Evening Exchange; Eleanor Holmes Norton

A congressman who fights for voting rights for the District of Columbia next evening x J. Hi I'm Kojo and she is the non-voting delegate from the District of Columbia to the United States House of Representatives. She's author of numerous bills in the measurements of several emerging in the law. Among her many accomplishments named the first woman to chair the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. She has overseen legislation that allows any district resident to attend any public U.S. college at in-state tuition rates. She is Eleanor Holmes Norton. Congresswoman Norton welcome to evening exchange. Thank you will be with you. When you grew up in the District of Columbia at a time when the city was a segregated city. Yes and that was the only part of growing up in the district that was not one. Because this was a wonderful city to grow up in with the home of

the black intelligencia in no small part because Howard University was it was the home of the best public high school in the African-American children in the United States and the first such school Godhra high school. My smile my motto was the very proud aspiring black community that we are that if in fact we educated our children even in a segregated city in society they would be able to compete anywhere any time. Is segregation one of the phenomena that show you will that believe have we in effect lost some of that enthusiasm for education as a result of the gains that we have made in other aspects of society. I would never attribute our hour.

Progress in any way to our problems for example in education what happens in history is. As his friend and his great improvements it it then puts great burdens of issues and problems on us. It was not in their bonnet and in segregated Washington. It was a city where there was less crime to be sure. But it was also a city of very few opportunities where blacks were grateful where there was work in the federal government. But. If I may say so in the bowels of the federal government where there were two or three occupations that blacks could aspire to professionally my mother went back to school to become a school teacher. That was one of the few professions my father graduated from Terre law school but never practiced law

because essentially there weren't opportunities here unless you wanted to represent criminal defendants. There really wasn't the kind of opportunities that are available today as for example. Youngster graduates from high school and takes advantage of my bill the one you described $10000 for every youngster who graduates from high school and gets in any public college in religion or throughout the United States my goodness we the world had just been created for that and it's good. The changes are wonderful. And yes we look back over our shoulders but it's interesting. You'll never find me and great nostalgia days in the civil rights movement or the good old days of Dunbar when everybody went to college and did virtually. Because I think that means that you're not going to press forward to meet the new challenges of the time the new challenges today are

even greater. For many in our community when they were for those of us who live in segregated our lives didn't mean that back then the were not very difficult decisions to make Allow me to jump forward a little bit. Eleanor Holmes Norton having becoming a lawyer become a lawyer and working with the ACLU and despite the fact that you grew up in a segregated city dedicated the earlier part of your life towards fighting against racism and segregation. You once as an ACLU lawyer defended George Wallace the segregationist governor of the state of Alabama. Most of our viewers probably don't know about that. I bet he and George Washington. George Wallace was very surprised that it was the height of the civil rights movement. And we frankly were on the forefront of First Amendment cases we had arrested for opening our miles when gauging infants for heating so we were making the first amend the law of the United States of America

for the first time. Most of those cases for the first time. And the other side would say Shut them up shut him down. Course once the Supreme Court says that black people are entitled to free speech then of course but the bottom dollar white white people are too. What how do you make the point that black people had nothing except their free speech. Frederick Douglass had nothing except his eloquence. Fannie Lou Hamer had nothing that's my read of what you meant or accept her speech. How do you make that point to make white people understand it. And black people understand well that I was an ACLU lawyer assistant legal director of the national office and I was in New York the New York office came to me and as a joke and said Elena you know if I deny Shea Stadium a public facility for WALLACE During the presidential campaign I'd like to go out to the Supreme Court I thought wow would be great.

