Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 71.djvu/334

328 by himself with a view to ascertaining the longitude of the Capitol. His figures were based upon an occupation of the star Alcyone, one of the Pleiades, by the moon, which was observed near the President's house on October 20, 1804. Lambert succeeded in deriving the Capitol's approximate longitude. On March 28, 1810, a committee of the house to which Lambert's memorial had been referred recommended the passage of a law authorizing the president to cause the longitude of Washington west of Greenwich to be ascertained with the greatest possible degree of accuracy, and empowering him to procure for this purpose the necessary astronomical instruments. The movement to establish a first meridian impressed the members of congress favorably, since it seemed to involve a declaration of astronomical independence from Great Britain. A native republican meridian was to be substituted for an alien monarchical one.

On January 21, 1811, the house referred Lambert's documents to a second committee, which a month later asked to be discharged. Apparently, it felt itself unequal to the solution of the astronomical problems involved in the learned formulæ of the memorialist. For an expert opinion the house now rather oddly turned to James Monroe, Madison's secretary of state. After keeping the papers more than a year, Monroe on July 3, 1812, made a report in which he confessed his ignorance of the scientific aspects of the subject. He had no hesitation, however, in declaring that a first meridian should be established at Washington. This, he said, should be done with the greatest mathematical precision by means of a long series of observations with astronomical instruments. An "observatory would be of essential utility. It is only in such an institution, to be founded by the public, that all the necessary implements are likely to be collected together, that systematic observations can be made for any great length of time, and that the public can be made secure of the result of the labors of scientific men. In favor of such an institution it is sufficient to remark, that every nation which has established a first meridian within its own limits has established also an observatory. We know that there is one at London, at Paris, at Cadiz, and elsewhere."

Monroe's letter together with Lambert's documents wore referred to a committee of the house, to which Dr. Samuel Mitchill, of New York, was chairman and John C. Calhoun a member. On January 20, 1813, this committee made a report, which was accompanied by a bill "authorizing the establishment of an Astronomical Observatory." The bill provided for the erection of an astronomical observatory on public ground within the city of Washington, and for the procuring of proper telescopes, instruments and furniture for the same. The president was to direct the construction of the building, and was to prescribe rules for the government of the new institution. He was to appoint, subject