Steve Burns
WMAL.com
WASHINGTON – (WMAL) No longer able to rely on a Democratic president for a veto, District officials have been wary of a newly emboldened Congress wading into local D.C. laws, with the intent of overturning measures the progressive city council passes.
The first fight may come over the District’s Death with Dignity law, which the Council passed last year and was signed a short time later by Mayor Muriel Bowser, allowing for physician-assisted suicide. Congressman Jason Chaffetz (R-UT), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, went as far as publishing an op-ed in the Washington Post over the weekend, making his case for overturning the law.
“We should not now or ever take steps to help facilitate, encourage or tacitly accept measures that prematurely end lives,” Chaffetz wrote. “In the interest of protecting D.C. residents, it is imperative that Congress act.”
The bill elicited emotional comment from Councilmembers during debate, as some remembered friends or relatives who physically and emotionally suffered immediately prior to their death. The bill provides a number of backstops, including requiring patients to receive a diagnosis from two doctors of less than six months to live, and requiring a patient be cleared of any mental illness.
Along with the District’s always outspoken but non-voting House delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, D.C. has a new supporter in Congressman Gerry Connolly (D-VA), who was recently elevated in his role on the House Oversight Committee.
“Local decisions are best made locally,” Connolly told WMAL. “Congress shouldn’t be second-guessing the District’s legitimately elected local leaders, even if we philosophically disagree.”
Connolly said he would do everything he can to prevent Congress from interfering with the District.
“I philosophically disagree with a lot of places in Utah, and I would hope that Jason Chaffetz would not want me to have any power to interfere with those decisions,” Connolly said. “Well, how about applying that same logic to the District?”
Further battles could be on the way, with some members signaling an interest in adjusting the District’s gun laws and newly-enacted marijuana possession provisions.
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