chief organized opposition to their program came from such large property owners as W. W. Corcoran and George W. Riggs, the bankers, who would have the largest sums to pay in special assessments for improvements.

In the lengthy investigations made by congressional committees in 1872 and 1874 of the conduct of the Territorial government not one shred of evidence was disclosed to substantiate the charges that Negroes voted illegally. Even the editor of the Daily Patriot, the opposition organ subsidized by Mr. Corcoran, was unable when placed upon the witness stand to produce facts and figures to maintain the extravagant accusations made in his journal.

At no time did Negroes constitute a majority in the Legislative Assembly of the District; the largest representation which they achieved was 3 out of 11 in the Legislative Council and 5 out of 22 in the House of Delegates. To speak of the Negroes dominating District politics at this time is grossly to distort the facts, since the Board of Public Works, all members of which were appointed by the Executive, was responsible for the financial chaos in which the District fell in 1874, it is clear that they have been made the scapegoats for the errors of others. While the substtitution of hearsay for facts is only to be expected of Messrs. Lait and Mortimer, it seems unfortunate that long-time residents of Washington should choose to repeat such distortions of local history year after year as arguments against the revival of local suffrage. The citizens of the District who are vitally concerned in the passage of the Taft-Kefauver bill would do well to investigate more closely the Territorial government and its operations so as to be equipped to refute such arguments in the future.

WASHINGTON.

JAMES H. WHYTE.

WASHINGTON, D. C., March 5, 1951.

Hon. MATTHEW M. NEELY,

Chairman, Committee on District of Columbia,

United States Senate.

DEAR SENATOR NEELY: I am sorry I was not in the committee room this morning when during the closing minutes you called for testimony in favor of home rule.

Attached is the brief statement I had planned to give on behalf of the Friends Committee on National Legislation and the Social Order Committee of the Friends Meeting of Washington. I shall appreciate your having the statement inserted in the record.

Sincerely,

LEWIS H. ROHRBAUGH,

STATEMENT FROM THE SOCIAL ORDER COMMITTEE OF THE FRIENDS MEETING OF WASHINGTON AND THE FRIENDS COMMITTEE ON NATIONAL LEGISLATION

(Presented by Lewis H. Rohrbaugh)

The Social Order Committee of the Friends Meeting of Washington and the Friends Committee on National Legislation wish to place themselves on record as favoring home rule for the District of Columbia. Whatever problems of detail have to be worked out to make such government possible, they believe that local self-government should be granted to the residents of the District as a matter of democratic principle.

For 300 years the Society of Friends has testified to its belief in the individual obligation of every man to seek the truth and to exemplify his belief in his daily life. Where men are denied the right to participate as citizens in carrying the responsibility for decisions of policy in government, where they have no voice in selecting their own representatives, and have only the costs of government to bear, individual responsibility cannot be transformed into public service and the best interests of both the individual and the government suffer. We, therefore, favor legislation which would once more grant to the American citizens who live in Washington the right to participate in their own Government and to carry the responsibility for their own regulation.

SUPPLEMENTAL STATEMENT ON HOME RULE BY GEORGE W. HODGKINS,
WASHINGTON, D. C.

A modified home-rule bill suited to the present situation, to obviate the chief objections and fears which have seemed increasingly to endanger the referendum adoption and the successful try-out of local self-government for the District of Columbia, should meet the following three conditions, which are obviously so closely allied that they will be met at the same time by a single type of bill.

(1) The bill should be made less forbidding and less vulnerable in its bulk and complexity, which are entailed by the effort to embody an extensive administrative reorganization with the basic home-rule set-up in a comprehensive new District charter. Although considerably shorter than some other recent bills for home rule and reorganization, the present S. 656 runs to 119 pages, which too few people can be expected to read carefully and understand. The extra bulk provides additional points on which objections and doubts may be raised, instead of concentrating on the main issues of an effective introduction of local self-government which various polls have shown the majority of local citizens desire although objections on details might cause many of them to argue and vote against any one particular measure for that purpose. In 1939 to 1945 there were several self-government bills for the District of 11 to 14 pages in length, and, while they may be judged to be a little too short to cover all that is needed, about 25 pages ought to be adequate for a bill which also meets conditions (2) and (3) below.

