cities. The answer does not seem to be less self-government, but more intelligent self-government. Why could not the electorate, which could be trusted to send Representatives to this Congress if we had national representation, also be trusted to elect a city council? The goal of the League of Women Voters is active and informed citizen participation in government, and to that end we will assume our share of responsibility toward making a local government in the District of Columbia a complete success. We hope that this committee will report the bill favorably and that the House will then give us this opportunity.

Mrs. Kathryn H. Stone, first vice president, League of Women Voters of the United States, intended to be present today but was unable to do so, and she has asked me to submit her statement, which reads as follows (reading):

STATEMENT OF MRS. KATHRYN H. STONE, FIRST VICE PRESIDENT, LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS OF THE UNITED STATES

Mrs. STONE. The League of Women Voters of the United States, as a Nation-wide organization with 89,000 members organized in 720 communities, has long been interested in helping the citizens of the District of Columbia regain control over their own governmental affairs. In addition, we view the lack of suffrage as a national problem: First, because the government of the District now requires a disproportionate amount of the valuable time of our national legislators; second, because it has become an increasingly conspicuous and embarrassing anomaly before the world that 900,000 citizens in the Capital City remain voiceless and without control over their local affairs.

The people from other countries who visit the league invariably express their amazement at the total disfranchisement of the citizens of the District of Columbia.

The league believes that S. 1527, as passed by the Senate, embodies the best plan thus far produced for home rule. We like especially its provisions for the Council-Manager form of government, since we have long supported this form, and a great many local leagues have worked to establish it in their own communities.

Since your committee has for the past 2 years given such careful attention to the evolution of home-rule legislation, we hope that you will soon report out S. 1527 in order that it may be acted upon before Congress adjourns.

Mr. HARRIS. Thank you very much, Mrs. Dunn.

Are there any questions, Mr. McMillan?

The CHAIRMAN. Mrs. Dunn, where is your office located in the city of Washington?

Mrs. DUNN. I don't have an office.

I am a housewife.

The CHAIRMAN. Where are you from originally?

Mrs. DUNN. I am from Pennsylvania, but I have been here a long time. My husband has been here since 1923. My husband comes from nearby Loudon County.

The CHAIRMAN. You are very much interested in the Government? Mrs. DUNN. Yes, sir; I am very much interested in the city government, and certainly in this particular.

Mr. HARRIS. Thank you very much. We are very glad to have your informative statement.

The next witness will be Mr. Culver B. Chamberlain, representing the Central Suffrage Conference.

STATEMENT OF CULVER B. CHAMBERLAIN, ESQ., PRESIDENT, CENTRAL SUFFRAGE CONFERENCE, INC.

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Mr. Chairman. and gentlemen of the committee, it is my privilege to address you as spokesman of the Central Suffrage Conference of the District of Columbia, of which I am presently the president.

Since the conference, with its affiliated organizations, is in hearty accord with your committee's expressed wish to speedily conclude these hearings, to enable a prompt report to the House, I shall be brief.

Our position on the measures under consideration, and particularly Senator Kefauver's District of Columbia Charter Act (S. 1527), has been repeatedly made a matter of record before the District Committee of the Senate and this committee in the last Congress as well as in the press.

The object of the Central Suffrage Conference is restoration of the American right of local self-government to the people of the District of Columbia by election of their officials. This was anticipated by the founders of the Nation. True, the Constitution gives Congress. exclusive legislative powers over the Federal City. But "A municipal legislature for local purposes (i. e., for the District) derived from their own suffrage will, of course, be allowed them," said James Madison (The Federalist Paper No. 43). And who could speak with greater authority than the Secretary of the Constitutional Convention which framed the Constitution, Madison himself.

And what were the views of Thomas Jefferson? We need not guess. While Secretary of State under Washington, he was charged with supervision of plans for developing the site for the Capital. In a memorandum to the President dated March 11, 1791, Jefferson

wrote:

*

As there is not as yet a town legislature (i. e., for the District * * it would seem justifiable and expedient that the President should form a capitulary of such regulations as he may think necessary to be observed, until there shall be a town legislature to undertake this office (Pp. 561-563, Writings, Washington ed., VIII, quoted on p. 48, Jefferson and the National Capital).