And when I looked there and I was I argued the First Amendment part. They argued the rest of it was easy case to call his First Amendment law was well settled at the time and by the way. That's when I with it was in the York my children were born there. John Lindsay the mayor Republican mayor of New York then the Republican mayor of New York we called him a fusion mayor like LaGuardia. Democrats and Republicans He year later asked me to be his human rights commissioner. I mean I'm I'm not but I was proud of my colleagues in the civil rights movement because that's when I was going around and speaking and would do Nonviolent Coordinating Committee still in an era. You didn't become anathema. Not only that people would introduce me said This is the system that Reverend that George Wallace needed to have represent him. It is reason for this is that a job as commissioner of human

rights in New York. It would appear is what led to your appointment as chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. You know it is and interestingly it's it with not so much that the substance of the job the job I'm very proud of the kinds of things that we were able to do in New York like the acting affirmative action and new techniques to keep people from moving out as black people moved in. But my heart be recognized by President Carter with our reduced the backlog of cases. Oh yeah and the equal employment opportunity here with what you heard in that city. If you need a manager ask me. OK I was constitutional lawyer and it was one of the highlights of my career able to sit down and figure out how to reduce the backlog so that we could get to the law. And as long as you were girding cases one on one cases you couldn't get through the systems of law

that will keep our folks and women and others like us from getting jobs for 20 years. Walter Fauntroy represented the District of Columbia. My good friend the Congress of the United States. And then he decided to go on to other things. You decided to run for that office was not there easily. Because when I left the EEOC I decided that what I really want to do was think and write and I went on the tenure track. At Georgetown University Law Center and I got tenure. Now today I teach one seminar there and I joke to my students that I come back to teach it at Georgetown because it was harder to get tenure than it was to get elected. That's OK. It really felt like it. What it says is that once you go through neighbor whining and peer review work that you have the right don't give it to you tonight.

Now your teacher that's where you all issue out of the yeah that's where you buy your beef or the regular they can divide are you. That's what 10 years on when it's kind of like being on the Supreme Court. That's right yeah. We're different but yeah I was there or was a side run for mayor. I thought did cross my mind. We crossed the mind of a few folks including Donna Brazil who had was a good friend but. And by the way very practiced even then very young but practiced in political office what I remember from the early 70s. Yes he actually was you know he'd never march here and gonna convince me to run. It took me months to decide in my opinion. And so but I have to tell you I have never turned back. Never regretted never regretted this native Washingtonian. Some people would say why this is a position in which you don't have a

vote in the U.S. Congress. And for people who have not been in Washington a long time if you have a vote then you can make deals with other member of Congress to get what you want for your constituents. If you don't have a vote you have absolutely no leverage is that you know with nobody makes deals in order to get things for their members and the reason they don't is if you don't vote your district your district will vote you out. So it is seldom that people will go to the other side for that reason they may. And I have many deals with Republicans. What do you bet that's come from searching out Republicans that that that that I can do business with code you know you introduced me as a non-voting delegate. That's true. Non-voting on the floor but I vote in committee and am on three important committees. This is a year when I had been in Congress one term that figured out which you don't have to be a constitutional lawyer to grab that is in

fact a vote in committee and there was something called the Committee of the whole where almost all the votes were taken that was created by Congress just like the committees I vote on. I should be able to vote on the floor in the committee of the whole wrote a memo that's huge progress where power was so shocked they had to send it to an outside lawyer but they agreed in public and sued. All the way up to the Court of Appeals but I got to vote for her. And then the Republicans took control. There went DC's vote and try to get it back ever since. But of course what's important now is to get the whole thing. And of course when you talk about trying to get a vote that it has been said that one of the reasons the voters of the District of Columbia aren't out marching in the streets for voting rights for the District of Columbia is because it's often a complicated process that they don't understand. During the time when Congressman Fauntroy occupied office you

tried to get it ratified by the states around the country and went and got some distance got some distance on that. Then there was a great deal of discussion about whether it could simply be enacted by the Congress of the United States and that's the states that you're in right now in a fairly complicated maneuver involving getting a vote for the District of Columbia. If the state of Utah gets the seat and but the state the state of Utah say it should be at large and it gets How does one persuade voters in the District of Columbia that it is worth following the ins the legislative ins and outs of this process because the outcome would be useful to us. But one issue that down to the last man and woman and child virtually every resident Revanth in sending people to war and second recap in federal income taxes are not having a family. Even when that vote you want I can get things done without that vote. It is a

