President George Washington visited the Senate to receive its advice and consent for an Indian treaty. Washington occupied the presiding officer's chair while the presiding officer---the vice president--sat in the chair assigned to the Senate's secretary. Intimidated by Washington's presence, senators found it difficult to concentrate on the treaty's provisions as Vice President John Adams read them aloud. After hearing the contents of several supporting documents, members decided they needed more time. An angry president spoke for the first time during the proceedings: "This defeats every purpose of my being here!" Although he returned two days later to observe additional debate and the treaty's approval, he conducted all further treaty business with the Senate in writing.

Word reached the Capitol on a sweltering summer's afternoon that invading forces had swept aside the defending American army at Bladensburg, Maryland, and would arrive by dusk. While President James Madison and his cabinet consulted demoralized commanders at a military outpost, First Lady Dolley Madison packed a portrait of George Washington into her carriage and left town. Despite the wartime emergency, Congress had been in recess for the past four months. Since 1789, Secretary of the Senate Samuel Otis had safeguarded the Senate's ever-expanding collection of records, including its handwritten journals, Washington's inaugural address, and the Senate mark-up of the Bill of Rights. But Otis had died several months earlier. With the secretary's position vacant, a quick-thinking Senate clerk commandeered a wagon. From a Capitol basement storeroom, he hastily loaded boxes of priceless records and headed for the safety of his family's farm in Centreville, Virginia. Within hours, British troops set fire to the remaining documents and furnishings; only a rainstorm saved the Capitol from total ruin. For the following five years, the Senate met elsewhere in Washington until the opening of its newly restored chamber in December 1819.