(2) The bill should provide for the try-out of the most essential changes, and avoid premature decision on many other matters which would have to be fitted into that changed situation in the most effective way. The District has had no recent experience with the operation of local self-government, and normal differences of opinion about provisions to be put into a charter are greatly in creased by this circumstance, even among persons who are confident of the success of home rule in general, and still more among persons who are skeptical and are inclined to look for and magnify dangers. The general plan of councilmanager government follows successful practice in other cities, several of which are well enough within Washington's population class for such purposes of comparison, but critics have been reluctant to recognize that fact. Moreover, there are some respects in which Washington needs special provisions in its charter, for which there is not really a satisfying precedent anywhere else. Wherever it is not practicable to postpone such provisions to later local or congressional legislation after other features of home rule are a going concern, they should be tried out on a tentative basis in such a manner as to give the best foundation for a permanent decision. Of course, anything in S. 656 is subject to later change on the basis of experience if the bill becomes a law, but its comprehensiveness and some features of its wording seem to give an air of finality which adds to the fears of those who imagine dire consequences with which we may be saddled permanently. These fears are increased by the present bill's emphasis on making a clean break from the present system, as in its frequent phraseology abolishing existing positions and agencies (even where something wholly or largely identical is set up in the place of what is abolished). It would allay such fears, and also smooth the transition to the new government, if the bill adopted the basic prinicple of continuing existing organs and procedures of government, under the control of the new Council and Manager instead of the Commissioners, except where expressly provided otherwise, or until the new regime makes changes it may be empowered to make.

(3) The bill should give added recognition to the home-rule principle by enabling the people of the District, through elected representatives, to participate in working out the more detailed provisions of a comprehensive and relatively permanent charter of government for the District. In the States it is cusomary for home-rule charters to be worked out initially by locally elected charter commissions. The setting up of a charter commission for the District has been suggested from time to time, but there is the difficulty that the District has no present elective sysem as a background for creating such a commission and for affording such a commission a basis of experience for decisions on many matters (as discussed above). Some of those who are opposing S. 656 as not providing "real home rule" in their special interpretation of that term have

objected in general as well as in some particulars to the inclusion of reorganization of the local administrative set-up along with home-rule provisions in the bill, and have suggested that decisions on such matters should be shared in by the District citizens more effectively than is possible merely by voting yes or no in a referendum on a completed charter. A bill that would do this should gain considerable support from those now opposed to or dubious about S. 656. The argument so often heard that national representation for the District should be a necessary part of or precedent to home rule should be met by prompt legislative consideration of measures for national representation, necessarily separate in nature and even in the committees which have jurisdiction over it in Congress; and also met by continued argument showing the fallacies of such a view and dispelling some of the apprehensions which seem to cause local residents to shy away from the responsibilities of an elective local government comparable to that of cities elsewhere and to seek refuge in the very diluted responsibility of a less-than-1-percent share in the membership of Congress and in the selection of the President as the controlling powers over the District. According to the tactics and the persons involved, national representation could be used to help or to interfere with the obtaining and the perfecting of local self-government, and nothing appreciable is to be gained by waiting for national representation if local self-government can be obtained earlier. On the other hand, there is much ground for believing that many persons in Congress and in the States whose votes will be needed to authorize national representation, will insist upon seeing the District successfully running its local affairs before admitting it to a full constitutional participation in National Government. At best, national representation would take some time to accomplish by the route now indicated. If a constitutional amendment is passed by two-thirds vote in the present Congress, there is still the process of ratification by threefourths of the States (which took almost exactly 4 years for the recently adopted twenty-second amendment, whose speed record is not likely to be surpassed by an amendment of much less active national concern and perhaps greater opposition), whereupon the matter must come back to Congress to implement in legislation at its discretion. It would be optimistic to expect that 8 years from now would see actual District representation in Congress by this route; and, moreover, if local self-government had not been installed in the District meanwhile, our District representation in Congress would be so largely occupied with local District affairs as to have little time and energy left to function properly as the District's spokesmen on those affairs which good "national representation" implies.