It is significant that later, during Jefferson's first term as President, Congress by the act of 1802 incorporated the city of Washington, with an elective city council, which form of local self-government, with various modifications, continued for over 70 years until 1874. Congress could, and did, delegate its exclusive legislature power. It can and should do so now.

Then a reactionary and timid Congress, concerned by the influx of a huge unassimilated refugee population following the Civil War, and the activity of local "carpetbaggers," passed the Temporary Organic Act of 1874, abolishing local self-government.

Now, gentlemen, I trust that it will be unnecessary for me or anyone else to be obliged to argue as to the efficiency of democracy. Need I remind you that as Jefferson, Franklin, and Adams put it:

Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed (par. 2, Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776)

Have we forgotten that in the same document these same men, in their specific charges against him, denounce the King of Great Britain and his officers:

For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments;

For suspending our own legislature and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

Patrick Henry said flatly that "Taxation without representation is tyranny." I challenge anyone to seriously contend that these basic principles, on which our country was founded and perfected, are inapplicable today, here, in the District of Columbia of all places.

Democracy, like charity, should begin at home. Self-government is the very keynote of democracy. Without self-government, there can be no democracy, no possibility for the full realization of community responsibility and progress. Washington has been deprived of this right, the right enjoyed by every other American community, for 75 years. That is too long.

Will it be good for us? Gentlemen, I say to you that if local democratic self-government is good for Arkansas, California, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, and South Carolina, it will be good for the District of Columbia; if elective town and city councils are good for New York, Boston, and San Francisco, for Florence, El Dorado, and Oklahoma, I have no hesitation in predicting that they will prove equally efficacious for Washington. Return to us our franchise and we will look after ourselves, just as your constituents do.

Further, Mr. Chairman, were you gentlemen to return to your constituencies and propose the abolition of their elective forms of local government and advocate the form of government that we have here in the District of Columbia—, well if you were to undertake such a course, I will venture to say that, come another Congress, there would be a lot of vacancies on this committee.

Will it be in the interest of the Nation at large? It is urged in all earnestness that this country, these United States, as the great advocate of democracy, denouncing totalitarianism and preaching the virtues of our system to Germany, Japan, Italy, and Russia, can ill afford to present to the world the spectacle of maintaining an authoritarian regime in our National Capital. Why, our occupation troops have set up and supervised popular elections in Berlin and Tokyo. How, then, can these rights logically be denied to us here in Washington?

I understand that they vote even in Moscow. Are we less capable of self-government than the deluded minions of Mussolini and Hitler, the Mikado, and Stalin?

Permit me to remind you, gentlemen, that most of the important functions of our Government-the day-to-day conduct of our Federal departments and agencies, the detailed handling of national finance, budgets, intelligence, foreign relations are largely confided to residents of this city. They have served in our armed forces; they pay taxes. They are intelligent, educated, and responsible.

How, in all common sense, can it be seriously suggested that these same people are incompetent to manage our own domestic, municipal housekeeping? How high weeds should be allowed to grow; what to name new streets; surgery on living dogs; how to raise local taxes; regulate the practice of optometry and podiatry; and how late drinks

should be served here? It is respectfully submitted that we are quite capable of handling these and similar matters on a local level, thus releasing you Members of Congress to devote your full attention to national policy and legislation.

And, should we neglect to discharge our responsibility in any affairs of consequence, Congress would still retain full power to correct, review, and alter at will any sins of commission or omission.

Of course, the act as submitted is doubtless not perfect. But it is sound and workable, and, most important, provides for changes by normal legislative procedure as and when the need for revision becomes evident.

