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Posted: 2:50 PM- WASHINGTON - If there's one thing proven in the debate over giving Utah a fourth congressional seat and the District of Columbia its first full-voting member is that constitutional scholars can completely disagree on what passes muster with the nation's founding document.
For some, the bill is patently wrong, "the most premeditated unconstitutional act by Congress in decades," as one professor has repeatedly testified.
For others, it's clear the founding fathers didn't intend for nearly 600,000 residents of the nation's capital to go without representation in Congress.
Wednesday, several scholars testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the measure primarily meant to give the largely Democratic district a voice in Congress but balanced with a seat for Republican-dominated Utah.
"Make no mistake: We are on uncharted territory," Patricia Wald, former chief judge of the U. S. Court Appeals for the District of Columbia, said in testimony submitted to the committee. Still, she added, "In such a landscape, Congress is justified in concluding the balance tilts in favor of recognizing for D.C. residents the most basic right of all democratic societies, the right to vote for one's leaders."
Despite the credentialed witnesses - a congressional researcher, a Harvard law school professor, a Department of Justice lawyer - the opinions varied widely.
"Despite the best of motivations, the bill is fundamentally flawed on a constitutional level and would only serve to needlessly delay true reform for district residents," Jonathon Turley, a professor of public interest law at George Washington University School of Law, said in prepared testimony. "Indeed, considerable expense would likely come from an inevitable and likely successful legal challenge - all for a bill that would achieve only partial representational status."
There are stock arguments on both sides of the legislation. Those against argue that the Constitution says members of Congress shall be elected by the "people of the several states," and the District of Columbia is not a state. Supporters of the bill say that's true, but that if the district is treated like a state for other purposes - such as paying federal taxes, serving on federal juries, etc. - then Congress can certainly grant the residents there a full-voting member.
Charles Ogletree, a Harvard Law School professor, said that "granting the District of Columbia a voting representative is so clearly within Congress' power, that the more appropriate question for all of us to ponder might be: Why has it taken so long?"
Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, testified that the legislation would help right a bad decision by the Census Bureau when it did not to count some 11,000 Utahns serving missions abroad for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The state fell short 800 people to get a fourth member of Congress.
"This legislation puts Utah on a path to remedy a flawed decision," Cannon told the Senate committee. "This act ensures adequate representation both in Utah and in the District of Columbia, and it does so constitutionally."
Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff also testified before the committee that the DC-Utah bill is constitutional and would fix an injustice that has left Utahns under-represented in Congress.
The measure still faces strong opposition from some senators concerned about the bill's validity. And President Bush's advisers have said they would advise him to veto it should the legislation pass.
If, however, the measure becomes law, Utah would elect a fourth member in 2008 and the new member would be seated in 2009.
Utah Senate Majority Leader Curt Bramble, R-Provo, attended Wednesday's hearing and vowed that if the bill passes, the state Legislature would stick to the four-seat map approved last year.
That map puts Utah's lone Democrat in Congress, Jim Matheson, in a more liberal district while creating three solidly Republican seats.
The Senate Judiciary Committee does not plan to vote on the DC-Utah legislation. The bill is likely to get a vote in another Senate committee.
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