WTOP:

D.C. got a unique Christmas Eve surprise from President Richard Nixon a half century ago — the right to self-governance.

It came after decades of failures for the city, between 1948 and 1964, as a handful of bills came to the floor of Congress only to fail passage.

“After turning out by the thousands for the March on Washington to support Black voting rights across the country, they couldn’t vote in their home city,” the DC library notes in its commemoration of 50 years of home rule.

D.C. leaders wrote to their “friend and ally” Martin Luther King, Jr. to support their cause, the library added.

“King spent three days in D.C., meeting with community leaders and leading rallies in support of racial justice and D.C. Home Rule,” the commemoration said.