A relatively brief bill to give an effective but not an overreaching beginning of local self-government to the District of Columbia, and to promote the filling out and perfecting of the system as promptly as study and experience and public assent will permit, might properly include the following features:

(a) The present government and its personnel will continue except as expressly changed by the act or by persons acting in their proper authority and discretion. The most central change would be the transferring of the present powers of the Commissioners (and some additional powers conferred by this act) to an elected District Council and a District Manager chosen by and responsible to the Council. Other changes would be such as are needed to make the new government workable, are noncontroversial means of improving governmental operation, or need to be tried out as a basis for determining the best permanent arrangement.

(b) The composition of the District Council would be in line with best experience in council-manager governments elsewhere. A simple 2-year term has merit as not mortgaging too much of the future on the working of the first election, although longer, overlapping terms may later be adopted. While proportonal representation has advantages (and the precedent of successful use by the largest present council-manager city, Cincinnati), a simple election at large might be best as a starter for a hitherto voteless city and until we can get a line on how our local electorial groupings will actually shape up. Whether two Council members appointed by the President to represent the Federal interest in the Capital, would help or hinder the system, would depend upon the political habits which grow up around those positions; but their inclusion on a tentative basis might not cause too serious objection locally, might have some special value in the initial try-out term of the new Council, and would give us a

chance to see how the arrangement really works before we consent or object to its continuance in the permanent charter.

(c) In the hands of the District Council, the ordinance-making powers now held by the Commissioners should be expanded to include full municipal lawmaking powers customary in other cities, which Congress can certainly delegate without any constitutional question, and which might possibly be covered by a grant in general terms as above without need to specify such powers in detail. However, it would be desirable, in advance of enactment of a home-rule bill, to analyze the District legislation by Congress in recent years to see how it would be classifiable on the municipal or the quasi-State side, how much liability there is of controversy on this point, and how largely a grant of merely municipal powers would relieve Congress of its burden of current local law-making detail. The complicated and highly controversial system of "legislative proposals" (as distinct from a mere reservation of the right of Congress to repeal or override local acts under its paramount power) would be unnecessary if the effort to give the District Council quasi-State law-making powers is not pressed at this time. (d) The powers of the District Council should certainly include the making of appropriations from District funds. Since an elaborate procedure for handling the annual District budget has been drafted for the Auchincloss and Kefauver bills, and has caused little or no controversy, it may well be included. Whether or not there is included any definite formula for the Federal payment toward District expenses, and also any details of adjusting intergovernmental services and charges, the act should at least mention such Federal payments for general purposes (in lieu of taxes or however else phrased) and under special grants as becoming part of District funds in order to settle a congressional decision for the record that such payments are not compensation for lack of suffrage to be dropped when suffrage is granted. While properly safeguarded powers to borrow money should be in any permanent charter, it is not essential that full-fledged bond-issue powers be included at this time if there is controversy over adequate safeguards under a new system of government which the local taxpayers have not yet seen in operation.

(c) The appointing powers of the Commissioners will be shared by the Council and the Manager whether under arrangements specified in detail in the act or left in part to arrangements which the Council may set up. While leaving the appointment and removal of ordinary administrative personnel to the Manager or his subordinates or the merit system, the Council would elect, or its chairman would appoint with the Council's consent, any existing boards now appointed by the Commissioners; but, to secure continuity of government except where expressly changed to a different system, such appointments should be to fill vacancies as they arise by expiration of term or other usual causes. With regard to control or other relations with such boards, the Council would merely take over the position of the Commissioners plus the powers incident to additional municipal lawmaking powers delegated to the Council by Congress (including those incident to the enactment as well as the original preparation of the budget). Presidential appointments of judges and officials related to the courts, and of some other persons, would not be altered; but the Public Utilities Commission and possibly some other positions might be reviewed for possible change of the appointing power. One group of appointments now made by judges but not in the operation of the court system is the Board of Education; and there might be legitimate difference of opinion whether that Board should be made over at once into an elected body at this time, or even continued as it is until other things are worked out, or chosen by the Council (as to any vacancies arising) without otherwise upsetting the powers or the procedures of the Board until separate attention can be given to working out a permanent plan.

