Washington, D.C., as the 51st State? What to Know

The U.S. capital is home to more than 700,000 people -- bigger than the population of Wyoming or Vermont. It pays more federal taxes per capita than any state. But Washington, D.C., isn’t a state, which means (among other things) that it doesn’t have a vote in Congress. A decades-long movement to make D.C. the 51st state may have its best chance now, with Democrats in charge on Capitol Hill and the White House. Though the House approved statehood legislation on a party-line vote on April 22, Republican opposition to creating what would be a reliably Democratic new state means it probably will remain just an idea.

The Constitution directed that the seat of U.S. government be a “District (not exceeding ten miles square)” over which Congress would “exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever.” The point of a special district, according to James Madison, was to prevent any particular state from holding too much power as a result of playing host to the national government. The capital was relocated from Philadelphia to what was then called Washington City in 1800. Today, the 20th-largest city in the U.S. is interchangeably known as Washington, D.C., and the District of Columbia.