Rohrabacher Makes Waves Fighting D.C.

WASHINGTON — In his five years in Congress, Orange County’s surfing libertarian, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach), has found plenty of reasons to fear for the future of the republic.

Early in his tenure, Rohrabacher worried about the federal government’s financial support for allegedly indecent art. Then he stewed over the economic impact of illegal immigration.

Now, Rohrabacher has become the lightning rod in a new controversy--statehood for the District of Columbia--which, on its face, seems to have little to do with the host of economic, social and environmental problems that beset California.

But the onetime speech writer for Ronald Reagan, who has thrown himself into this new war of words with characteristic gusto, says the fight over D.C. statehood is a battle that engages all Americans.

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Rohrabacher is using his seat on the obscure House Committee on the District of Columbia, which considered statehood legislation this week, to make his case. So far, the contretemps has landed Rohrabacher’s name on the front page of the Washington Post, and on the lips of radio talk show hosts throughout the capital region.

But the Orange County conservative says he is not in this game for the publicity.

“It’s not fair to give 600,000 people in the District of Columbia two United States senators,” grouses the congressman. “If D.C. gets to be a state, Orange County should be at least two states, if not four states, and I will move to do so.”

Five states have populations roughly the same size or smaller than the district’s.

But what earned Rohrabacher the enmity of many district politicians were his outspoken attacks on the district’s leadership, which is largely composed of African-Americans.

“This area is not working as a city,” the congressman says. “Who can take it seriously as a possible state? It’s nowhere nearly able to function on its own right now.”

In recent weeks, Rohrabacher wrote an incendiary “Dear Colleague” letter to the other members of the House, attacking the pro-statehood demonstrators who have blocked streets and corridors near the Capitol and Capitol Hill building where Rohrabacher works.

He referred to the city’s political Establishment as a “renegade government,” and called on fellow lawmakers to cut $17 million from the district’s $630-million federal stipend.

The congressman portrayed the demonstrations as “an unprecedented illegal attack on Congress by another government.” And he said the statehood movement is “nothing more than a political power play by liberal Democrats who want two more United States senators in their hip pockets.”

All of which has not gone unnoticed by Eleanor Holmes Norton, the district’s delegate to Congress.

“I regard Dana as a good friend, but he is certainly no friend of the District of Columbia,” Norton said in a recent interview. “He is a straight-out, unadulterated, far-right, partisan politician.”

Wanting to make herself perfectly clear, Norton added: “Dana stays up nights thinking of ways to go at the district. . . . He has taken this on as a holy cause.”

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The contentious relationship between Congress and the district dates to 1791, when federal lawmakers carved a 100-square-mile home for the nation’s capital from Maryland and Virginia.

In 1846, under pressure from residents south of the Potomac, on the Virginia side, Congress returned what is now Arlington and Alexandria to the Old Dominion.

One of the principal arguments for granting statehood is that district residents have been disenfranchised for most of the city’s history.

Because the Constitution made no provisions for it, they could not vote for President until 1961, after the Constitution was amended. Norton has only a symbolic vote on the House floor, and the district is not represented in the Senate.

With only brief exceptions, the capital remained under direct congressional control until 1975, the year after Congress gave the district authority to elect its own mayor and City Council. But Congress retains the power to veto legislation passed by the council or district voters.

Rohrabacher’s solution to what he admits are serious inequities is simple: Give most of the district north of the Potomac back to Maryland.

It is an answer that Norton rejects.

“Offering retrocession to Maryland is like offering the Ukraine to Russia,” Norton said. “The Ukraine wanted out, not in. And Maryland is very unlikely to want another large city, given the way that it already treats Baltimore. His alternative is less realistic than statehood.”

Rohrabacher vows to continue the fight. Referring to his assignment five years ago to the generally unpopular district committee, the congressman said: “They handed me a real lemon. Not willing to let them ruin my day, I’ve made lemonade.”