USA > Washington > Standard history of the city of Washington from a study of the original sources > Part 24
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be committed to any body or board. The committee have permitted the present Delegate in Congress to continue until the close of the next session, in order that the District might have a representative on the floor to make such criticisms as he might deem necessary upon the form of government which they have raised a committee to provide for and report upon.
"The committee recommend the appointment of a com- mission to manage the affairs of the District, under limited and restrained powers, because there is not sufficient time to prepare a proper system of frame-work for the govern- ment of the District, and have it fully discussed and passed upon at the present session of Congress. The committee have placed the repair, improvement, and control of the streets under the management of an officer of the Engineer Corps of the Army, because they believe, under such officer, whatever work is done will be well done, and by an officer responsible to the Executive and to Congress." * * * *
"Your committee have unanimously arrived at the con- clusion that the existing form of government of the District is a failure; that it is too cumbrous and too expensive; that the powers and relations of its several departments are so ill defined that limitations intended by Congress to apply to the whole government are construed to limit but one of its departments; that it is wanting in sufficient safeguard against maladministration and the creation of indebtedness ; that the system of taxation it allows opens a door to great inequality and injustice, and is wholly insufficient to secure the prompt collection of taxes; and that no remedy short of its abolition and the substitution of a simpler, more restricted, and economical government will suffice. Your committee have, therefore, reported a bill for a temporary government, until Congress shall have time to mature and adopt a permanent form."
The recommendations of the Committee were embodied in a bill abolishing the Territorial government and providing for a temporary form of government to wind up its affairs. It further recommended the appointment of a committee to devise a perma- nent form of government for the District and submit the same at the next session of Congress, this committee to settle and determine also the proportion of expenses to be borne by the
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District and United States respectively. The report also recom- mended an audit of the finances of the District with a view of funding its indebtedness into a bond payable at a remote period and bearing a low rate of interest.
CHAPTER VIII.
The Temporary Commission Government; 1874-1878
The recommendations of the Allison Committee were put into effect by the speedy passage of the Act of Congress, ap- proved June 20, 1874, which abolished the Territorial form of government and provided for a Commission of three members to be appointed by the President of the United States by and with the consent of the Senate. This Commission was to exercise much the same power and authority as had been vested in the Governor and Board of Public Works under the Territorial government. To co-operate with and assist the Commission, the President was by this act authorized to detail an officer of the Engineer Corps of the Army who, under the general supervision of the Commissioners, was to have control of the engineering work of the municipality.
The first three Commissioners appointed and confirmed under this law were William Dennison, of Ohio, John Henry Ketcham, of New York, and Henry T. Blow, of Missouri. President Grant nominated Alexander R. Shepherd as one of the temporary Commissioners, but the Senate refused to confirm the nomination, deeming it advisable to administer the new policy by new agents.
Commissioner Dennison had been governor of Ohio during the greater part of the Civil War, and near the close of the war had been appointed by President Lincoln to be Postmaster General, in which capacity he served through part of President Johnson's term. As District Commissioner under the temporary government he served from July 1, 1874, to July 1, 1878.
Commissioner Ketcham was born in Dover, N. Y., December 21, 1832. He served two terms as town supervisor, member of the State Assembly and State Senator and entered the Union
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Army as Colonel of the 150th New York Volunteer Infantry, being promoted in 1862 to Brigadier General and after the close of the war being brevetted Major General. He was elected to Congress from New York, to serve in the 39th, 40th, 41st, 42nd and other Congresses until his death which occurred in New York City, November 4, 1906. He took office as District Commissioner on July 3, 1874, resigning June 30, 1877, in order to be a candidate for re-election to Congress.
General Ketchain was forceful, physically and mentally, and during his service as a Commissioner, dominated the manage- ment of the affairs of the District Government through the energetic, thorough and constant attention which he gave them. It was fortunate for the District that an administrator so well equipped, so resourceful and devoted to his task, had been entrusted with the complicated and responsible duty of bringing order out of the municipal chaos which existed at the time of his appointment.
Commissioner Blow was born in Southampton County, Virginia, July 15, 1817. He removed to Missouri in 1830 and was graduated from St. Louis University, afterwards serving four years in the State Senate of Missouri. In 1861 he was appointed Minister to Venezuela, from which post he resigned in less than a year. He was elected to Congress from Missouri in 1862 as a Republican, and re-elected in 1864, serving also as a delegate to the Baltimore Convention in the latter year. From May 1, 1869, to February 11, 1871, he represented the United States as Minister to Brazil. He went into office as District Commissioner July 1, 1874, but owing to ill health resigned December 31, 1874, his death occurring September 11, 1875, at Saratoga, New York.
