White House gossip

by Edna M. Colman

The climax of the day’s events was the ball held in the north wing of the Treasury Department.

The President and Mrs. Grant and Vice President and Mrs. Colfax attended. Mrs. Grant wore an unusually rich and handsome gown of elegant white satin elaborately trimmed in point lace with pearl and diamond ornaments, while Mrs. Colfax was especially lovely in soft pink satin, with a profusion of pink illusion (tulle), offset by pearls.

The affair was horribly mismanaged, causing great discomfort and drawing severe criticism to the managers. The bitter weather added to the distress. There were no adequate arrangements for wraps and hats, no system for calling cabs and carriages, and, consequently, scores upon scores of people were obliged to give up all hope of finding their own garments when they desired to leave. There were no hired carriages to be had, and many walked home through the mud and slush in the wee small hours of the morning minus cloaks and headgear. Horace Greeley lost his cherished white hat and venerable gray overcoat in the mêlée. Many ladies, in their struggle to get into the supper room, lost their escorts, and, failing to find them again or to get any supper, remained sitting on the floor, cold, hungry, and disconsolate, through that never-to-be-forgotten night. Ten o’ clock next morning found nearly a thousand people still clamouring for their hats and coats.

The supper also was a dismal failure. Half of the assemblage could not get near the door, much less to the table, after having bought supper tickets. All of this confusion was bad enough; what made it worse was that Washington was locked in the teeth of a blizzard. Many deaths and much illness were attributed to the exposure.

General Grant kept the personnel of his Cabinet a complete secret until he sent their names to the Senate for confirmation the day after inauguration. Elihu B. Washburne, of Illinois, was made Secretary of State. He had been the staunchest defender of General Grant when General Halleck’s charges and complaints of Grant’s conduct to President Lincoln threatened to cause him to be relieved of his command after the engagement of Shiloh. He served only six days, when Hamilton Fish, descended from a long fine of prominent New York statesmen, was nominated and confirmed as his successor. Washburne went to France as Minister Plenipotentiary.

President Grant found his problems multiplying with unpleasant rapidity. From the start, he had difficulty with Senator Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts, who was offended because he had not been consulted about Cabinet nominations, and showed his disapproval by objections to the President’s nominee for Secretary of the Treasury. This man was A. T. Stewart, the millionaire merchant of New York, who accepted the position with pleasure and engaged a suite at the Ebbitt House preparatory to assuming his position. Senator Sumner’s objections to him were based on the grounds that it was not lawful for a man who was an importer in active business to hold the position of Secretary of the Treasury. Although Mr. Stewart was ready to retire from business and devote the entire profits that might accrue during the term of his desired Cabinet service to charity, this was not regarded as a proper procedure for him or for the government to sanction. The President requested that the old law, accredited to Alexander Hamilton, covering this situation, which had been passed in 1788, be set aside so as to enable his candidate to qualify for the office. However, the Senate declined, and the President was disappointed and distinctly annoyed at meeting antagonism at the beginning of his term. The antipathy between President Grant and Charles Sumner came finally to open rupture. President Grant appointed George S. Boutwell, ex-Governor of Massachusetts, as Secretary of the Treasury. This nomination was unanimously confirmed.

Edwin M. Stanton’s career as Secretary of War was ended, and he had been appointed Justice of the Supreme Court through the efforts of Senator Ben Wade, of Ohio. He accepted and took the oath, but never sat in the tribunal, since he died December 24, 1869. Considerable mystery surrounded his death; many believed that he committed suicide, but investigation of this matter and evidence of the attending physician brought the statement that death occurred from natural causes.

The President chose for his Secretary of War General John A. Rawlins, who had been his chief of staff and military adviser. Rudolph R. Borie, a retired Philadelphia merchant, received the nomination as Secretary of the Navy; John D. Cox, lawyer, of Ohio, the post of Secretary of the Interior; John A. Cresswell, of Maryland, that of Postmaster General; and Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar, of Massachusetts, Attorney General. This concluded what was regarded as a very strong Cabinet. James G. Blaine was elected Speaker of the House. By this time, every state was represented in the legislative body, and the administration had the support of a large majority in both Houses.

Shortly after his induction into office, President Grant developed a plan to improve the condition and appearance of the Capital City. He considered it unworthy of its name, and no credit either to the nation or the name of General Washington, who had selected the site and had approved the designs and plans made for its development by his friend and aide, the gifted Major Pierre L’Enfant. With each war of the nation, the Capital City experienced a mushroom growth in population and in business enterprise. Then would come a slump financially and physically. The effect of the slump following the close of the Civil War was not conducive to either national or civic pride in the city as the seat of government for an already great and growing nation.

The streets were wagon trails of alternating mud and dust; the pavements crooked and overgrown with grass and weeds. The parks, having been soldier camps, were covered with brush, weeds, and even débris of wrecked buildings, the grassy slopes beaten bare by the tramp of thousands of feet. The population and business projects alike had shrunk, and the general aspect of squalor and neglect was heightened in many localities by the presence of shanties, cabins, and lean-tos thrown together with nondescript odds and ends of lumber, tin, and what-not to make shelter for the Negro element. These were pitched anywhere about the city where a darky family of squatters were unmolested long enough to get a shack put up and install themselves. Frequently, for many years, their little hovels abutted some of the stateliest mansions.