EIR NEWS HIGHLIGHT

---

Coalition Seeks 'Indispensable
Victory' In D.C. General Battle

by Paul Gallagher

At the end of May, the national mobilization by Lyndon LaRouche's movement had brought Congress to the brink of intervening to reopen Washington's D.C. General Hospital; that Congress actually do so, is an "indispensible victory" to be won for the principle of the general welfare of the whole nation. The mobilization, as Capitol Hill sources have told its leaders, is unprecedented in their experience, as a sustained, broadly-based lobbying effort from all over the nation, from ordinary citizens to elected leaders in the states.

On May 28 and 29, both House minority leader Richard Gephardt (D-Missouri) and Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle (D-South Dakota) told public audiences that they were committed to saving D.C. General. The national support statement, "It's Time to Draw the Line," of the Coalition to Save D.C. General, was signed by California Congresswomen Loretta Sanchez and Grace Napolitano. This brought to seven, including also House Democratic whip David Bonior, the number of Congressmen and Senators who had signed the statement or made public pledges to restore the capital's only public hospital. The hospital was forcibly privatized April 30 and is being shut down by an "emergency" fiat of the unelected D.C. Financial Control Board, over the unanimous opposition of the elected city council, and at the cost of at least seven or eight unnecessary deaths in the city in the month of May.

The full article is in EIR's June 8, 2001 issue.