From George Washington to the Commissioners for the District of Columbia, 21 October 1796
To the Commissioners for the District of Columbia
Mount Vernon 21st Oct. 1796
Gentlemen,
According to my promise, I have given the several matters contained in your letter of the first instant, the best consideration I am able.1
The following is the result: subject however to alterations, if upon fuller investigation, and the discussion I mean to have with you on these topicks on my way to Philadelphia,2 I should find cause therefor.
Had not those obstacles opposed themselves to it, which are enumerated by one of the Commissioners, I should, (for reasons which are now unnecessary to assign) have given a decided preference to the Site which was first had in contemplation for a University in the Federal City; but as these obstacles appear to be insurmountable, the next best Site for this purpose, in my opinion, is the square surrounded by numbers 21. 22. 34. 45. 60 a[nd] 63.—and I decide in favor of it accordingly.3
Conceiving (if there be space sufficient to afford it) that a Botanical Garden would be a good appendage to the Institution of a University, part of this square might be applied to that purpose: If inadequate, and the Square designated in the Plan of Majr L’Enfont for a Marine Hospital, is susceptible of that Institution, and a Botanical Garden also, ground there might be appropriated to this use.4 If neither will admit of it, I see no solid objection against commencing this Work within the President’s square; it being previously understood that, it is not to be occupied for this purpose, beyond a certain period; or until circumstances would enable, or induce the Public, to improve it into pleasure Walks &ca &ca.5
Although I have no hesitation in giving it as my opinion, that all the Squares (except those of the Capitol & President’s) designated for public purposes, are subject to such appropriations as will best accommodate its views, yet it is, and always has been my belief, that it would impair the confidence which ought to be had in the Public, to convert them to private uses, or to dispose of them (otherwise than temporarily) to individuals. The Plan which has been exhibited to, and dispersed through all parts of the World, give strong indications of a different design; and an innovation in one instance, would lay the foundation for applications in many; and produce consequences which cannot be foreseen, nor perhaps easily remedied. My doubts therefore with respect to designating the Square on the Eastern Branch for a Marine Hospital, did not proceed from an idea that it might be converted, advantageously, into Saleable Lots; but from the utility of having an Hospital in the City at all.6 Finding however, that it is usual in other Countries to have them there the practice,7 it is to be presumed, is founded in convenience; and as it might be difficult to procure a Site without the City that would answer the purpose, I confirm the original idea of placing it where it is marked, in L’Enfont’s plan.
I am disposed to believe, if foreign States are inclined to erect buildings for their Representatives near the United States, the Sites for these buildings had better be left to the choice of their respective Ministers: for besides the reasons which have been already adduced, against innovations, it is very questionable whether ground as low as that in the Capital Square, west of the building, would be their choice: to fix them there then, might be the means of defeating the object altogether.
As the business of the Executive Officers will be chiefly, if not altogether with the President, Sites for their Offices ought to be convenient to his residence; but as the identical spots can be better chosen on the ground with the plan of the City before one, than by the latter alone, I will postpone this decision until my arrival therein; as I shall also do other appropriations of public Squares, if it be necessary to take the matter up before my return to Philadelphia.
It might be well to amplify on those subjects which you conceive ought to be laid before Congress, or the national Council, and to suggest the mode which you may have contemplated as best for the purpose, against my arrival; which, probably, will be on Tuesday or Wednesday next.8 With great esteem I am Gentlemen Your Obedt Humble Servant
Go: Washington
LS (retained copy), DLC:GW; LB, DLC:GW.
2. GW may have met with the commissioners sometime between 25 Oct., the day he reached Georgetown, D.C., and 27 Oct., when his “Bill in the City of W.” placed him in the Federal City. He returned to Philadelphia on 31 Oct. (; see also GW to Alexander Hamilton, 2 Nov., and n.1 to that document).
3. D.C. commissioner William Thornton had disputed certain points made in the commissioners’ first letter to GW of 1 Oct., but he agreed with them on the proposed site for a national university (see Thornton’s first letter to GW of 1 Oct.).
The public square, then known as Peter’s Hill, which was surrounded by lots 21, 22, 60, and 63, was the site recently selected for the planned national university (see Commissioners for the District of Columbia to GW, 1 Oct. [first letter], and n.2 to that document). Prior to the selection of Peter’s Hill, the commissioners, as early as 1793, had anticipated an appropriation of land for a national university northeast of Massachusetts Avenue. They initially recommended a tract located between “I Street North, & P Street North, and between 5th Street and 11th Street West” (Thornton to GW, 13 Sept. 1796, in , 395–97, quote on 396; see also the commissioners’ book of proceedings under 24 and 25 Dec. 1793, in DNA: RG 42, Records of the Commissioners for the District of Columbia, Proceedings, 1791–1802).
4. For Pierre Charles L’Enfant’s 1791 plan of the Federal City, which proposed to locate a marine hospital on the Eastern Branch, see Commissioners for the District of Columbia to GW, 1 Oct. (first letter), and n.8 to that document.
5. For the unsuccessful plans to establish a botanical garden near President’s Square, later renamed Lafayette Square, see Commissioners for the District of Columbia to GW, 1 Oct. (first letter), and notes 3 and 19.
6. For the controversy surrounding the commissioners’ proposal to divide into marketable lots the area on the Eastern Branch designated for a marine hospital, see their first letter to GW of 1 Oct., and n.12; see also their letter of 7 Oct., and n.2 to that document. For the “Plan” of the Federal City, see the commissioners’ first letter to GW of 1 Oct., and n.5 to that document.
7. GW likely obtained this information from Thornton’s first letter to him of 1 October.
8. The following Tuesday was 25 October.