Washington D.C. Seeks Statehood

WASHINGTON (AP) â€” The District of Columbia elector who cost Al Gore one of the city's three electoral votes says 2001 is the year for D.C. statehood. <br><br>Barbara Lett-Simmons, 73, cast a blank

Friday, December 22nd 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

WASHINGTON (AP) â€” The District of Columbia elector who cost Al Gore one of the city's three electoral votes says 2001 is the year for D.C. statehood.

Barbara Lett-Simmons, 73, cast a blank electoral ballot this week to protest the city's lack of voting rights in Congress.

She and about a half dozen supporters braved 20-degree temperatures Friday to announce the formation of a national D.C. statehood committee. The nonprofit group will gather signatures throughout the country to support voting the district into the Union.

Committee members will be announced the week of Martin Luther King's birthday.

``We have the greatest democracy,'' Lett-Simmons said.

The fact that people in the nation's capital do not have a vote in Congress ``is a paradox without rationale and meaning,'' she said.

The district's delegate, Eleanor Holmes Norton, can vote only in committee, but not on the House floor.

Lett-Simmons, a longtime activist, said it is ``downright wrong'' for district residents to pay taxes and not have representation.

She called it ``magnificent'' that President Clinton is changing the plates on his limousine to the new ones with the ``Taxation Without Representation'' slogan.

Lett-Simmons has already requested a meeting with President-elect Bush.