On September 28, 1967, Walter Washington assumed his duties as the first mayor of Washington, D.C. No, it’s not some city with a famous name but in the wrong place like Paris, Texas. Washington D.C., the one with the White House, has had a surprisingly turbulent governmental history in its two centuries of existence, meaning it wasn’t until the 1960’s and President Lyndon Baines Johnson that the district got a mayor and a democratically elected government.
The District was established in the Residence Act of 1790, which named a ten mile by ten mile section of the Potomac river lands as the new federal district and home of the new United States capital city. This area had actually already been settled and contained the existing town of Georgetown, which lay just a stones thrown from where the new federal city would be built. Because it was a federal district and not a state, it wouldn’t have a governor or legislature, but instead was governed directly by Congress. In 1802, when the city had been built up enough to have a governable population and resources to be managed, Congress officially recognized the City of Washington and gave it a local government.
Congress and the federal government never wanted to play too much of a role in the management of their city, but didn’t want to leave the people of Washington to their own devices either. The first governmental scheme instituted by Congress, which actually lasted for two decades, put in place a Mayor, appointed by the President, and a democratically elected city council. While this worked for a time, as the city grew and became more important and economically rich, governmental graft began to take root. The city was largely mismanaged by federal appointees, and following a post-Civil War population boom, Congress saw fit to change how the District as a whole was managed.
The areas in the District that lay outside city limits had previously known no government, but with people flocking to the area, Congress decided to implement a change. Beginning in 1871, the entire District, including Georgetown and the City of Washington, was governed by a two-house legislature, with the entire upper house appointed by the President. Known for appointing his friends and allies to high office, President Ulysses Grant did just that with his friend Alexander Shepherd, whom he named Governor of the new territory. Within just three years, Shepherd and the territorial government had bankrupted the District and their government was abolished. For the next 92 years, the District would be run by a three-member board appointed by the President.
In 1967, President Johnson sought to make a change. He proposed to Congress the creation of what was essentially a regular city government; a system with a mayor, deputy mayor, and city council. The only difference was that the President himself would appoint all of these positions. Johnson, betraying his true dedication to the cause of civil rights, appointed a black mayor, Walter Washington, and a city council with a majority of black councilors. This transitioning step of having a well controlled, yet effectively regular city government worked well, and in 1973 Congress handed control of the entire District of Columbia, not just the city of Washington, to its people. While the Home Rule Act is very restrictive of the types of laws the city government can make, it placed general control of the city in the hands of its citizens for the first time in 170 years. District residents still rightfully gripe about their lack of representation in the federal government, but since Walter Washington became the first Mayor of Washington, D.C., they have been well represented at home.
