GOP Files Suit to Block Voting in House by D.C., Territories

House Republican leaders filed suit Thursday to nullify new rules approved by House Democrats to expand voting rights for five delegates representing four island territories and the District of Columbia.

GOP officials said they would try to retaliate at the polls in 1994 against Democrats who supported the change, which would benefit legislators from the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Under previous rules, the delegates--all currently Democrats--were allowed to vote only in the standing committees of the House.

The new rule would permit them also to vote on floor amendments, although such votes would have little practical effect. If the delegates’ votes proved to be decisive, the House would vote again without their participation. The delegates would, however, also be given additional powers to vote on some procedural matters that would not be subject to retroactive cancellation.

In any case, the delegates would be barred from voting on final passage of any legislation in the House.

In their suit, a dozen Republicans asked a federal court to declare that the change violates the Constitution and to block the five delegates from casting their votes during consideration of legislation on the House floor.

“Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that representatives from territories are allowed to vote on the floor of the House,” argued House Minority Leader Robert H. Michel (R-Ill.). “We disagree that the House has the authority to unilaterally expand the powers of the delegate offices . . . as a matter of pure political convenience.”

Other Republicans denounced the change as a Democratic “power grab” and complained that residents of the island territories do not pay U.S. taxes.

“We worked hard to elect 10 additional members of the House last year,” said Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach). “This would cancel out five of them.”

Democrats who supported the change said it would provide only limited voting rights to the five delegates and would do so as a matter of fairness. Since the votes would occur only in the “Committee of the Whole,” a parliamentary format used to expedite debate, many Democrats argued, the change would not violate the constitutional prohibition against voting in the House by non-members.