If you’ve visited the U.S. Capitol, you may have noticed many statues. Each state can donate two statues in the Capitol, by federal law.
As you learned in middle school, Washington, D.C., is not a state. That is one reason there is one statue in the Capitol. However, recently U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced that a statue of Pierre L’Enfant will soon reside in the Capitol complex.
L’Enfant was a Revolutionary War veteran and devised the original city plan for Washington, D.C., in 1791. Though traffic here can be a real headache, L’Enfant’s city design makes the nation’s capital simple to navigate.
In late February, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser announced the donation of L’Enfant’s statue, which currently resides in an office building.
In announcing the statue, Mayor Bowser said, “While we continue to fight to secure our full democratic rights as American citizens by becoming the 51st state, placing Pierre L’Enfant’s statue in the Capitol is a fitting way to honor DC’s 705,000 taxpaying residents and our contributions to the nation.”
This statue may not seem like a big deal to those living outside the “Beltway.” However, this is one symbolic step closer to D.C. statehood.
D.C. residents still are not adequately represented in the federal government. Our democratic Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton is considered a delegate and has limited voting privileges.
How about a senator from D.C.? Nope.
Yet, Washingtonians pay steep local taxes and the highest federal taxes per capita of anywhere in the country.
Heck, they even have “END TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION” plastered on both license plates.
And, Washingtonians have served in every war that America has fought.
As she has done many times before, Congresswoman Norton has introduced a D.C. statehood bill.
In Norton’s announcement of L’Enfant’s statue, she said, “With historic momentum as our D.C. statehood bill is headed to the House floor for passage this year, the L’Enfant statue is a potent symbol that D.C. equality and D.C. statehood are on the way. From the Speaker’s strong endorsement of D.C. statehood, to her unwavering advocacy for D.C. voting rights and home rule, she is moving the District toward the equality our residents have sought for 219 years.”
Norton is referring to the District of Columbia Organic Act of 1801, which took away the district’s ability to self-govern.
The next time you’re visiting Washington, take a Capitol tour and see the statues. One of my favorites is Norman Borlaug, which was placed in the Capitol by the state of Iowa in 2014. The father of the “Green Revolution” and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Borlaug was an agronomist whose work on wheat varieties saved a billion lives.
In addition to L’Enfant, there will be several new (stone) faces in the Capitol. Music legend Johnny Cash, evangelist Billy Graham, and civil rights activist Daisy Lee Gatson Bates have been approved to replace existing statues.
Editor’s note: Seymour Klierly writes Washington Whispers for the Journal from inside the Beltway.
