ct. Some of his bitterest sentences are penned about the
conduct of those who preferred some other site to that on the Susquehanna
River which he knew to be the best because he lived there himself.
Bargaining among the members as to the selection had been going on almost
from the first. As early as April 26, 1789, before Washington had been
installed in his office, Maclay mentions a meeting "to concert some
measures for the removal of Congress." Thereafter notices of pending deals
appear frequently in his diary. After the defeat of the assumption bill,
the diary notes the activity of Hamilton in this matter. An entry of June
14, 1790, ascribes to Robert Morris the statement that "Hamilton said he
wanted one vote in the Senate and five in the House of Representatives;
that he was willing and would agree to place the permanent residence of
Congress at Germantown or Falls of the Delaware (Trenton), if he would
procure him those votes." Although definite knowledge is unattainable, one
gets the impression, in following the devious course of these intrigues,
that had Pennsylvania interests been united they could have decided the
site of the national capital; but the delegation was divided over the
relative merits of the Delaware and the Susquehanna as well as on
the question of assumption. Hamilton's efforts in this quarter were
ineffectual, and the winning combination was finally arranged elsewhere
and otherwise by the aid of Jefferson.

Thomas Jefferson was at this time forty-seven years old, and owing both to
seniority and to the distinguished positions he had held, he ranked as the
most illustrious member of the Administration. His correspondence at this
period shows that he was fully aware of the importance of the crisis, and
he did not overrate it when he wrote to James Monroe, June 20, 1790, that,
unless the measures of the Administration were successful, "our credit
will burst and vanish, and the States separate to take care everyone of
itself." In this letter Jefferson outlined the compromise that was
actually adopted by Congress. The strongest opposition to the assumption
bill had come from Virginia, although Maryland, Georgia, and New Hampshire
also opposed it, and the Middle States were divided. Jefferson was able to
get enough Southern votes to carry assumption in return for enough votes
from Hamilton's adherents to carry the Potomac site. An agreement was
reached at a dinner given by Jefferson to which he invited