A History of Free DC

The call for a Free DC is not new. Community activists here have been fighting for dignity and self-determination for the people of DC for generations. We recognize and acknowledge these leaders who won transformative victories that make DC as strong as it is today.

Marion Barry delivers a statement on the Free D.C. campaign on the steps of the District Building, 1966. Photo via “Black Power in Washington D.C., 1961-1998.”

The denial of full statehood to DC is deeply rooted in racism.

Citizens of the District have had the right to vote beginning in 1867. But in 1874, as DC’s majority-Black population gained political influence, Congress dismantled the city’s elected local government, replacing it with federally appointed commissioners. For the next 80 years, DC residents lacked even the right to vote for president, a restriction that remained in place until the passage of the 23rd Amendment in 1960.

In the mid-1960s This milestone toward self-governance was driven by the efforts of the Free DC movement, co-founded by Marion Barry, the first chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Free DC mobilized students and organized acts of civil disobedience to protest the lack of representation for D.C. residents. Although the Act paved the way for the election of Walter Washington and later Barry himself as DC’s first Black mayors, it fell short of granting full rights to the city's residents.

Since the 1980s, statehood advocates have persisted in their efforts to Free DC, despite mounting opposition from the Republican Party. Over the years, organizations like the DC Statehood Party (founded in 1970), Stand Up! for Democracy in DC (founded in 1997), and DC Vote (founded in 1998) have led the fight for equal representation for District residents.

Congress has a long history of using fear about crime as a way to exert power over DC communities.

“Throughout DC’s history, fears about crime (and related racial prejudices) have been used to make the case against expanding local autonomy for District residents,” Jenny Gathright wrote in DCist in 2024. “And the dynamic continues today, even 50 years after home rule.

“‘In recent years we’ve seen the Congress and the president serve as sort of benign dictators, kinder and gentler colonialists…But when that third rail was crossed, when the DC Council voted on a whole new criminal code at the same time that crime [and] anxiety about Black men was on the rise, that’s when democracy for DC went too far,’ says Georgetown law professor Paul Butler, who advised the group of lawyers that revised the criminal code.

“This attitude, Butler says, has a lot to do with racism.

‘“Fear of crime is often weaponized by politicians in support of tough on crime strategies and in support of more resources and power for the police,’ Butler says, but ‘race is the subtext; in particular anxiety about Black men. In D.C. we have a perfect storm. We have a jurisdiction that’s roughly 40% black. And we have what’s essentially colonial rule.’”

Around the world, pro-democracy movements have taken on autocratic regimes and won. These movements have been consistently shown to have three things in common:

1. Prioritize joy — Autocrats count on fear to make their work easier. If we let fear guide our actions, we are already ceding power.

2. Take up space — Autocrats count on silence and compliance. Part of how global movements succeed is to be physically vocal and visible in our communities in outspoken celebration of our people and movements.

3. Show solidarity — Autocrats attempt to portray people and groups who disagree with them as “dangerous” and those who comply as “safe.” They gradually move the bar to make more and more people seem “dangerous” until only total loyalists are “safe.” Global movements that win interrupt this through clear and outspoken solidarity.

4. Organize — Across movements, when efforts to oppose authoritarian regimes have ongoing and active participation from 3.5% of the population, those regimes fail.

• Chocolate City: A History of Race and Democracy in the Nation's Capital (Chris Myers Asch & George Derek Musgrove, 2019)

• “‘Yes, We Will See Statehood for DC’: Anise Jenkins and D.C.’s Fight for Civil Rights.” (ACLU of DC, 2024)

• “The Case for Statehood.” (DC History Center, nd)

• “50 Years Of Home Rule: How Opponents Weaponize Crime, Then And Now.” (DCist, 2024)

• “50 Years of Home Rule” full series. (DCist, 2024)

• “Majority White Legislatures Taking Control Of Predominantly Black Cities In Emerging Pattern.” (BET, 2023)

• "How Democrats Caved to “Soft on Crime” Fears. (Slate, 2023)

• “Black Power in Washington D.C., 1961-1998.” (George Derek Musgrove, n.d.)

• “50 Years of Home Rule.” (DC Public Library)

• CANVAS Core Curriculum: A Guide to Effective Nonviolent Struggle

• From Dictatorship to Democracy

• A Force More Powerful

• Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict