of the way: Joe Lieberman, who has carried whatever bill empowers the District with unequalled determination, dedication and skill as if all of us lived in Connecticut; DC Vote, whose ceaseless effort gave the bill a base and a reach we have never had and expert leadership that has no parallel in our history; the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, our not so secret weapon whose influence with Republican and Democratic senators is unequalled and who made S. 1257 a "scored vote," i.e. a vote that has consequences, and they will; and those who have the most to gain - thousands of D.C. residents, many of whom had not been involved before, led by Mayor Adrian Fenty, who not only spared no effort but found effective new ways to move voting rights forward, and Council Chairman Vincent Gray who converted the D.C. Council into a formidable lobby for a bill.
One man stands alone however, and indeed was almost alone in carrying the bill among Senate Republicans. Orrin Hatch never buckled or even hesitated, when most men might well have, in his effort for a bill that was unpopular in his caucus. He could have thrown us overboard and waited patiently, hoping that Utah's time would come without us. A former chair of the Judiciary Committee, Senator Hatch's view of the constitutionality of our bill was critical to the support we received. I never doubted that Orrin Hatch was a principled senator because I have worked with him (yes, and against him) in the past. But, Orrin's sense of principle was unfairly tested during the last few months in the Senate. Yet, he did not blink. In a day filled with heroes, Senator Orrin Hatch stands out.