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WASHINGTON (AP) - A bill that would have given District of Columbia residents their first-ever member of Congress died in the Senate on Tuesday, dashing hopes of finally gaining full voting rights after a 206-year wait.
Senators voted 57-42, just three votes short of the 60 needed to move the measure forward. The bill would have created two new House seats: One for the city of about 600,000 people and one for Utah, which narrowly missed out on a fourth seat after the last census.
The procedural vote effectively killed the best chance in decades to win the District a full-fledged House member. The city has been denied voting rights in Congress since 1801, making it the only major capital city in the world where citizens are denied a vote in the nation's representative body of government.
Advocates had hoped to resolve what they call a "national disgrace" and the most important civil rights issue of the era.
(Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