The Engineer officer detailed to assist the Commission was Lieutenant Richard L. Hoxie, who had been named by the Presi- dent and confirmed by the Senate as engineer officer with the Board of Public Works a few days prior to its abolishment. He met once or twice with the Board but took no part in its official proceedings. He acted as such assistant to the temporary board of Commissioners, form July 2, 1874, until July 1, 1878.
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Lieutenant Hoxie, who afterwards become Brigadier General Hoxie, of the Corps of Engineers of the United States Army, was born in New York, and removed during his youth to Iowa. He served in the First Iowa Cavalry during the Civil War, and on July 1, 1864, entered the United States Military Academy from which he was graduated on June 15, 1868.
This Commission held its first meeting on the afternoon of Saturday, July 3, 1874, in the H Street parlor of what was then the Arlington Hotel at the northwest corner of H Street and Vermont Avenue. At that meeting the Commissioners appointed William Birney assistant attorney and Dr. William Tindall Secretary. Among those present and advising the Commissioners was Senator Allen G. Thurman of Ohio.
The afternoon of that day is memorable for the violent tempest which occurred towards evening doing immense damage to trees and houses.
The Commissioners held their sessions at the Arlington on the 6th, 7th and 8th of July; on the 9th in the office of the former Governor, located in the second story of the building at the northwest corner of 17th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, northwest, and thereafter in the building called the Columbia Building or Morrison Building on the west side of John Marshall Place, then Four-and-a-Half Street, three doors above Pennsyl- vania Avenue.
Commissioner Blow's term under the temporary govern- ment was completed by Captain Seth Ledyard Phelps, a native of Ohio, and a graduate of the Naval Academy, who had served with credit in the Mexican War and in connection with the Chili Astronomical Survey. During the Civil War he was assigned to the command of a gunboat in the western river flotilla where he made the friendship of General Grant. After the war Captain Phelps became President of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company and in connection with its affairs spent several years in China and Japan, returning to America and resigning his position with the Company in 1873. He entered upon his duties as temporary Commissioner on January 18, 1875.
Commissioner Phelps was of a genial, generous tempera-
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ment, and was by nature and training well equipped for the admirable service which he rendered during his term of office.
An interval of five months elapsed following the resignation of General Ketcham before his successor took office. This was due to the determined opposition, led by Mr. William Birney, to the confirmation of Judge Thomas B. Bryan who was nominated by President Hayes for the position. Judge Bryan's nomination was, nevertheless, finally confirmed, and he took office on Decem- ber 3, 1877, and held until July 1, 1878, when the permanent Board succeeded to the duties of the temporary Board.
Judge Bryan was a lawyer, linguist and author of national reputation, but had little opportunity during his brief term of office to render any noteworthy service in his official capacity.
Pursuant to the recommendations of the Allison Committee, Section 6 of the Act creating the temporary Board of Commis- sioners provided for a Board of audit to consist of the first and second Comptrollers of the Treasury of the United States. The function of this Board was to audit for settlement the unfunded or floating debt of the District, including that incurred by the Board of Public Works, and to issue to creditors whose claims should be established, certificates of indebtedness which were to be convertible by the Sinking Fund Commissioners created by the seventh Section of the Act into bonds bearing 3.65 per cent interest, payable in fifty years and guaranteed by the faith of the United States.
The principal function of the temporary Board of Commis- sioners was to close up the affairs of the Board of Public Works and put them on a systematic basis. Incident to the accomplish- ment of these purposes, it was necessary for the Commissioners to complete and in some cases to extend the contracts made by the Board of Public Works in order to prevent deterioration of work partially done. Under their alert and judicious adminis- tration, the District also developed normally in all branches of its government.
Section 5 of the act creating the temporary form of govern- ment provided for a joint select committee to consist of two Senators and two Ex-Representatives whose duty it should be to
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prepare a suitable form of government for the District with proper drafts of statutes to be enacted by Congress to carry it into effect. This Committee was also to submit a statement of the proper proportion of the expenses of the District which should be borne by the District and by the United States respectively.
On December 7, 1874, the joint committee, through its Chairman, Senator Lot M. Morrill of Maine, made a majority report (No. 479, 43d Congress, 2d session), accompanying Senate Bill No. 963, which contemplated a department of the United States Government strictly limited to the affairs of the District, at the head of which should be a board of general control, desig- nated the Board of Regents. This Board was to consist of three members to be appointed by the President, which should have power to appoint such subdivisions and bureaus of the municipal government as should be necessary, except as to the Board of Education, part of whose members were to be elective.
On January 11, 1877, Senator Spencer, of Alabama, sub- mitted a minority report (No. 572, 44th Congress, 2d session), which recommended the creating of a local government to be derived from the free suffrage of the people of the District.
