If the District sleeps alone at night, as the Postal Service song suggests, the city certainly awakens by day. It becomes alive with the buzz of politics and history, lobbyists and tourists. Living in ...

Introduction: The Concerns of the Nation -- Prologue: The "Mutinous Insult" -- The General's River and the Federal City -- Planners, Speculators, and Slaves -- "The Most Agreeable Town" -- Rebuilding ...