Tell your two US Senators to vote YES for full-vote Washington, DC representation

Public Citizen is asking us to call or write our US Senators in favor of having a US Representative for Washington, DC residents. Our more than half a million District of Columbia citizens have been paying federal income taxes, fighting in wars and all of the other things Americans have done over the years, but they don't have a vote in Congress!

Prominent constitutional scholars and former Congressmembers agree that they can legally have their own full-voting Congressmember. Why wait any longer? Please call both of your US Senators at the Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121; or, use Public Citizen's webpage to send them a message. Then email action@citizen.org with your senators' responses. Thank you

Call U.S. Attorney General Mukasey and ask him to meet with Common Cause

From Common Cause:

Over the seven years of the Bush Administration, the American justice system has taken quite a beating. From the denial of fundamental civil rights and civil liberties to the outright abuse of our Constitution – the integrity of our justice system is in jeopardy.

So, Common Cause is stepping up to the plate to restore our democracy's rule of law. Our first step was to ask new Attorney General Michael Mukasey for a meeting to express our concerns and recommendations. But he refused. I am writing to you today to ask you to make a simple, quick phone call to Attorney General Mukasey, urging him to meet with Common Cause.

Common Cause is running a telephone campaign. They are having difficulty getting U.S. Attorney General Mukasey to talk with them. We can help by calling his office directly ourselves and asking him to meet with Common Cause, then leaving the answer at Common Cause's webpage for this campaign. The number is (202) 514-2001. Be sure to report your call! Thank you.

Attorney General Mukasey: USDOJ Office of Legal Council pardons lawbreakers in advance

TPMmuckraker reports the ongoing struggle between the U.S. Department of Justice and Congress. New Attorney General Michael Mukasey is defending the Justice Dept's. Office of Legal Council, even if it's opinions may breach actual law.

The Justice Department will not investigate whether CIA agents engaged in torture by waterboarding detainees, Attorney General Michael Mukasey said earlier. Ditto goes for the administration's warrantless wiretapping program, Mukasey added later, when asked by Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) whether he would appoint a special counsel to investigate. The question came after Mukasey had baldly asserted that it was not a "practical view" that the president could order someone to act outside the law. Nadler wanted to know if the president hadn't done just that with his warrantless wiretapping program, which had ignored the constraints of FISA. Well, Mukasey said, the President had ordered that on the advice of the Justice Department that it was lawful. So, just as he will not initiate an investigation of waterboarding since the DoJ had given its OK, he will also not investigate whether the warrantless wiretapping was lawful, since it was legal, because the DoJ said it was ("there are views on both sides of that" he acknowledged). Mukasey also went back to correct his statement during last week's hearing that he "didn't know" if the President had ordered the warrantless wiretapping outside the law. Silly me, he said, of course it was legal -- it was authorized by the DoJ.

Now you know why Jack Goldsmith, the former chief of the DoJ's Office of Legal Counsel, said that OLC has the power to issue “free get-out-of jail cards,” or "advance pardons" with its opinions.

Right wing power grabs for the Civil Rights Commission

CREW, a public advocacy organization, has issued a press release concerning the Bush legacy of politicizing civil rights-- the Civil Rights Commission is stacked with partisans.

Washington, DC – This morning, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR) hosted a press conference call with the NAACP and MALDEF to demand that U.S. Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey rescind a Bush legal memo that authorized deceptive appointments of exclusively partisan Republicans to the bipartisan Civil Rights Commission.

The letter, signed by LCCR, CREW, NAACP, MALDEF, National Women’s Law Center, National Partnership for Women & Families, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, National Congress of American Indians and the ACLU is online:

http://www.civilrights.org/library/advocacy-letters/usccr-letter.html

In order to circumvent the Civil Rights Act of 1957, the Bush Justice Department wrote a memo allowing Republican members of the Commission to switch their party affiliation to “independent.” That allowed the president to appoint more Republicans to the bipartisan eight person commission under the guise that they were somehow “independent,” allowing the Bush administration to circumvent the law requiring that no more than four members of any party serve on the commission.

During his confirmation hearing, Mukasey pledged to review “significant” decisions of the Office of Legal Counsel to ensure that such decisions were “sound, soundly reasoned, soundly based.” Allowing this deception in the appointment process was neither sound, soundly reasoned or soundly based and is a continuation of the Bush administration's legacy of undermining the credibility and subverting Congress' intent to retain the commission's independence and bipartisan membership

Mukasey is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday.

Bring representation to the District of Columbia

Public Citizen's Congress Watch is running an email campaign asking the public to help bring congressional representation to the District of Columbia. The DC Voting Rights Act would also add a House of Representatives seat to Utah.

September 14, 2007
Dear David,
While we endlessly debate the possibility of democracy in Iraq, our democracy at home remains in question.
More than half a million people live in the capital of the United States without voting representation in Congress. Yes, the citizens of the District of Columbia pay U.S. taxes, fight and die for the U.S. during wartime and yet, shockingly, they have no vote in the Congress that governs them.
A vote to right this wrong is imminent - but we need your help.
A key procedural vote on the DC Voting Rights Act is scheduled for Tuesday, September 18. We must act now to prevent some senators from blocking this bill. If Tuesday's motion succeeds, the Senate could next vote on the bill for final passage. If it fails, an endless filibuster could ensue, killing the bill that the House already passed in pril.
The bill would provide for a seat for traditionally Democratic Washington, D.C., with an additional seat for Republican-leaning Utah, making it a partisan and politically neutral bill.
Citizens in the District of Columbia don't have senators of their own to call, so they need you to stand up for them and our democratic values. Contact your senators today and insist that they allow this important civil rights legislation to proceed to the floor for a vote!
Tell your senators to make history by ending taxation without representation in Washington.
Sincerely,
Angela Canterbury, Public Citizen Field & Outreach Director of Congress Watch mailto:Watchaction@citizen.org