total and complete insult. They recognize it. Problem District residents is not one of their many. How do you see a quote going for 200 years to get the vote. Remember the civil rights movement a movement essentially went from 1960s and sit ins to the end of the 60s and then look what we took out but we didn't course. African-Americans that started since slavery until then. But in terms of what you could call a movement before that or when the movement of the rights lawyer the people here in their you know grinding away at it. But Inter. Moment culminating in the 1063 Martin Washington. That was what the 1960s what happened. The district the moment that it became the District of Columbia they demonstrated in an 18 0 1 and I have been demonstrated have a sense of keeping people yes in touch with the ins and out of a complicated

process complicated Democrats with their complicated where Republicans are there is a lot to ask people. And I'm very grateful that we have organizations and for example we have the help of the civil rights movement and yes residents will get involved at high points when it looks like there is a yet yet new momentum. And this this 200 year this two centuries and that's what we have a shadow representative and settle some of those to focus explicitly. However your job is a little bit different. You can't focus exclusively on voting rights with the District of Columbia. How do you approach your job overall. I approach my job very much like every other member of Congress. You ask what is most important for your district includes your committees. What's most important. If I was from Alabama I'd probably be on the Agriculture Committee I'm from D.C. It was hard to figure out what's important. But I

did figure that I'm on a committee that controls federal construction jobs in the District of Columbia Government Operations Committee. Now that that's that that's an important one that also has to do with dramas. It's it's a subcommittee rather obscure a subcommittee of the Transportation Committee called Golden Emergency Management. But that's how M Street is being developed that's how the southeast Federal Center which will allow revenue to come to the District of Columbia for the first time is develop. That's how the federal jobs like the Transportation Committee the Transport Department Transportation building that's being built there stays there. Is that why you get involved for instance in security issues at the common homeland States a guy Ramsdell in the car of the Capitol in the next thing we see Congress.

That little home and look is talking about it is that what at bats why I'm on the Homeland Security Committee. And I'm grateful that the leadership my own leadership has allowed me an extra committee so unusually on three committees in order to be on it maybe. And I pay attention to some matters that other members that I'm really and other members rarely with except they don't care. Capitol police were on a committee but the committee. Well of course the ideals of the categories because I care about them because they operate here and in fact I've gotten them to patrol even into parts of the sea or the mall. Like you care about the mall because I care about tourism I don't like a mini computer. I'm going to have surprise in a great many people right now. You can be assumed that you were on all of these committees. How much of this is simply the responsibility of the member representing the District of Columbia or B how much of this is the personality of the forceful personality of

Eleanor Holmes Norton. Now every member looks for first what will affect the economy of her district. That's how you start. The other issues kind of beat into that I have to say to myself Eleanor what for me didn't want to give up since I was a constitutional warrior. Many people expected me and just shared this room for what. What's that Ed. We're going to bring home except a lot of fights over constitutional issues. So I had to say to myself take that risk and likely right off your face. Look for a committee that will bring home tangible things for the District of Columbia its jobs its economic development who controls that federal government here. If it's tourism every thing I mean by a third of our economy comes from tourism that's why you see me getting capital belief to help the park police on a mall they were taking police from our federal park Anacostia park Rock Creek Park because of the assaults.

Well nobody this is not Mike. Nobody but nobody pays any attention even the hope of the people being assaulted. Now there were were not DC residents or. But what was being assaulted was a D.C. economy because it was right down there on that mall by the way. They caught those people. I am very pleased that that that was that was done that this week this is affected by so much that the federal government does that act. You can't assume that because I'm not on a committee that that isn't something that I can get my hands and I got to choose my committee wisely. But the great thing about being in Congress is you can just roam over the many issues that affect our country. How do you how do you negotiate between what the Democratic Party may want and what Eleanor Holmes Norton may want for the District or what District of Columbia residents may want for the district. That issue often comes up in the voting rights discussion and never it came up. You know it's that we you know that the Democrats have been