(f) The act should contain a definite mandate to proceed to study the workings of the new government and other matters leading to more permanent charter arrangements. The District Council itself might be the charter commission, but not undertaking much definitely in that line until some few months have elapsed, both to obtain experience in the operation of the new government, and to get clear of the initial complications of setting up the government and of adopting its first budget, which together should be enough to occupy the body during its opening months. The alternative plan of a separate charter commission elected for that express purpose might be considered. Either the Council or such

a commission should gather in suggestions, hold hearings, undertake staff studies, and submit proposals to the voters by referendum-preferably not waiting for one complete charter to be drafted and submitted for one yes-or-no vote, but permitting some provisions to be separately voted upon, with choice between alternative proposals where appropriate. Some matters would be within the competence of the Council or of executive officers to adopt and put into effect; others would be submitted to Congress for recommended enactment as particular items of legislation or in combination as a comprehensive District Home Rule Charter resting upon try-out experience and referendum approval already obtained from the local voters.

(g) In the absence of full-fledged representation of the District in Congress (which would obviously take several years to accomplish), the presence of at least one spokesman elected by the voters of the District would be helpful to Congress as well as to the District, especially in this formative stage of local self-government. This could be set up in very few words by applying to the District all the existing provisions of law about Delegates from Territories. It would hardly be worth while to set up a voting system in the District for the sole purpose of electing a Delegate, but when such a system is being set up for other purposes, it should be used to elect a Delegate as well. This was provided for in the Auchincloss bill that was before the House of Representatives in the summer of 1948, although it is not in the Kefauver bill. Under all the circumstances, the Delegate would probably be too busy with District affairs on Capitol Hill (besides his lack of a vote in the House) to constitute much national representation there; but his position there, if properly used by the incumbent and his constituents, could be made to help secure for the District a permanent national represenation to replace this obviously temporary expedient.

(h) For the election of the District Council, and of a Board of Education and a Delegate if those are included in the act, and for referendum purposes on the act itself and on subsequent charter proposals, qualifications of voters and electoral machinery will have to be set up. Most of these arrangements are of a standard type and have caused no controversy. The question of the permanent Presidential power of choosing the Election Board (with which might well be merged the board to conduct the initial and subsequent charter referendums) has been raised, but need not be of much concern in the initial setting up of elections, which may be altered in a permanent charter. Most controversial has been the dual voting provision, which must be recognized as just one solution of a dilemma. Possibly, if that provision had not been inserted, some of the people who are now objecting to it would have been on the other side, objecting that no consideration was shown for the numerous good citizens who retain a national voting right at their former residence so long as they cannot acquire one in the District. It ought not to be too difficult for either side of this argument to give in for purposes of a try-out. If the provision is regarded as temporary in the same sense as other provisions of a streamlined bill for try-out of local selfgovernment, and if the dual voters do not have any bond issue to vote upon, and may possibly be subject to some other limitations in qualifying to vote in order to safeguard against too much transiency, it might be preferable to include such persons in the voting as an innovation that is worth trying. Whether it is decided that way or the other way for the purposes of enactment at this time, the study of the operation of the new government should include some investigation of the number of persons who would exercise dual voting and of the effect which their number and inclinations would have upon voting results. It might be practicable to include them with a separate counting, in some of the referendums if not in voting for the District Council. The lack of any reliable information about such persons, whether they would seriously alter results if voting, or seriously reduce the local electorate if prevented from voting, has been a. handicap in coming to any decision about what should be done in regard to them.

The CHAIRMAN. This hearing on the home rule bill is now closed so far as this committee is concerned.

(Whereupon, at 12 o'clock noon, the hearing was closed.)