Mr. Chairman, let me assure you that we advocates of suffrage are not dupes of communism or any form of totalitarian regimes. On the contrary, we are merely advocates of practical democracy after the fashion of Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln, and Truman. Mr. Truman is for this measure, you know. We merely believe in the practical application of "government of the people, by the people, for the people," here and now in Washington, in the city named for the Father of our Country, who believed, fought for, and established these principles.

Gentlemen, may I remind you that this is a nonpartian issue, that provisions for self-government for the District of Columbia were made in the platforms of both Republican and Democratic Parties last year. This is a great social and moral as well as political issue.

Do we want home rule in the District? We only ask you to permit all of us to give you our answer by referendum next November 15, as provided in Senator Kefauver's bill.

The Central Suffrage Conference endorses the District of Columbia Charter Act (S. 1527) in its present form, designed as it is not only to enfranchise the citizens of the District of Columbia, but providing machinery for altering and improving local administration by a normal legislative process responsive to the will of the people. It is sound in principle and designed to restore to the citizens of the District of Columbia the right-the American right, the democratic right of self-government under the present provisions of the Constitution.

Gentlemen, we urge your committee's prompt approval and submission to the House of Representatives, not next year, not in the next session, not next month. Now! I thank you.

Mr. HARRIS. Thank you, Mr. Chamberlain.

Do you reside in the District of Columbia now?
Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. I do, sir.

Mr. HARRIS. What is your business?

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. I am an attorney at present, in private law practice.

Mr. HARRIS. How long have you lived here, Mr. Chamberlain? Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. I came to Washington in 1920, but I was in the Foreign Service for some 15 years and only took up my present residence in Washington in 1935. I was absent 3 years in the Army during the war.

Mr. HARRIS. In the Army? You were in the First World War? Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. No, no. I am just a GI.

Mr. HARRIS. That is a high compliment, and I want to pay you a tribute.

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Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Maybe I am not as old as I look.

Mr. HARRIS. Where is your native State.

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. I was born in Indiana; however, I largely grew up and regard and my parents as Missourians.

Mr. HARRIS. In Missouri?

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Yes.

Mr. HARRIS. How long did you live in Missouri?

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Oh, until I was a boy in the early teens.

Mr. HARRIS. In other words you have lived all of your adult life other than the time you were in the Service here in the District of Columbia?

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Well, no; I was in the Foreign Service in the State Department.

Mr. HARRIS. I said Foreign Service and in the Army.

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Yes; that is correct. So I never had a vote. Mr. HARRIS. There would be no reason you could not establish your former residence, with your background, either in the State of Indiana or in Missouri.

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. I am not informed on that definitely, and I rather doubt it. Why should I? My residence, my property, my business, my interests, are here in the District of Columbia.

Mr. HARRIS. So are thousands of other people who also maintain their voting privilege back in the State from which they came.

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. But, sir; there are hundreds of thousands of others who are not in such a position, among whom I may include myself. But, as I said, I have never had an opportunity to cast a vote in any such election. Now, do you think that a person who is deprived of any active participation in government can sensibly or realistically call himself a member of any party, when he is deprived of a right to participate in any political function?

Mr. HARRIS. Of course, that might be a reflection on some of the people of the District of Columbia who fail to exercise their rights. Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. That is right, but they are not provided with any voice in public affairs.

Mr. HARRIS. I seem to recall you in attendance at the Democratic National Convention.

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. That is true, and we also had delegates to the Republican Convention.

I will tell you, sir: When we are granted suffrage here, I shall not hesitate to affiliate myself with a political party which I feel will serve the interest in my views the best.

Mr. HARRIS. You don't deny this is a Federal city?

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Certainly not.

Mr. HARRIS. And because it is a Federal city, is there any difference in this city, as far as local interests are concerned, than any other city in the Nation?

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Fundamentally, I don't believe so; not so far as rights to participate in local self-government affecting local citizens. Mr. HARRIS. Do you indicate there has been no progress in the District of Columbia over many years?

Mr. CHAMBERLAIN. Why? In what term of years? Since its establishment?

Mr. HARRIS. In its history.