Upon the submission of the select committee's resolutions for the removal of Washington's remains discussion arose. From a remark by Mr. Clay, the purpose seems to have been to place the remains in the vault under the center of the rotunda, which had been suggested on a former occasion by President Adams, in 1825.
The two Senators and some of the Representatives from Virginia opposed the removal of the remains of Washington from Mount Vernon. In the discussion Senator Tazewell referred to the application by Virginia in 1816 for the removal of the remains of Washington to Richmond, to be there deposited under a suitable monument. He remarked that Judge Washington replied that "it was impossible for him consent to the removal unless the remains of one of those dear relations accompanied the body."
"Are the remains," asked Mr. Tazewell, "of the husband to be removed from the side of the wife? In their lives they lived happily together, and I never will consent to divide them in death."
This thought appears to have made so strong an impression on Congress that the resolution was altered so as to ask the consent of Mr. John A. Washington and that of Mr. George Washington P. Custis, the grandson of Mrs. Martha Washington, for the removal and depositing in the Capitol at Washington City of her remains at the same time with those of her late consort, George Washington.
In response to the purpose of the resolution, Mr. John A. Washington felt constrained to withhold his consent by the fact that General Washington's will, in respect to the disposition of his remains, had been recently carried into full effect. Mr. Custis, however, took a different view of that clause in the will, and gave his "most hearty consent to the removal of the remains after the manner proposed," and congratulated "the Government upon the approaching consummation of a great act of national gratitude."
In the debate in the House of Representatives on the resolution and accompanying report, Mr. Doddridge, of Virginia, remarked that he was a member of the State's legislature when the transaction by it took place in 1816, and "he felt entirely satisfied that the resolution for removing the remains to Richmond would never have passed the Assembly of Virginia but for the loss of all hope that Congress would act in the matter."
Mr. Duffie opposed the removal of the remains, saying: "As to a monument, rear it; spend upon it what you will; make it durable as the pyramids, eternal as the mountains; you shall have my co-operation. Erect, if you please, a mausoleum to the memory of Washington in the Capitol, and let it be as splendid as art can make it."
The refusal of Mr. John A. Washington to permit the removal of the remains of Washington seems to have prompted Mr. Clay to urge the adoption of the pending resolution to erect a statue of Washington at the Capitol. "An image," he said, "a testimonial of this great man, the Father of his Country, should exist in every part of the Union as a memorial of his patriotism and of the services rendered his country; but of all places, it was required in this Capitol, the center of the Union, the offspring, the creation, of his mind and of his labors."
The resolution for the statue of Washington by Greenough was adopted, and it was ordered. The statue was made and was placed in the rotunda in 1841, but subsequently removed into the east park of the Capitol, where it now rests.
In 1853, Congress appropriated $50,000 for the erection of an equestrian statue of George Washington by Clark Mills.