Neither of these reports was adopted. So well did the tem- porary Commission accomplish the ends for which it had been created that when Congress came to consider the establishment of a permanent government the main features of the temporary Commission were adopted, and a permanent Board of three Commissioners to be appointed by the President, two from civil life and one from the Engineer Corps of the Army, was provided for. This action on the part of Congress was in a great measure the result of the influence of a volunteer committee of one hundred citizens who by united and organized effort did much towards inducing Congress to enact the much needed legisla- tion ; but more especially of the earnest public spirited efforts of Honorable J. C. S. Blackburn of Kentucky, who had charge of the measure in the House of Representatives.
In less than two years after the temporary board of Com- missioners had assumed its duties, it too became the object of
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an investigation by the Committee of the House of Representa- tives on the District of Columbia, which propounded a series of interrogations as to the manner in which those duties had been discharged.
This investigation related principally to the manner in which the Commissioners had adjusted the number and compen- sation of official personnel with regard to the most economical service, and the extent and authority for work under extensions of contracts of the board of public works. These questions the Commissioners answered in full on April 4th and 10th, 1876, and obviously to the refutation of any direct or implied impu- tation upon their honor or judgment, as Congress took no action adverse to them in the matter.
The Board of Audit was also investigated pursuant to a resolution of the House of Representatives adopted on January 31st, 1876. The result of this investigation was the summary repeal on March 14, 1876, of the law establishing that board, and the transfer of all of its records to the custody of the Com- missioners.
CHAPTER IX.
The Permanent Commission Government; 1878
The act creating the permanent Board of Commissioners was approved June 11, 1878. This act declared that all the terri- tory ceded by the State of Maryland for the permanent seat of Government of the United States, should "continue to be desig- nated as the District of Columbia," and that the District of Columbia should "remain and continue a municipal corpora- tion."
By the terms of this act the two civil members of the Board of Commissioners were required to have been residents of the District for three years next preceding their appointment. Their salary was fixed at $5,000 per annum. The first appointment was to be one Commissioner for one year and one for two years, after which their successors were to be appointed for three years. The Engineer Commissioner was required to be above the rank of Captain, though later, in order to make possible the appointment of Captain William T. Rossell, then one of the Assistants to the Engineer Commissioner, the law was amended to permit of the appointment, as Engineer Commissioner, of a Captain in the Corps of Engineers who had held that rank for fifteen years. The salary of the Engineer Commissioner when the position was first created, was to be the same as his regular pay as an officer in the Army but was later fixed at $5,000.
The act of Congress which provides for the appointment of a Captain, as Engineer Commissioner, was approved December 24, 1890.
Representative-afterwards Senator-Joseph C. S. Black- burn, of Kentucky, who was the Chairman of the committee which prepared the draft of the Act creating the permanent Commis- sion government, inserted in the draft a clause directing that the
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Commissioners to be appointed from civil life should belong to different principal political parties; but President Hayes, through Representative-afterwards President-Garfield, re- quested Mr. Blackburn to omit this requirement as it would be in the nature of a reflection upon the President's impartiality. Mr. Garfield orally assured Mr. Blackburn that the President would be governed by the policy indicated in the intended proviso, and on the strength of that assurance Mr. Blackburn withdrew the objectionable clause from the bill.
This Act gives the Commissioners plenary powers, under certain prescribed regulations, in administering the affairs of the District, except so far as they may be controlled by Congress. It abolished the Board of Metropolitan Police and transferred all its powers to the Commissioners. It abolished the Board of School Trustees and provided for the transfer of its functions to a board of nineteen persons to be appointed by the Commis- sioners. By a subsequent Act jurisdiction over the public schools has been placed in the Board of Education of nine members, three of them to be women, appointed by the Judges of the Supreme Court of the District. The "Organic Act" abolished the Board of Health and transferred its duties to a Health Officer to be appointed by the Commissioners.
The Act, in addition to defining the general powers and duties of the Commissioners and establishing the details of the District Government, provided that after the Commissioners had in each year submitted their estimates of the work proposed to be undertaken and of the cost of the government during the ensuing fiscal year, Congress should, to the extent to which it should approve the same, appropriate the amount of fifty per centum thereof and that the remaining fifty per centum should be assessed upon the taxable property and privileges in the District other than the property of the United States and of the District of Columbia.
The incorporation of this provision was in large measure due to the activities of the committee of one hundred previously mentioned, a subcommittee of which submitted to Congress on November 21, 1877, an address signed by J. M. Wilson, Joseph
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Casey, C. F. Peck, Joseph Shillington, S. V. Niles, Josiah Dent, W. S. Cox, C. B. Church, B. G. Lovejoy, W. H. Clagett, W. W. Corcoran, S. H. Kauffman, W. M. Dixon, A. Y. P. Garnett, L. A. Gobright, M. W. Galt, A. T. Britton, Thos. P. Morgan and Wm. Stickney.
