Room for a 51st star?

“New States may be admit­ted by the Con­gress into this Union.”

— U.S. Constitution,

Arti­cle IV, Sec­tion 3

“The ball is now in Con­gress’ court and Con­gress will have to react to this result.”

— Pedro Pierluisi,

Puerto Rico’s Con­gres­sional representative

Not since Alaska and Hawaii joined the Union in 1959 has the United States had to find room for new stars in the field of blue on Old Glory. While sev­eral unsuc­cess­ful attempts have been made at state­hood for the Dis­trict of Colum­bia, the next few years should bring some seri­ous dis­cus­sions about state­hood for Puerto Rico fol­low­ing a ref­er­en­dum vote in the ter­ri­tory on Tuesday.

When Alaska and Hawaii joined, they left the United States with­out any incor­po­rated orga­nized ter­ri­to­ries. Four unin­cor­po­rated orga­nized ter­ri­to­ries remain — Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Vir­gin Islands and the North­ern Mar­i­ana Islands. Since 1952, Puerto Rico has been gov­erned by a con­sti­tu­tion and under that con­sti­tu­tion its head of state is the Pres­i­dent of the United States. Puerto Ricans elect their own gov­er­nor, sen­a­tors and rep­re­sen­ta­tives. They have a non-voting del­e­gate to the U.S. Con­gress and while they vote in party pri­maries, they do not vote in U.S. Pres­i­den­tial elections.

On Tues­day, Puerto Ricans had a two-part ref­er­en­dum on their bal­lot. The first part asked if their cur­rent sys­tem of gov­er­nance should be changed. Pre­vi­ous ref­er­enda on that issue had been defeated. The sec­ond part asked what the change should be if a change was made. The results were note­wor­thy, but not nearly clear enough to be able to pre­dict what will hap­pen in the com­ing years.

For the first time ever, a major­ity of those vot­ing indi­cated that they wanted to change the exist­ing rela­tion­ship with the United States. Fifty-four per­cent of vot­ers gave that response. All vot­ers, regard­less of their vote on the first part of the ref­er­en­dum, were then asked what the new rela­tion­ship should be if it were to change. Sixty-one per­cent chose state­hood as the new option. About half that num­ber chose a more ten­u­ous ‘sov­er­eign free asso­ci­a­tion’ and fewer than 10 per­cent voted for full inde­pen­dence as a sov­er­eign nation.

The ref­er­en­dum was not quite as clear a state­ment on state­hood as those num­bers might make it seem. Nearly half a mil­lion peo­ple didn’t cast a vote in the sec­ond part of the ref­er­en­dum at all. Fur­ther­more, Puerto Ricans ousted their pro-statehood gov­er­nor by a nar­row mar­gin. None the less, Pres­i­dent Obama has said that he would sup­port what­ever result came from the elec­tion and ask Con­gress to review and act upon the vote result.

Indeed, it is Con­gress that would have to act under the Pro­vi­sions of Arti­cle IV, Sec­tion 3 of the U.S. Con­sti­tu­tion. That sec­tion empow­ers Con­gress to act to approve state­hood and requires the con­sent of any exist­ing state if land is to be take from it to make the new state (as hap­pened with the cre­ation of Ken­tucky, Ten­nessee, Maine, West Vir­ginia and the entire West­ern Reserve).

The most recent attempts at state­hood have involved the Dis­trict of Colum­bia. In a vote not unlike the one this week in Puerto Rico, D.C. res­i­dents voted to seek state­hood in 1980. In 1982, they adopted a con­sti­tu­tion, but the effort stalled there. A pro­posed amend­ment to the U.S. Con­sti­tu­tion to give D.C. res­i­dents full rep­re­sen­ta­tion in both houses of Con­gress failed in 1985 (though Ohio sup­ported it). A sec­ond effort at state­hood was launched in the early 1990s, and in 1993, the issue came to a full vote in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives where it was defeated by a vote of 277 to 153.

The polit­i­cal forces at play in that vote remain at play in the dis­cus­sion of Puerto Rico. In an edi­to­r­ial on Nov. 27, 1993, the Day­ton Daily News wrote, “The drive for D.C. state­hood is not about vot­ing rights or tax­a­tion with­out rep­re­sen­ta­tion. It is about power. It is noth­ing more than an attempt by some in the Demo­c­ra­tic Party to grab for them­selves another seat in the House and two in the Sen­ate, at the expense of the Constitution.”

Indeed, unlike the bal­anced effect of the addi­tion of Hawaii and Alaska, adding Puerto Rico as a state will shift the bal­ance of power in Con­gress in favor of whichever party gar­ners the most votes among Puerto Rico’s cit­i­zenry. Whether that fact trumps the polling result in the ter­ri­tory remains to be seen.

David Hej­manowski is a mag­is­trate and court admin­is­tra­tor at the Delaware County Juve­nile Court and a for­mer assis­tant pros­e­cut­ing attorney.

Posted by Dave Hejmanowski on Nov 8 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.