Past Exhibitions 2023
Hyde Cabinet #21: Fifty-first
Hyde Cabinet #21: Fifty-first advocates on behalf of the Washington, DC, statehood movement by prompting a conversation around the congressional underrepresentation of DC citizens.
Exhibition Label
In 2000, “Taxation without Representation” replaced “Celebrate and Discover” as the tagline for newly issued District of Columbia license plates. The phrase indicates that despite paying federal taxes and being US citizens, residents of Washington, DC, are denied full and equal representation in national government. This fact is ironic, given their physical proximity to the institutions from which they are excluded—and seems antithetical to US democracy, which is rooted in the election of representatives with voting power.
In 1787, the Constitution designated Washington, DC, as a stand-alone district and granted Congress complete jurisdiction over the city, including the ability to block the passage of local laws. It was not until 1961 that Washingtonians earned the right to vote in presidential elections. To this day, DC’s 700,000 residents have only a non-voting representative in the House and are altogether absent from the Senate. Given the city’s majority-Black population, this disenfranchisement is connected to race and class.
The iteration of the DC license plate on view is the default for vehicles registered in the city and has appeared on US presidential vehicles under the Obama and Trump administrations. For DC residents, the image is at once ubiquitous and iconic. Beyond city limits, the license plate’s mobility has transformed the everyday object into an essential tool to promote DC statehood and inspire curiosity about the issue.
