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INTERVENTION BY TIMOTHY COOPER
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, WORLDRIGHTS
HDIM: INTOLERANCE AND DISCRIMINATION
September 29, 2005

Mr. Chairman, distinguished ambassadors,

Last week, I noted that the US OSCE Mission claimed at the Permanent Council last year that the lack of equal voting rights in the US Congress for the 572,000 residents of Washington, DC was a “supposed disenfranchisement.” That same day, the US Mission issued a written communication, rendering its statement inoperative.

We welcome the US Mission’s change of position and its de facto recognition of the fact that an entire city’s population is disenfranchised in America.

In its communication, the US Mission provides cursory background about our restricted rights. It fails to note, however, the many political, ideologue and racial reasons, among others, that have historically served to perpetuate our plight. These factors constitute discriminatory treatment and explain why a 21st century human rights violation continues to be justified—at the highest levels of the US government--by an 18th century constitutional rationale that has long since served its intended purpose.

We believe that the intended purpose of the US Mission’s material is to convey three subtle messages to the distinguished ambassadors.

1) That the denial of equal voting rights to Washingtonians is a constitutional matter, and therefore an internal affair of the government;
2) That a comprehensive solution that will remedy the human rights violations taking place in Washington may be forthcoming, thereby rendering OSCE’s intervention at the highest levels unnecessary; and finally
3) That the legal and constitutional issues involved in this human rights matter are so cumbersome and complicated that they are best left to the US to handle.

First and foremost, violations of OSCE standards are, as we have heard for the past two weeks, matters of legitimate concern for all OSCE participating states. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice noted this principle at the Parliamentary Assembly in July when she said, “Regrettably, the governments of some OSCE states…. reject OSCE's offers of assistance, charging interference in their internal affairs. That was a false charge when the Soviets made it and it is a false charge now."

In light of the Secretary of State’s remark, the US should welcome the OSCE’s deeper intervention into this matter, if for no other reason than to demonstrate that OSCE states “west of Vienna” are treated equally to those “east of Vienna.”

Secondly, the US Mission appears to be inferring that four bills stuck in Congress-- mostly for years and years, with no genuine prospects for passage-- obviate the OSCE’s need for heightened involvement. They do not.

According to our nonvoting Delegate in Congress, she has introduced a bill to remedy the OSCE violations every year for 8 years, and it has yet to come up for a vote. She has 74 cosponsors. A second bill has only 1 cosponsor. A third bill, which wasn’t introduced this year, but has been introduced almost every year for 14 years, has never come up for a vote, and after all this time has only 8 cosponsors. A fourth bill, introduced last year for the first time, would grant the residents of Washington only one vote in the US Congress. It would concretize the rather novel principle of one person, one-third vote, and fail international human rights standards, which call for equal voting rights.

This is why the OSCE’s intervention is required at the highest levels.

Finally, while it is true that these are complicated constitutional and legal matters, this is not the issue. What is at issue is the categorical absence of good faith to remedy US OSCE violations. Good faith on the part of the vast majority of Republicans in Congress, good faith on the part of the President of the United States, and good faith on the part of even a few recalcitrant Democrats.

This is why we are where we are today. The truth is, there are no constitutional impediments to granting us equal rights; but historically the US constitution, which is in and of itself discriminatory against us, is invoked by political opponents as an excuse to do nothing—nothing at all. It is used to veil the deep prejudices that lie beneath the surface of the politics of our disenfranchisement. And here we come to real discrimination: We are denied the right to vote fully in Congress because we are a majority Democratic city, a majority African-American city, and a majority Liberal city.

There is no rational basis under the constitution today to deny use equal voting rights—even a US Federal Court has stipulated this. The only reason we go without rights is because discrimination is alive and well against the people of Washington, and because we don’t have an equal voice in Congress to help us get what we lack.

Thank you.