This address concluded with the following passage:
"As in the beginning, the Federal City was without population or resources to which its founders could look for its development and improvement, so also, at the present time, it is wholly without means, either of wealth or industry, to meet the enormous outlays, necessitated by the magnificence of its plan. It has no business except what is based upon the wants of its citizens and of the government service ; one-half of its property, and the best half, is owned by the United States, and pays no taxes; and the other half- is now mortgaged for more than one-fourth of its value by the debt contracted in exhausting and paralyzing efforts to make it what its patriotic founders designed it to be, a National Capital, worthy of the name it bears. Several millions of dollars are now required to renew its decayed and almost impassable streets. Where shall its already over- burdened taxpayers look for aid and relief except to the Congress of the United States? From the facts here pre- sented, the inference is plain that the United States and our own taxpaying citizens, as part owners or tenants in common, are bound, respectively, to contribute a just and equal share of the funds necessary to develop and improve the common property; and that the United States, having exclusive and absolute title to the streets and avenues of the city as well as to the public grounds and buildings, (which alone give value to the property of citizens), and being clothed by the Constitution with plenary and exclusive power of control and administration, the Government is under special obligation to furnish its share.
"It is equally clear, that the taxpayers of the District have already and in fee simple contributed more than their equal share of these improvements. Will not the Govern- ment, with equal fidelity to its high trusts, discharge the obligations required alike by its Constitutional relations to the District, and by justice to its citizens ?"
The chief credit, however, for the determination of Congress to recognize a liability on the part of the National Government
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for one-half the cost of the government of the Capital City was the report of the Committee on Judiciary of the House of Repre- sentatives submitted by its Chairman, Mr. Luke Poland, on June 1, 1874.
While the Allison Committee had been investigating the Board of Public Works the House Committee on Judiciary had been directed to inquire into and report upon the legal relations between the Federal Government and the local government of the District, and the extent and character of the mutual obliga- tions in regard to municipal expenses; and further to inquire and report whether some accurately defined basis of expendi- tures could be prescribed and maintained by law.
The report of this committee ranks with the report made by Senator Southard in 1835, as a classic in its appreciation and presentation of the responsibilities of the National Govern- ment towards its Capital.
After reviewing the conception of the founders of the city as evidenced by the "observations" set forth in L'Enfant's plan, the report continues :
"The committee believe there can be no question, in lay- ing out such a city as is here described, that it was fully contemplated by Government that the extent of expenditures would keep pace with the magnificence of the plan to be ultimately carried out. The founders of the capital city evidently did not believe that in their time this plan could be consummated, but they were establishing the permanent seat of government. It was as the Supreme Court said in Van Ness vs. The City of Washington: 'The grants were made for the foundation of a Federal city, and the public faith was necessarily pledged when the grants were accepted to found such a city.' And again in the same opinion, 'that the city was designed to last in perpetuity-capitoli immo- bile saxum.'
"The Federal city was to be a temple erected to liberty, toward which the wishes and expectations of all true friends of every country would necessarily be directed; and, consid- ered under such important points of view as evidently controlled the minds of the founders, it could not be calcu- lated on a small scale. Everything about it was to correspond with the magnitude of the object for which it
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was intended. It foresaw a far distant future when it was to be the center of a continent under one form of govern- ment looking to it for its laws and for its protection. It was to be a city where all improvements made and expenses incurred were to be for the benefit of the whole people.
"Viewing the capital city in this national aspect, we may well understand the motives which governed its founders in imposing upon all who were to come after them such duties and responsibilities toward it as would be peculiar to the capital city alone, and which would fully justify a liberal if not a munificent policy in expenditures.
"As to the mutual obligations of the Federal Govern- ment and the citizens to defray these expenses, the committee find little difficulty. It is clear, if this national capital was founded for the use of the United States, and was placed under its exclusive government and control, and upon a. scale of magnificence appropriate only for a national capital, it never could have been contemplated that the burden of expenditures should fall upon those citizens of the United States who might temporarily or permanently take up a residence at the capital. Originally we know there was no population here to which the Government could look for contributions toward these expenditures; and as the city was not to become one of trade and commerce and manufac- tures, the local population could not be looked to in the future as being sufficient, either in numbers or wealth, to carry out the magnificent intentions of the founders. Nor, indeed, would it have been just to impose this burden upon them; for, upon the theory upon which the capital was founded, all these expenditures would ultimately be for the benefit of the whole people, and justice would dictate that the burden should fall upon the whole people."
As to the basis of contribution between the United States and the District toward the expense of the local government, the report says :
"Aside, then, from all questions of sentiment or patriot- ism or pride in the national capital, your committee are impressed with the belief that the Federal Government sus- tains at least such relation toward the citizens and the local government as would require it to contribute to municipal expenses an amount bearing the relation to the whole amount required, which the interest of the Federal Govern- ment here bears to the interest of the local government; and this they believe to be at least one-half."
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