WASHINGTON DC

This determination found expression in the Constitution, which provides that the Congress shall have power "to exercise exclusive jurisdiction in all cases whatsoever, over such district (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular States, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of government of the United States."

In 1790, as the result of a bargain made by Alexander Hamilton at a dinner arranged for the purpose by Thomas Jefferson, the seat of Congress was fixed for ten years at Philadelphia, and after that time permanently on the Potomac. In return for this concession by the North, the State debts were to be assumed by the General Government-a measure which had found small favor in the South.

Congress, having charged President Washington with selecting the exact boundaries of the Federal District within which the capital city should be located, Maryland and Virginia ceded to the General Government jurisdiction over the territory so selected, including the Maryland city of Georgetown and the Virginia town of Alexandria.

Washington bargained with the seventeen landowners for their respective holdings included within an area, wholly on the Maryland shore, extending from the Anacostia to Rock Creek, and from the Potomac to the range of hills now marked by Florida Avenue.

This territory, four and a half miles from east to west and two and a half miles from south to north, was as large as that comprised within the limits of Paris, then a city of 800,000 people. Today a population half that size occupies the entire District of Columbia.

In 1789, while these arrangements were in progress, "Major Pierre Charles L'Enfant, a young French engineer of thirty-five years, who had served with distinction and had suffered wounds and captivity in the Revolution, applied to Washington to be appointed to design the Federal City, and was selected for the task.

Washington personally knew the man who had secured in France the designs for the eagles worn as the insignia of the Society of the Cincinnati, and who successfully remodeled the New York City Hall, making of it the most beautiful building in America. Indeed, in this building…"