all I had and sometimes I've had to say to Democrats I want I want. Vote against the D.C. appropriation in order to send it back to the president. Let it come again. Strategically they don't have to turn around I want you to vote for it now. Now the Democrats had a point. The way a problem way we deal with not of their making. The bill Tom Davis and I are working very well on the bill and then Tom DeLay the former Republican majority leader decided to do something it's never been done in the history of the republic in the middle of the decade to redistrict in the state of Maryland Texas in order to pick up seats. So obviously the Democrats would have had problems with allowing redistricting in a Republican state which might have meant that instead of D.C. getting the extra vote Utah would have gotten to so how to safeguard that and both we have to think our way through it. And we brought up a number of ways to go at that.

But I had fun of being in Congress is is it's almost like a puzzle. OK here's an article let's see if we can figure it out it's like a crossword puzzle it's like playing chess. Oh. OK let's see if we can find the answer. It's frustrating but it's also energizing the idea to get students from the district of in-state tuition rates at public colleges across the country. Where does that come from and how do you negotiate that into Liz's lives without finding good friends on the other side that could never happen. And all all remember I've been in Congress. What is it 16 years four years of Democrats so that my homebuyer tax credit which has had an extraordinary effect in stopping people from leaving the district now the census says they were often recently said we were wrong we were losing population. I can't carry a bill to the floor I've got to go to people like in this case Tom Davis who's been a good partner and he was my indispensable partner on this bill.

For example Live is good when your Republican comes in as it was my good partner with whom I could be anywhere on. On voting rights but I have to tell you when Newt Gingrich the speaker I just went started talking to him and found we had a lot in common we were both academics. And his term as speaker was very truthful to the District of Columbia when I was a waiter to help the District of Columbia have a man that I disagreed with on every single national issue. So I mean he's not going to say OK all right we go out and speak you know favor the death penalty maybe OK. How considerate. Being on your side there is something about most decent members of Congress that says you know it's the nation's capital and if you're not coming with something outlandish. Same time Democrats who voted against it as well as Republicans on guns. So they've tried to repeal our gun laws four times and I had a Democrat to come up and say

on the NRA National Rifle Association when 30 min a bag I want to take a pass on this. So I had to find myself I have to somehow find strategic ways and I have with the help of district officials and particularly with victims have found ways that I don't want to put all this on the Republicans. Occasionally I do have problems on my side as with guns I must say I don't think I was having a problem with with with my side on voting rights. I think we had to find a way to get around a real problem and we found it was a brings me to the issue of crime. You apparently persuaded was when Tom Davis to hold a hearing which he I guess. I found a good name for you cause here in CSI Washington because you wanted the opportunity to make the argument that Washington DC needs its own climate. Can you explain to our viewers why that is and why we don't have one.

Well Tom has been very accommodating since he is chairman of the committee in holding hearings that I request I said I don't want to hearing a home rule hearing I don't want to hear it on D.C. crime I want a hearing on the federal contribution. What can be done and I told him that my I believe that that our city and many other cities will simply he really have to have a revolving door approach to grandma and me more please. You know we need over time got to do that. Maybe you need to refuse at but that as I looked at the district I thought they had probably done as much as they could without going the next step and the next step wasn't altogether obvious and I had studied the crime lab I got some money board in appropriations and it was clear to me that if DC had its own crime lab to do its own DNA I could get to. Cases before they became so old that witnesses got when they were going to say that we could send a message hey it's a real deterrent here we can get you now. And that's why I make your major projects of the more imminent cases in the District

of Columbia are prosecuted by the U.S. attorney's office and so the crime lab that is used as the FBI crime lab and that often causes a delay in the resolution of these cases. So if in fact the District of Columbia ever gets its own number. You heard it here first Eleanor Holmes Norton thank you very much for joining us. My pleasure. And good luck. Thank you. That's it for this edition of evening exchange. Stay well. Good night. Yeah I don't know. I don't know that you know when I got it right. That's why I sense I'm real at this than the

average voter.