U.S.A. Government

1

The license plates of Washington DC read Taxation without Representation ' echoing sentiments American revolutionaries held against England before the Revolution . Residents of the Washington DC certainly have reason to be feel resentment towards their lack of political capital . Simply put , they have no representation in Congress just as the American colonies had no representation in Parliament . There seem to be three options to address this issue : allow DC to become a state , construct a constitutional amendment that would allow it a limited but proportional representation in Congress , or merge it

into the state of Maryland or Virginia . The third option is rather unattractive there would undoubtedly be clashes between whichever state annexed Washington and the Federal government that could end up unnecessarily messy . The second option is also unattractive , as it would still leave those that live in the District without a man in the Senate While achieving statehood may lead some to argue that Washington would be overrepresented in the Senate , these allegations are spurious at best . In real terms , large states like California and New York are underrepresented in the body small states like Rhode Island and Montana are overrepresented . However , the Senate , as a body , was designed so that each state received equal representation in it while the House was meant for representation by population . Another small state with two Senators would do nothing to change that tradition . Washington DC achieving statehood and the Congressional representation it entails is an entirely appropriate fix for its constituents ' complaints against their lack of representation

2

President George W . Bush has issued more signing statements during his presidency than all other presidents combined . While the actual affect of these statements is unclear , Bush 's use of the statements seem dubious , primarily because of the uncertain status of what a signing statement really means . Line-item vetoes , where the president passes a bill save for specific lines of the legislation he rejects , were deemed unconstitutional during the Clinton Administration . If President Bush means to use these statements in place of line item vetoes , then their use should be halted . However , these signing statements are not published in the American law code , so it seems likely that the President , more than anything , is simply describing how his administration will interpret the law he is signing , something that his administration would do regardless of where he made the signing statement or not . In these terms , it seems that the signing statements are innocuous in and of themselves , while the intent behind them may or may not be...