House Passes the DC Voting Rights Act
April 19th, 2007 by Jesse LeeThe D.C. Voting Rights Act has passed by a vote of 241 to 177.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi: “I take some personal pleasure in today’s proceedings because when I was born my father was a Member of Congress, he was on the Appropriations Committee and he chaired the District of Columbia Committee. At that time there was no mayor, there was no home rule, he was a strong supporter for the District to attain both. He would never have imagined all those many, many years ago that it would take this long to get a full vote on the House floor for the District of Columbia.” |
Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton (DC): “For the many that have come to the nation’s capital seeking freedom for 206 years, among them my great-grandfather, Richard Holmes, a slave who ran away from a Virginia plantation in the 1850’s, and settled our family here. I appeal to your conscience, and ask for your vote, so that finally there also will be a vote here for your fellow Americans here who have paid for this precious right many times over in blood and treasure.” |