Washington D.C. is a Great City
Don't Let Anyone Tell You Otherwise
For my second essay this month, I wanted to offer an ode to Washington D.C. – one of my favorite cities, and a great American one. As cities go, it sometimes gets a fair amount of shade thrown at it. New Yorkers don’t consider it a real city. Europeans turn up their noses at America’s capital. Heartlanders, Westerners, and Sourtherners of a certain bent also look down upon life inside The Beltway as elitist and out of touch.
But D.C. has a majesty and, if nothing else, it represents this nation well, in more ways than one.
What Washington Has to Lend It:
To many new visitors, the most notable thing about D.C. is the classical architecture of the monuments on the National Mall. The striking Jefferson Memorial stands out upon the Potomac. Lincoln gazes over the Reflecting Pool and looks towards Congress. The Washington Monument stands above everything and can be seen almost anywhere in the city.
Certain Americans of a small-r republican bent dislike the grandeur of this architecture. It smacks almost of idolatry to them, or at the very least of the aristocratic and monarchical world we fought a war to leave behind in Europe. Our heroes are neither Greek Gods nor Roman patricians, but farmers and lawyers and frontiersmen. Why should our monuments depict them as Caesars?
But the Founders knew the American Republic was the heir to a classical tradition of self-government, and the men who designed our capital city (including Pierre L’Enfant), wanted it to be a city that would command respect from the foreign dignitaries who visited – even the Europeans who would never grow old of saying, “What history? You think this city is old?”
It is altogether fitting for our mixed regime (and more than a little ironic), that our aristocratic monuments to men who would not be kings can be found at most times throughout the year with the demos crawling all over them – crowding the steps, traveling in bands marked by matching t-shirts, taking pictures, and backing up traffic. There is a symbolism in that picture.
We turn from the monuments to the Smithsonian – a national treasure and hub of cultural enrichment. The network of museums in and around the nation’s capital range from children’s favorites like the Air and Space Museum and the Museum of Natural History, to impressive art museums which include the famous National Gallery (donated to the American people by the great Andrew Mellon) and the lesser-known Freer and Renwick Galleries.
New Yorkers and Chicagoans may contest that D.C.’s museums are no match for theirs, but the Smithsonian is actually the largest museum complex in the world, with a collection that rivals all comers. The French may be partial to the Louvre, and the Italians to the Uffizi, but the Smithsonian’s museums contain plenty of French and Italian art, as well as a sizable collection of American art – including an extensive devoted to North American landscapes painted by the likes of Albert Bierstadt and Frederick Jackson Turner.
And though the British Museum may make even a proud Irish-American think there was something grand about the British Empire after all, the collections of antiquities and artifacts in the Smithsonian are world-class. And multiple sources have suggested that there is more to the Smithsonian’s collection than meets the eye.
One would be remiss in leaving the National Mall without remarking on that other set of buildings done in classical architecture, which house uniquely American institutions: the U.S. Capitol, the White House, and the Supreme Court. The first, of course, takes pride of place at the head of the Mall. Upon stepping out of Union Station upon arriving in D.C. for the first time, one can’t help looking up the street and declaring, “There it is! The Capitol Dome.”
The grandeur of the second lends itself to the aforementioned small-r republicans’ cries of monarchism, and the lamentable tendency of the current occupant (and the one before him, and the one before him, and many of their predecessors) to deck himself in the trappings of kingship, certainly does not help the case. But after nearly two hundred and fifty years, the White House still does not house America’s monarch, and the tradition of the man who refused to be king (and who gave his name to the city in question) still very much holds (despite threats to it). Though we are unfortunately unlikely to get the president this country really needs (a man or a woman in the mold of Calvin Coolidge,1 rather than a “strong” leader) anytime soon, we remain “a republic if [we] can keep it,” and the White House still symbolizes that.
That third building is the highest court in the land. “Nine unelected judges,”2 some will cry. But of all the institutions of American government, the Supreme Court remains the most trusted and venerated among the general public. And the Supreme Court Building – just like the Capitol and the White House – is hallowed ground, a site of historical weight – both for the men and women who walked its halls and sat inside it, and for the weight of the events which took place within its walls. To look at any decisions (at present or in the past) that you or I dislike would be too narrow. In visiting this building – just as in visiting the Capital and the White House – we pay homage not to those inside but to the offices they hold, not to the current makeup or outlook of the institution, but to the institution itself and what it represents. An institution that has been around much longer than any of us, and which will be around long after we are gone.
