Demos may revive 4th Utah House seat bill

House Democratic leaders are discussing a resurrecting a thought-to-be-dead bill that would give Utah a fourth U.S. House seat and give the District of Columbia a House seat with full voting rights.

The leaders are considering maneuvering around opposition by adding it to a must-pass defense-spending bill.

A hint came Thursday during House floor discussion about upcoming schedules. Republican Chief Deputy Whip Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., asked Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., if rumors were true that the defense appropriations bill would include the D.C. vote bill.

"I've heard discussion," Hoyer replied. "I will continue to fight to find any way to bring that to the floor."

Congressional Quarterly reported Friday that D.C.'s non-voting delegate, Eleanor Holmes Norton, said the idea came from House Appropriations Committee members. But she said no decision has been made, and other ways to revive the bill are also being considered.

Congressional Quarterly said House Democrats used similar strategy earlier this month to expand the definition of federal hate crimes by attaching it to a House-Senate defense-authorization-bill conference report.

The Senate in February passed its version of the bill to give the heavily Democratic D.C. a long-sought House seat with full voting rights and give heavily Republican Utah a fourth House seat at the same time as a political counterweight.

However, the Senate included an amendment that would repeal many of D.C's strict gun-control laws, including erasing its ban on semiautomatic weapons and dropping its criminal penalties for possessing unregistered firearms.

House leaders had hoped to remove that amendment in a House version of the bill and keep it out in a House-Senate conference. However, allies of the National Rifle Association made clear they likely have enough support to retain that measure if it comes to a vote on the House floor.

So the original bill stalled as D.C. officials split about whether they want a full-voting-rights House seat at the cost of possibly losing their gun-control laws, or keeping the gun control and losing a shot at full House voting rights.

The bill is supported by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah. However, Utah Republicans Sen. Bob Bennett and Reps. Jason Chaffetz and Rob Bishop oppose it.

Chaffetz especially contends the bill is unconstitutional because the Constitution allows House representation only for states, and D.C. is not a state.

Hatch, however, said the Constitution also allows federal taxation and jury trials only for residents of states, but courts have ruled such language also applies to D.C.

Hatch noted that Congress allowed D.C. residents from 1790 to 1800 to vote for senators and representatives in Maryland and Virginia, from which D.C. had been extracted. He said if Congress could allow D.C. residents to vote for members of Congress then, it can do it now, too.

If the bill passes, it could give Utah an extra seat in elections next year. Even without that, the state is likely to gain an extra seat in 2012 (after the 2010 Census) because of population growth in the past decade.

e-mail: lee@desnews.com