Marietta daily leader. (Marietta, Ohio) 1895-1906, 1900-11-29
The Marietta Daily Leader.
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 1900.
A CENTURY AGO
Congress First Assembled in the City Of
Washington,

since the Congress of the United States
first assembled in Washington, and
the formal transfer of the national
capital to that point took place, the
centennial of which is to be elaborate
ly celebrated on December ~. Along
until the time that Washington was
selected for the seat of government of
the United States this country had al
most a dozen capitals. The meeting
place of the Continental Congress dur
lively as did the headquarters of the
army's commander Its location was
often determined by the eNigencies of
war and the necessity for keeping 1t
out of the hands of the British. Wash
ington, as the first President, was in
augurated at New York, though the
constitution was framed at Philadel-
phia, which was the capital at that
time, 1857, as it became the capital
later on. In 1890 the present site on
the Potomac was selected. When the
Sixth Congress closed its first session
on May IA, 1900, in Philadelphia, it
adjourned to meet in the new City of
Washington, and the second session
opend there on November II of that
year This transfer of the seat of
government from Philadelphia to
Washington hundred years ago is the
event which is to be celebrated at the
national capital on December H.
Nothing in the rise and development
of any other nation in history is at all
comparable with the transformation
which has taken place in the United
States in the century which has passed
since the seat of government was first !
located at its present site. The nations |
first chief magistrate, for whom the |
capital city was named, had died few |
months earlier; John Adams, then |
President, was about to leave that Of.
fee third of year later, and Jeffer-
son, the then Vice President was to
take the place, and start the era of
Democratic supremacy in the national
two short periods of interruption,
down to the eve Of the war of secession.
John Eager Howard, of Maryland, the
most distinguished member of his fam
lily in America, was chosen President (
of the Senate a few days after Con-
gress met for the first time at Wash 1
ington, and Theodore Sedgwick, of
Massachusetts, was Speaker of the
House. The Senate had thrty-two
members then and the House 13S Am
ong the Senators who were then dis IN
tinguished or who became SO later
were Humphrey Marshall of Ken il
tucky a member of family we'll c
known in the annals of that state down
to the civil war days; Howard, of il
already mentioned; Jona Il
than Morris, of New York one of the
most prominent of the trainers of q
the constitution; Charles Pinck fl
ney, of South Carolina, and JEFF Il
,erson's close friends, Stephens Thomp-
son Mason and Wilson Cary Nicholas, fl
Of Virginia. The w'ell-known Repre- e
included Levi Lincoln and
Harrison Gray Otis, of Massachusetts,; s.
Harper Rutledge and Sumter, of South /,
Carolina; Matthew Lyon, of Vermont
and John Marshall, of Virginia, who F
before the session was com T
oleted to take his place as Chief JUS
ice of the Supreme Court.
The Governors of all of the states are B
% participate in the festivities at
which are to mark the lis
completion of the hundred years since OF
he transfer of the national capital to W
hat site. While there were only six in
cen states in the Union then, there are he
orty-iye now. The country's popula- to
ion has grown from 100000 at that hs
ime to 76,OOO,OOO today. Less than
10000 of this population of 1900 was
vest of the Alleghenies. The countrv's so
erritory extended only to the east tn
'ank OF the Mississippi tnen, and not m
IL OF that bank belonged to us. Spain Id
.Wned Florida, with strip of terri
ory stretching from the western end
1 the present State of Florida onward
the Mississippi along the southern
nds OF today's States of Alabama and
Mississippi and the eastern projection ex
the State of Louisiana The archives at
l the government when they were Sp
'ansferred from Philadelphia to Al
Washington were conveyed by gloop stl
ne members of the executive and the
'glslatiye branches of the govern an
Ient reached the capital by wagons or Ell
horseback. Steam for the purposes br
navigation was dream of Rumsev Pa
ltch and a few others whom their pie
thought to be infected
lth mild form of insanity. Full
III Clermont did not make its an
9arance until seven years later, and
't I'LL more than quarter of a CEN 4,
ry later did the Baltimore and Ohio aw