The Capitol Dome

Capitol shook. Many members wounded (not corporeal but mental wounds), who hate the name whose memory is hon- ored." Cutler noted every occasion he dined with his "Dem- ocratic Majesty," but also commented on how graciously President Jefferson habitually treated him, as well as his other guests. 16 On 20 March 1804 the Senate passed a bill sponsored by Sen. Robert Wright of Maryland to move Congress to Bal- timore. Cutler recounted the vociferous protest of Washingto- nians in the Senate when it met on Monday, 26 March. "Gal- leries extremely full of people. Caricature of Wright, with the Capitol on his back, travelling off, and calling to [Sen. Jonathan] Dayton [of New Jersey] to help; reply 'I will see you hanged first.' People crying from the windows, 'Stop, thief.'… Great fuss. President there….The head men [instigators], it was said, were arrested by the order of the Senate." 17 In late February 1804, Cutler "Agreed with Jess, a black man, to go to Hamilton [Massachusetts] to live with me; at $8 a month. Wages begin today; paid him $10." Cutler's grand- children included a lengthy (and rather paternalistic) footnote on Jess Shorter, a freedman who had apparently worked at Speake's boarding house. Cutler educated Shorter, who soon married, worked as a gardener, and raised his family in Hamilton. Shorter lived and died in the cottage Cutler built for him next to his parsonage. Shorter returned to Washington with Cutler in the fall of 1804 to serve him again at the Speake's boarding house during his last term in Congress. While a member of the Seventh Congress, Cutler commented in his correspondence and diaries on the excitement of being an eye witness and participant in history. His remarks about his life in Washington during the Eighth Congress were cursory about his attendance at the House, more fulsome about his botanical interests and social life, especially among the diplomatic com- munity. He was not a candidate for the Ninth Congress in the 1804 election. Perhaps Cutler became convinced that being a member of the minority party in Congress was either too tire- some or an exercise in futility, or possibly both. 18 PAMELA SCOTT is an independent scholar who has been researching, teaching, and writing about Washing- ton's architectural, planning, and landscape histories for the past 35 years. She wishes to thank Kenneth R. Bowling, Priscilla McNeil, and Barbara Wolanin for their support in launching this inaugural column from the U.S. Capitol Historical Society Resident Scholar. Notes 1. "Viator" [Joseph B. Varnum, Jr.], The Washington Sketch Book (New York, 1864) quoted several authors on the physical conditions in early Washington. This author's essay, "Capitol Neighbors," in a forthcoming book to be published by the U.S. Capitol Historical Society, delves into property development near the Capitol from the 1790s until 1829. 2. James Greenleaf's speculative ventures in Washington are recounted widely, but most cogently and accurately in Robert D. Arbuckle, Pennsylvania Speculator and Patriot: The Entre- preneurial John Nicholson, 1757-1800 (University Park, PA, 1975), pp. 113-199. For the reproduction of many documents see Allen C. Clark, Greenleaf and Law in the Federal City (Washington, DC, 1901). Bob Arnebeck, "Tracking the Specu- lators: Greenleaf and Nicholson in the Federal City," Washing- ton History v. 3, 1(Spring/Summer 1991):112-125 is one mod- ern account of a multi-faceted and rapidly evolving situation. 3."Viator," Washington Sketch Book, pp. 91-3 for the quote from Wolcott's letter; p. 94 for Abigail Adams's letter to her daughter Abigail (Nabby) Adams Smith; and p. 97 for Smith's account of life in his boarding house. John Cotton Smith, The Correspondence and Miscellanies of the Hon. John Cotton Smith, LL.D. (New York, 1847), pp. 205-06. 4. Jerry W. Knudson, "The Jeffersonian Assault on the Fed- eralist Judiciary, 1802-1805: Political Forces and the Press Reaction," The American Journal of Legal History 14(January 1970):55-6. 5. William Parker Cutler and Julia Perkins Cutler, eds., Life, Journals and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler, LL.D. (2 vols.; Cincinnati, OH, 1888), pp. 50-3. An edited version of Cutler's letter was published in Allen C. Clark, "Daniel Carroll of Duddington," Records of the Columbia Historical Society 39(1938):32-3, hereafter cited as RCHS. 6. Cutler's fellow lodgers were Rep. John Davenport (1752– 1830), Sen. James Hillhouse (1754–1832), Rep. Elias Perkins (1767–1845), and Rep. John Cotton Smith (1765–1845), all of Connecticut; and Sen. Dwight Foster (1757–1823), Rep. Ebene- zer Mattoon (1755–1843), and Rep. Nathan Read (1759–1849), of Massachusetts. 7. King's boardinghouse was the southernmost building in Carroll Row, Duddington's investment of $24,000 to provide elegant accommodations for Members of Congress. King's house at the corner of 1st and A Streets SE was about 25 feet in width. The creation of a viable neighborhood near the Capitol beginning in the late 1790s is the subject of the author's forth- coming essay "Capitol Neighbors." 29 THE CAPITOL DOME

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