Washington D.C., as the capital of the United States of America, represents our nation. And in the minds of many it represents our government. But what it really represents is our form of government, a form that has endured for two and a half centuries – and to mistake the former for the latter would be to lose the forest for the trees.
Objections:
Some will no doubt object that despite whatever it has to lend itself, D.C. is crawling with government stiffs. To be sure, there is much that is unlovely about our sprawling bureaucracy. But about these men and women who comprise it, it must be said that they swear an oath to the American Constitution, and not to any man or woman or party. And there is virtue in that. Nothing more need be said on that matter at present time.
Beyond that, Washington D.C. is also a hotbed of American politics. This gives many Americans heartburn and they spend much time trying not to think about it. One can understand why they would not want to spend their vacation in the place where so much of it goes on. But, for our sins, we should consider this: American politics, for all that it is, may not reflect well on us – but it does reflect us well. Perhaps more than we’d like.
Readers will have noticed that it has already proven impossible for me to write at length about Washington without spending time on American politics.3 Very well, I will turn from it. However, before I do, I must say that even the most disconsolate among us should remember that when it comes to American politics, the glass is more than half full. At most times and in most places, human beings have conducted their politics at the point of a sword or the end of a gun. The world should be so lucky as to have our politics.
Some will object that D.C. has a swampy climate. “It’s unlivable in the summer,” and so on. To which I say: compared to what? Good portions of the United States have climates that are either miserable in the summer, or dreadful in the winter, or both. And most Americans don’t spend enough time outside to have a complaint! We live in an era when technology has made it easier than ever for human beings to live comfortably in terribly uncomfortable climates. Besides, the Potomac is beautiful in the spring, and the summer isn’t any worse than the rest of Virginia (and a good sight better than Florida).
Some will claim that the nightlife is boring in D.C., or that the food is better in New York (or Chicago, or San Francisco, or…), or that the sports teams are better in Boston. About the former I can pass no comment. About the latter I will point out that D.C. is thriving with immigrants from all over the world, and that if you know where to look, you can find a tremendous variety of outstanding restaurants offering as many different cuisines as there are nations. About the latter, well…
Visiting D.C.:
Every American should visit D.C. at some point in their life, if only to walk up and down the Mall until they get dehydrated and buy overpriced ice cream from the trucks playing that instantly recognizable musical jingle. The best time of year to visit D.C. is the spring, preferably early spring, when the cherry blossoms are in bloom. Summer comes early to D.C. and lasts until October (don’t say you weren’t warned).
One of the criteria by which I judge a city is walkability. Washington is very walkable, which makes it a top-tier city in my book.4 Unlike many cities, it is good for running and biking (protestations about the summer humidity and heat are overblown) – you can travel good parts of the city on foot without waiting at a stoplight. And the network of bike trails extending throughout the greater D.C. area will take you down to Mount Vernon (literally) or out to the C&O Canal.
Much more could be said about Washington, but I will close with this: there are larger cities, and older cities, and sexier cities, and more stunning cities. But Washington D.C. isn’t exactly like any other city in the world – and in that regard, it also reflects this nation well.
In other words, one who does not see him or herself as bigger than the office in which he or she serves and therefore does away with the pomp and circumstance and pretension.
The small-r republican will reply that he likes that part of the arrangement just fine.
Some readers will read that sentence as saying, “it has proven impossible for me to write at length about Washington without spending time on American politics.” That may also be true. And yet, I contest that anyone writing on this topic would have to go out of his or her way to avoid mentioning American politics.
Boston is also very walkable, as are Dublin and Glasgow. Denver is not a walkable city (unless you are willing to walk all day). Parts of San Francisco and Salt Lake City are, but not if you are in a hurry. London is technically walkable, but it stretches the definition of that term – if you need to be somewhere under an hour, you’ll need to take the Tube. Rome is in the middle.