District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment - Effects If IT Had Been Adopted

Effects If It Had Been Adopted

Had it been adopted, this proposed amendment would have repealed the Twenty-third Amendment. The Twenty-third Amendment does not allow the District of Columbia to have more electoral votes "than the least populous State," nor does it grant Washington, D.C. any role in the election of a President by the House of Representatives (or that of the Vice President by the Senate). In contrast, this proposed amendment would have given Washington, D.C. full representation in both houses of the Congress in addition to full participation in the Electoral College. The proposed amendment would have also allowed the Council of the District of Columbia, the Congress, or the people of Washington D.C. (depending on how this proposed amendment would have been interpreted) to decide whether to ratify any proposed amendment to the Constitution, or to apply to the Congress for a convention to propose amendments to the United States Constitution, just as a state's legislature can pursuant to the Constitutional amendment process.

The amendment would neither have made Washington, D.C. a state, nor affected the Congress' authority over it.