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Senate Approves Bill Requiring Respect for D.C. Flag, Bill Goes to President

PRESS RELEASE
 
 
The Office of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) announced that a provision requiring the armed services to display the D.C. and territorial flags whenever the flags of the 50 states are displayed passed the Senate today as part of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 Conference Report. The House passed the conference report on Thursday, and now goes to the President. The conference committee also rejected a House-passed provision that expressed the sense of the Congress that active duty members of the military should be exempt from the gun laws of only the District of Columbia.
Norton’s fight for respect for the D.C. flag, service members, and veterans began this year when D.C. resident and fire investigator Tomi Rucker wrote to the Congresswoman expressing her dismay that the Navy did not display the D.C. flag to honor her son, Seaman Jonathan Rucker, during his boot-camp graduation ceremony at Naval Station Great Lakes while state flags were raised to honor the other graduates. Norton investigated the issue, spoke with officials at the highest levels of the White House and Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI), held a press conference with Members representing the territories, and demanded respect for the District’s flag at a Veterans Day press conference at the D.C. War Memorial. Last week, a dozen D.C. veterans met with staff members from the offices of Chairman Levin and Senate Armed Services Committee Ranking Member John McCain (R-AZ), and shared stories of their disappointment and humiliation when the D.C. flag was not displayed with state flags during military ceremonies.
“We are gratified to see this conference report passed by both houses of Congress,” Norton said. “Never again will D.C.’s service members and veterans suffer the indignity of the failure to display the D.C. flag in their honor when the flags of the 50 states are displayed. We are particularly grateful to Tomi Rucker, mother of Seaman Jonathan Rucker, who spoke so eloquently about her feelings when the D.C. flag was not raised for her son at his graduation ceremony during our Veterans Day press conference, and to our veterans, whose personal stories helped us get the provision included. We also appreciate the leadership of Chairman Levin, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-CA), and Ranking Member Adam Smith (D-WA) and President Obama.”
Norton also fought strongly against the inclusion of the sense of the Congress provision, even though a sense of the Congress provision is not law. “We were not about to be mollified because this was only a sense of the Congress resolution -- not on guns,” Norton said. “We could not take the chance that approval of this provision could encourage gun extremists to launch a new congressional assault on the District’s gun laws.”
More at www.norton.house.gov
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