Download - UDC Law Review

18 UNIVERSITY OF THE DISTRICf OF COLUMBIA LAW REVIEWthe First World War and the New Deal. Even with increased construction, therewas a lack of office space to house the expanded federal government, as well ashousing shortages. Congress turned to removing parts of the government to thesuburbs. 135 The first significant crack in the compact was the relocation of theNational Institutes of Health prior to World War 11.136 This removal ignored twofacts: 1) the District was and is prohibited from building skyscrapers; and 2) thefederal government had ample undeveloped land in the District. 137 Additionally,it enhances the validity of Phillips on the question of whether it was constitutionalfor Congress to retrocede Alexandria and reduce the size of the capital.Moreover, this process may be the only way in which Arlington could have possiblybeen reunited with the District, as Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1 would requireconsent from the Commonwealth to sever the state. 138 Senator McCarranaccurately forecasted an era of Congressional spoils, undermining the compact.139 McCarran argued:If [the Pentagon] belongs anywhere it belongs in the District of Columbia... If the state of Virginia is to have this building, the State of Maryland willclaim the right to have the Navy Building, some other state will claim theright to have the Internal Revenue Building, and so on ... 140Cobb argues that the removal decision, in spite of Congress' will, was unconstitutional,and the District needed the land back to house its expanding federalagencies. 141135 Id. at 584-587.136 Id. at 585.137 Id. at 588 (citing ALFRED GOLDBERG, THE PENTAGON: THE FIRST FIFTY YEARS (1992) (Ifthe District were permitted to build such structures, the office and residential space arguments wouldlose much of their sheen. Over 5,000 acres of land was available.».138 Interestingly, Virginia already had a Constitutional question put before the Supreme Courton severing part of its land in the creation of West Virginia. In that case, Congress no longer viewedthe Richmond government (which admittedly has announced cessation from the Union) as the seat ofgovernment in Virginia, and considered a competing government seated in Wheeling to be the recognizedcapital. Vasan Kesavan & Michael Stokes Paulsen, Is West Virginia Unconstitutional?, 90 CAL.L. REV. 291, 299-302 (2002). The Wheeling government conducted the electoral and legislativeprocesses that led to the creation of West Virginia, achieved by severing state west of the Appalachianfoothills. Id. The Supreme Court affirmed the validity of this act in Virginia v. West Virginia, 78 U.S.39 (1870). Ironically, it would be in Arlington where perhaps the most egregious breach of the capitalCompact would take place. The War Department, expanding swiftly, desired a building suitable to itsneeds. Without such facilitates readily available in the District, and with the nation at war, plans forthe $35,000,000 Pentagon were expedited. Id. This violation of the Compact was not without its critics.Cobb, supra note 68, at 590-591.139 See Cobb supra note 68, at 590-591.140 Id. at 591.141 See generally id.