buildings that had served as barracks and stables for army mules still stood mute, months after the end of the fighting.”40
Taking Care of His Business Interests
Shepherd remained out of elective politics for several years and devoted his energies to two principal goals: becoming a successful, wealthy businessman and advancing the cause of Washington’s transformation. The long-expected transition at the J. W. Thompson plumbing firm took place in mid-May 1865, when newspaper announcements confirmed the company’s dissolution and the elevation of Shepherd, the former junior partner, to owner of Alexander Shepherd & Brothers.41 The firm then consisted of five shops for gas fitting, plumbing, brass finishing, carpentry, and blacksmithing.42 Much of the merchandise boasted a Philadelphia pedigree, and advertisements in Washington papers for current lighting models frequently cited their having been brought from Philadelphia. This became a Shepherd trademark to be repeated in his later development work, when he made use of the text of the Philadelphia Board of Trade document in his next major civic venture, the Washington Board of Trade. Aside from any intrinsic superiority, Philadelphia was also the home of Mary Shepherd’s maternal ancestors, and it would have been natural for Shepherd to strengthen family ties while conducting personal or public business.
A key element in Shepherd’s plans for Washington was the Board of Trade, which he helped launch at a meeting at City Hall on October 17, 1865, bringing together some fifty leading businessmen and twenty-one firms. He understood the nexus between commerce and politics and saw a business development organization as a useful tool to address political issues indirectly. Shepherd was one of the first speakers at the meeting, and he eloquently described the advantages of a merchants’ exchange and urged cooperation among members of the business community, including those in Georgetown, in order to make it happen. Not surprisingly, Shepherd was spokesman for the planning committee, whose draft preamble noted that a lack of unity had been a detriment to the interests of the community and that commercial advantages were best obtained by united action.
The Board of Trade’s initial skirmishes included criticism of a proposed license for a Washington and Alexandria Railroad line through the city as “a gross outrage upon the industrial interests of this city; of incalculable harm to the interests of its citizens; and calculated to destroy the business prospects of this Metropolis.”43 At a meeting with the Washington Board of Aldermen in November, Shepherd argued against the license because, he asserted, it would further monopolize control of local rail lines by outside interests and degrade vital parts of the city with tracks, water towers, and parked rail cars. Employing a technique he would use effectively throughout his career, Shepherd arranged for an elegant repast at the end of the meeting in an effort to create goodwill.44 Always a gregarious figure, Shepherd had become adept at using the leverage afforded by his wealth, more than his physical size and aggressive personality, to influence others to his way of thinking.
Shepherd’s strategic objective with the Board of Trade became clear in November 1865. He returned to a favorite topic by proposing to create a new, single charter for the whole of the District of Columbia built around consolidation of the capital’s three fragmented and separately governed jurisdictions (Georgetown, Washington City, and Washington County). He argued that Congress should be persuaded to create an “efficient and harmonious” government for the District through consolidation and that the Board of Trade, which represented such a large proportion of the District’s commerce, was the proper vehicle for advancing the project.45 A number of board members objected to using a business promotion organization for political purposes, but Shepherd framed the issue differently: the resolution was only a business necessity that “should not be mixed up in any degree with politics, negro suffrage, or anything else. . . . We have nothing to do with politics in this District, and they should never be dragged into matters of District interests.”46
At the December 6 meeting to discuss consolidation, Shepherd provided insights into his thinking about how the consolidated entity might be governed: “Whether the Government should be territorial or be vested in appointed commissioners, or a ruler to be elected by the people, are questions which might cause a diversity of opinion, but the advantages [are] fully recognized by businessmen and taxpayers.” He went on to argue that “there are no politics here, and we had no political rights,” assuring his audience that the initiative would not be viewed by the people as political and asserting that nine-tenths of the residents would favor consolidation.47 Despite general agreement that Georgetown would also support the move, one participant noted that the people, not the Board of Trade, should initiate such an important change in local government. Shepherd retorted that he expected the cry of politics to be raised, “as is always so when something of benefit to the District of Columbia is proposed.” He reiterated his view that consolidation was a pure business issue, “and if the municipalities were placed under one good man, and Congress pay the Government’s portion,” there would be positive results and reduced corruption. “As for political rights, we haven’t any, and are not as good as darkies.”48 Shepherd pressed the point by noting, “The City has few privileges, and Congress may at any time enact obnoxious laws, and it would therefore seem much better if Congress had entire control.”49 To give additional weight to the initiative, Shepherd also offered a resolution for the Board of Trade to urge Congress to consolidate the District of Columbia. With these assurances from its most forceful member, the board passed the resolution unanimously.
Shepherd was playing a sophisticated political game. He used the newly established Board of Trade to advance a radical political initiative while maintaining that it was nonpolitical and that business promotion alone was the focus. He was able to identify an issue that combined commercial development with an implicit appeal to the conservative “old citizens’” rejection of black enfranchisement. He was well aware of but not sympathetic to the rapidly changing goals of black Washingtonians. Although blacks were not to receive the vote until January 1867 and their votes were not yet in play, class and politics mattered a great deal. As businessmen and loyal Republicans, members of the board had the ear of Congress. The board made no explicit case for or against voting rights and steered clear of inflammatory language. Instead, it emphasized the vocabulary of progress and prosperity to make the case against black voting rights and, more generally, against democratic government.50 Board members wanted a unified District above all, and Shepherd’s formula for charter consolidation avoided addressing the racial issue.
Deploying the Board of Trade, a nonpolitical entity, as a tool of influence to achieve political ends was a tactical if not a strategic change because in the years before 1864 Shepherd had made every effort to use his initiatives in the Common Council for the same purposes. He may also have realized that his defeat for a seat on the Board of Aldermen provided him with an opportunity to change gears. For the next several years he would work officially outside the political system in order to bring about change within.
Notes
1Robert Harrison, “An Experimental Station for Lawmaking: Congress and the District of Columbia, 1862–1878,” Civil War History 53 (Mar. 2007):33.
2Constance McLaughlin Green, The Secret City: A History of Race Relations in the Nation’s Capital (Prince ton, N.J., 1967), p. 18.
3Jefferson Morley, Snow-Storm in August: Washington City, Francis Scott Key, and the Forgotten Race Riot of 1835 (New York, 2012), pp. 144–56.
4Josephine F. Pacheco, The Pearl: A Failed Slave Escape on the Potomac (Chapel Hill, 2005), pp. 53–57, 92, 112.
5Alan Lessoff, The Nation and Its City: Politics, “Corruption,” and Progress in Washington, D. C., 1861–1902 (Baltimore, 1994), p. 18.
6Green, Secret City, pp. 89–90.
7Social equality
