Utah lawmakers approved new congressional district lines Monday that would add a fourth seat for the state and reconfigure the 3rd District to include all of Utah County and most of the state's east side.

The new lines, passed in a special legislative session, are part of an agreement that would bestow a fourth seat on Utah as well as a voting member of Congress for Washington, D.C. -- provided Congress approves the arrangement before it adjourns this week.

The state Senate approved the new boundaries 23-4. Members of the state House of Representatives supported them in a 51-19 vote.

"The day of reckoning has finally arrived," said state Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo and one of the architects of the new map, which he described as a compromise that balanced many competing interests. "This plan -- there's something in it for almost everyone to like ... this is the best work product the committee could come up with."

The next step is up to Congress, which must approve expanding the U.S. House of Representatives to 437 members, up from 435.

"We've had mixed signals" on whether that will happen, Bramble said.

It's the last week in session for the Republican-dominated Congress, and it seemed unlikely to some that the bill will come up, the Associated Press reported Monday. As of Monday evening, the Utah bill was not on the House calendar. Utah's senators have said they were unsure if the bill would reach the Senate.

The Utah Legislature needed to approve the proposed district map before House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., would agree to bring the bill to a vote, the AP reported.

The offices of U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, and Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, did not respond to requests for comment Monday night.

Utah narrowly missed obtaining a fourth seat following the 2000 Census.

In the map passed Monday, the 2nd District is a compact, mostly urban district surrounding Salt Lake City and Park City. The redrawn 3rd District restores a sliver of Utah County that had been in the 2nd District, and makes the 3rd District a sprawling area that extends from Morgan, Summit and Daggett counties in the north to Kane and San Juan counties in the south.

The new 4th District includes part of south Salt Lake County and covers the western part of Utah from Tooele County to Washington County.

In the relatively short debate Monday, a handful of lawmakers objected to the arrangement because of concerns that granting a voting seat to Washington, D.C., violates the U.S. Constitution.

The Constitution specifies that members of the House of Representatives will be selected "by the people of the several states" -- and the District of Columbia was deliberately created as something other than a state, noted state Rep. Julie Fisher, R-Fruit Heights.

She tried to add a condition that the new districts not take effect unless Congress makes Washington, D.C., a state, cedes most of the District back to Maryland or amends the Constitution.

"I don't think we wish to turn our responsibility over to the Congress and the courts when we also took an oath to support the Constitution," Fisher said. "Congress cannot move forward on this without our complicity.

"We'll get our fourth seat in a few short years. Our problem is temporary. The proposed solution is not."

Sen. Greg Bell, R-Fruit Heights, also said he opposed "doing a deal" that raised constitutional questions, even though D.C. residents are without voting congressional representation.

"There are citizens in Guam and the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico who are also underrepresented in the same way," Bell said. "So, for constitutional concerns, I have to vote against it."

Democrats in the Senate said they didn't like the process that led to the map, although they still voted in favor of it.

"The problem is who's drawing the maps," said Sen. Patrice Arent, D-Salt Lake City. "We have people with vested interests involved. Voters should pick legislators, and legislators should not pick voters."

Utah Democrats have called for a redistricting process headed by a nonpartisan commission instead of lawmakers, but the idea has little momentum -- and Bramble said the 4th District process showed a commission wasn't necessary.

All of the Senate's Democrats voted for the new map, and in the House, only three of the 19 "nay" votes came from Democrats.

"I think today you saw a truly bipartisan plan passed," Bramble said. "We demonstrated today that you can have a bipartisan effort in a redistricting process. If it's possible to do now, it's possible to do in a few years."

This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page A1.