A lot of conservatives are criticizing AG Eric Holder for apparently taking the position that the DC voting rights law is constitutional when OLC thinks it is not. There's an angle to the story that I haven't seen addressed, though, at least on the right: Does Holder have an obligation to oppose the bill if he thinks its passage is the best step to a constitutional amendment to add DC voting rights?

  Here's my thinking. We know that AG Holder favors voting rights for DC as a matter of policy. Let's also assume that he knows that the bill is probably going to be struck down. If that's right, Holder may logically believe that the best way to get a constitutional amendment passed to secure DC voting rights would be to have this bill passed into law and then struck down. If the bill is passed, and the Supreme Court strikes it down, the publicity and focus of a Supreme Court case may go a long way towards gathering political support for a constitutional amendment. Rick Hasen recently made this argument in Slate:

Rejection by the court would put the issue on the front burner. Obama could then push for quick passage of a constitutional amendment in Congress and the states. He could remind people that many of our most important advances to voting rights have come through constitutional amendment, including enfranchisement of African-Americans, women, 18-year-olds, D.C. residents (in presidential elections), and those too poor to pay a poll tax to vote in federal elections.

  If that's what Holder is doing, then it seems to me that the debate over his decision is really about the somewhat academic question of the nature of an Attorney General's constitutional obligations, rather than the question of whether Holder is "politicizing" DOJ.