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| Fighting the good fight for D.C. voting rights |
admin writes, "Fighting the good fight for D.C. voting rights
BY JOSHUA GRAY
Nelson Rimensnyder is a very patient man. In a transient city where one-term residents style themselves veterans of the struggle for voting rights, Rimensnyder stands out — he’s been fighting the good fight for nearly 20 years.
Rimensnyder started his campaign as a high-school student in Philadelphia, at a time when few outside the District were even aware of D.C.’s disenfranchisement.
“In our textbook, there were a couple of pages on our territories and the District of Columbia, and that’s how I even knew about the connection,” says Rimensnyder. “My senior year in 1960, the amendment was going through Congress to give the District the vote for president — and I took it on as my senior project, to go and lobby my state senate and legislature to support the resolution in the General Assembly in Pennsylvania.”"
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Fast forward 10 years, and Rimensnyder found himself living in D.C., after a stint in the Army, followed by graduate school at Penn State. He came here to pursue a career at the Library of Congress, a serendipitous move at the urging of a college professor. “I was actually looking for a job in the Pennsylvania state government,” he laughs, “but I came down for an interview.”
Over a thoughtful lunch (bratwurst special on rye,) at the venerable Tune Inn on Pennsylvania Avenue, Rimensnyder recalls that he picked up his quiet battle for equal representation from his first day in his adoptive hometown. A lot has happened in the last 37 years, but two things haven’t changed: D.C. still doesn’t have voting rights in Congress, and Nelson Rimensnyder is still one of the most vocal supporters of reform.
Rimensnyder’s gentle approach strays from the typical activists’ path. Surprising to many D.C. vote supporters, he’s a Republican, and points to his party affiliation as a key strategy.
The GOP, he stresses, historically has advocated D.C. voting rights, though he admits that support has been thin on the ground in recent decades. And local Republican affiliates remain staunchly in favor of D.C.’s vote, which he feels augurs well for swaying party backing at the national level.
Rimensnyder made an unsuccessful bid in 2006 for D.C.’s shadow seat in the House of Representatives, and he plans to run for the Senate seat that’s coming up in 2008. A bipartisan delegation on the Hill, he believes, is crucial to rallying national support.
There’s more to D.C. than politics, of course, and Nelson Rimensnyder’s passion for local flavor goes well beyond the now smoke-free back rooms. He’s also an ardent student of D.C.’s history and heritage.
As a board member of local residents’ coalition Area’s Oldest Inhabitants, he lent his voice to the 25-year effort to restore the city’s statue of native son Gov. Alexander “Boss” Shepherd to its place of honor in front of The Wilson Building. Rimensnyder also spearheaded the unsuccessful effort to preserve historic Rhodes Tavern, which was demolished in 1984 to make way for the Metropolitan Square office building at 15th and F streets, NW.
As the interview winds to a close — the plates cleared by a waitress who calls us both “Honey” — Nelson Rimensnyder has one more opportunity to demonstrate both his passion for D.C. and his seemingly depthless tolerance. A gentleman at an adjacent table, perhaps emboldened by a few too many midday gin and tonics, decides to join into the interview. Playing off of Rimensnyder’s D.C. Vote T-shirt and button, the bibulous diner leans in and loudly proclaims: “It’s about [expletive] time we got the vote in D.C.!”
So confronted, many community activists would either ignore or distance themselves from the tipsy interloper. But Rimensnyder engages him as he would any other concerned citizen, explaining key points of his platform, and gently refuting some of his neighbor’s more egregious lapses in logic.
As always, he is endlessly, unfailingly patient.
Know of someone making a difference in your neighborhood? Let us know at editor@voiceofthehill.com.
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Posted on Sep 01, 2007 15:43pm.
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