Determining a permanent location for the United States government was an issue almost before the ink was dry on the new Constitution. New York had won out in the beginning and spent freely trying to perpetuate the honor. The city was booming. Population doubled during the period of the Confederation, at last outstripping that of Philadelphia. In the interest of pleasing the new government, city fathers engaged Pierre Charles L’Enfant to remodel the old 17th-century city hall into a suitable capitol. He created Federal Hall, the building familiar in early graphics, certainly one of the most innovative and sumptuous public buildings in the United States at that time.

The Residence Act of July 9, 1790, hotly debated, bypassed New York entirely, calling for the creation of a permanent capital on the Potomac. To appease the Philadelphians, who wanted the capital as well, and whose lobbying in the person of William Bingham was very strong, the act located the government in that city for 10 years, time for the new capital down south to be established and ready for occupancy. New York’s loss seems sudden and surprising.

Neither New York nor Philadelphia was ready to give up trying to recoup the crown from the new city. Much could happen in 10 years. Both cities made every effort to woo the government and reduce the new capital to merely a bad idea, and they knew fairly well that whoever gained the approbation of President George Washington would win out. Could he be distracted by a fine house? His love for building and domestic details was probably better known then than today. In the interest of capturing him, two magnificent houses rose in the course of this political court-ship, each expressing the highest hopes of its sponsors. Each was also a particular viewpoint on the concept, as yet vague, of what sort of housing was appropriate for a president of the United States.

The house in New York City was authorized by the state legislature, which sat in Manhattan, on March 16, 1790, even as Congress, at nearby Federal Hall, was taking up the subject of a permanent residence for the government. There were many applicants, and New York had no time to waste. A building commission, appointed that same day, immediately advertised for architectural plans, and by late March the legislature had put £8,000 into the commissioners’ hands. A plan was approved in about a month. It is usually assumed that James Robinson was the architect.

Very little documentary material exists about this building, outside legislative records. Manuscript records of the city of New York were decimated in a series of fires, the last in 1911. Building documents of "Government House," as it was styled, have not been found. The project met bad luck even as its foundations were being laid, for in the summer of 1790 Congress passed the Residence Act. On August 12, President Washington was present in Federal Hall for the last time. One might have thought it all over for Government House, but the building was carried to completion, perhaps with the faint hope that, by some quirk, New York would again be considered for the capital.

Government House could hardly have been more British in its design. The tall building of red brick was set up on a rusticated stone basement and was rich in Anglo-Palladian ornament, not unlike that which would appear later on the White House. South Carolinian John Drayton saw the house in 1793, about a year after its completion, and found it plac’d upon a handsome elevation, and fronting roadway, having before it an elegant elliptical approach, round an area of near an acre of ground, enclosed by an iron railing. . . . [It] is two stories high. Projecting before it is a portico covered by a pediment; upon which is superbly carved in basso relievo, the arms of the State, supported by justice and liberty, as large as life. The arms and figures are white, placed in a blue field; and the pediment is supported by four white pillars of the Ionic order, which are the height of both stories.

Little else is known of Government House.

The Philadelphia house, in contrast, is profusely documented. It was always called, rather cumbersomely, "The House Intended for the President of the United States." Here again, the architect is not known. The political effort seems to have begun with a

design in hand. A major player behind the scenes was William Bingham, a leading Philadelphia businessman who lived in the city’s most elegant residence and had ideas of his own about what was proper and elegant. Donor of one of the lots acquired for the house, Bingham may have been involved in the plan, although no reference specifically states it.

The Pennsylvania legislature, sitting in Philadelphia, appropriated £20,000 just before it adjourned in the autumn of 1791. The money was borrowed from the Bank of North

America. Additional funds were to come from auction duties, a very favorable provision at the time, with many auctions by private speculators of the "public paper" protected by Alexander Hamilton’s financial program. Very quickly the funds from the auctions began to pour in. The maximum cost of the house was to be $25,000. Not surprisingly, the cost exceeded that.

Richard Wells, a banker and member of the building commission, wrote to William Thornton, who would soon design the United States Capitol, "The house is to be 101 by 95 feet–a circular stair case in the center lighted by a sky light cupola something like Rena-leigh. It is to be three stories fronting Market, 9th and Chestnut Street with finished fronts standing mid way between Market and Chestnut Street, having a garden to the north and south." The cornerstone was laid May 10, 1792. A stone was inscribed and laid upon that, saying: "This corner stone for this House to acommodate the President of the United States was laid the 10th day of May 1792, Pennsylvania being happily out of debt–Thomas Mifflin then Governor."

