Trump’s Federal Crime Crackdown in D.C. Is Constitutional

Cut it how you like, but the fact will remain: the people of Washington, D.C., have no greater capacity to avoid direct federal rule than did the erstwhile denizens of the Northwest Territory. Per the plain terms of the U.S. Constitution, Congress has plenary power over “the Seat of Government of the United States,” which is not a city, or a state, or even a reservation, but a special district like no other in the land. If the national legislature wishes to, it can delegate some of its power to a council or a mayor or an emissary in a pointy hat. But it is not obliged to do so, and if, according to its judgment, any existing deputation has become intolerable, it can abolish or limit it at will. In D.C., home rule is a luxury, a privilege, an indulgence. It is not a right. To pretend otherwise is to replace fact with desire — which, in cases where the law is straightforward, is never a salutary idea.

I relate these facts not out of malice but frustration at the poor quality of the arguments that have been advanced against President Trump’s decision to hand some of D.C.’s crime-fighting efforts over to the feds. Among the briefs that have been lodged are that the move is intrinsically “authoritarian,” that there is more lawlessness “in other places,” and that, because he behaved disgracefully on January 6, 2021, Trump has no right to complain about other people’s transgressions. None of these cases makes any sense. To the charge that his call is “authoritarian,” one must respond that Trump is acting within the bounds of the Constitution, that he is following the text of the appropriate statutes to the letter, and that his announcement was quietly welcomed by the mayor whose authority he has partially superseded. To the charge that crime is worse elsewhere, one must observe that, irrespective of whether that is true or false, it is irrelevant, for it is over Washington, D.C., and not elsewhere, that the president has been accorded direct power. As for January 6? I remain one of Donald Trump’s most tenacious critics on this point, but, frankly, I do not understand the logic undergirding its invocation in this realm. January 6 was bad, because lawbreaking is bad. The aim here is to reduce lawbreaking. That the person in charge of that effort is a hypocrite is indisputably true, but that does not affect the virtue of his intervention either way.

About the Author

Charles C. W. Cooke

Charles C. W. Cooke is a senior editor at National Review and the host of The Charles C. W. Cooke Podcast.

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Cut it how you like, but the fact will remain: the people of Washington, D.C., have no greater capacity to avoid direct federal rule than did the erstwhile denizens of the Northwest Territory. Per the plain terms of the U.S. Constitution, Congress has plenary power over “the Seat of Government of the United States,” which is not a city, or a state, or even a reservation, but a special district like no other in the land. If the national legislature wishes to, it can delegate some of its power to a council or a mayor or an emissary in a pointy hat. But it is not obliged to do so, and if, according to its judgment, any existing deputation has become intolerable, it can abolish or limit it at will. In D.C., home rule is a luxury, a privilege, an indulgence. It is not a right. To pretend otherwise is to replace fact with desire — which, in cases where the law is straightforward, is never a salutary idea.

I relate these facts not out of malice but frustration at the poor quality of the arguments that have been advanced against President Trump’s decision to hand some of D.C.’s crime-fighting efforts over to the feds. Among the briefs that have been lodged are that the move is intrinsically “authoritarian,” that there is more lawlessness “in other places,” and that, because he behaved disgracefully on January 6, 2021, Trump has no right to complain about other people’s transgressions. None of these cases makes any sense. To the charge that his call is “authoritarian,” one must respond that Trump is acting within the bounds of the Constitution, that he is following the text of the appropriate statutes to the letter, and that his announcement was quietly welcomed by the mayor whose authority he has partially superseded. To the charge that crime is worse elsewhere, one must observe that, irrespective of whether that is true or false, it is irrelevant, for it is over Washington, D.C., and not elsewhere, that the president has been accorded direct power. As for January 6? I remain one of Donald Trump’s most tenacious critics on this point, but, frankly, I do not understand the logic undergirding its invocation in this realm. January 6 was bad, because lawbreaking is bad. The aim here is to reduce lawbreaking. That the person in charge of that effort is a hypocrite is indisputably true, but that does not affect the virtue of his intervention either way.