The House Intended was equally British, but more modern than the Anglo-Palladian Government House, more in the Adamesque vein then popular in England. Building records detail what is vague in the engraving. The outer shell was brick and limestone, with capitals of stone surmounting pilasters carved from ship’s masts. Five "gentlemen stonecutters" provided moldings, steps, entablature, and rich carving for the exterior. Glass was imported from Bristol, England; a temporary roof of shingles during construction was replaced toward completion with copper. From a carver the commission obtained "a Moddle mead the full size in Stucco for the Capitols on the front" of the house. The eight actual capitals were made of stucco and installed on the principal stairs by Guissepi Provini. Gutters also of copper were installed by Joseph Rakestraw, who made the copper dove weather vane that flies over Mount Vernon’s cupola.

While the engraving describes the exterior, the interior is largely resurrected through the building records. An oval room at the rear of the house anticipated the Blue Room at the White House yet to come. Rich stone carving around the long "Venetian" and "Palla-dian" windows was finished "circular" as needed. A low dome rose from within, over the rotunda, extending up into the attic and on the roof was topped by a large glazed lantern, through which light fell into the interior. Apparently plans for a grand stair in that space were abandoned, for the stair was just inside the front door, in a large entrance hall. Atop the lantern was a carved and gilded eagle. The external woodwork was coated with white lead paint.

Within, the interior must have been splendid: the august entrance hall with its grand mahogany staircase; the rotunda with its soaring dome and balcony supported by eight Corinthian columns. The staterooms, all on the second floor, opened off the balcony of the rotunda and included a ballroom and a gallery, which may have been one and the same, also sometimes described as the "Long Room." The interior of the dome was paneled in plaster. Decorations of the major rooms were very elaborate, with ovals, beads, fruit vases, ribbons, flower swags, and drapery all cast in composition, a fine mixture of plaster of paris and mortar to give precise definition. There were "eighteen pair Roses & drops," "99 leaves," "4 Scroll tablets," "2 feet Vetruvian Schroll," "40 Corinthian leaves," and others. One wonders, without any way of knowing, if the agricultural implements were added to please the president, who had adorned his own large dining room at his plantation Mount Vernon with such symbols only a decade before.

George Washington never entered either house. Wholly sold on his Potomac venture, he was already planning the White House as the two rival houses rose. Philadelphians hoped he would yield. His close friend, Elizabeth Willing Powel, attempted to bluff him into entering the House Intended, but he was too quick for her and declined. As the Residence Act directed, the government relocated in Washington, D.C., on time, November 1, 1800, under President John Adams.

What of the two houses that would have housed the president? Too large for private use, too domestic in character for commercial use, their futures were not promising. Government House served as a governor’s mansion. John Jay lived there in that capacity, and so did DeWitt Clinton. When the New York government moved to Albany in 1797, the building was used as a customhouse. For a while it was rented out as the Elysian Boarding and Lodging House. One can imagine its physical decline. It was sold to the city of New York in 1813, and in 1815, decrepit, it was torn down, lasting about as long as that far more important relic of the period, Federal Hall.

The Philadelphia house fared better. Hammers and trowels were still being worked over those fine interiors as the Federal City took shape. At last the government left Philadelphia. On August 27, 1800, the commission still in charge of the building ordered a plat plan drawn of the mansion lot and the 12 adjoining lots that would have provided stable yards and gardens. This done, they set down their terms of sale, which they posted at the Merchant’s Coffee House. The property was bought by the University of Pennsylvania for $41,650, on condition that the commission order plaster repairs, window glazing, and some painting. The house was demolished in 1829 to make way for two buildings better suited to university uses.

George Washingon’s vision for how a president should live can be seen clearly in the White House he ordered built and watched with the greatest care, even as the houses in New York and Philadelphia were being built. The vision of other Americans of his time about the presidency is more difficult to find. There are the competition drawings that survive for the White House, and it is interesting to see how the designs strive for an almost regal tone.

Yet they lived only on paper. Government House and the house in Philadelphia, having been actually built, are the only two buildings that can be turned to in an attempt to gain a wider view of current opinions on presidential appropriateness. Like the White House, they were, in scale and decoration, more ambitious than even the finest private houses the new nation had to offer. Their designs were wholly British. They were symbolic of office with a measure of grandeur that characterized the high federalist period in its outlook on the character of government.