Douglass did love Washington. With his children and their families he occupied the double house at 316 and 318 A Street, N.E. But he wanted to buy some place on the outskirts of the city where Anna could have peace and rest. His house was only a few minutes’ walk from the Capitol, and visitors were always knocking on their door. Besides, Anna missed her trees and flowers. She shrank from what she termed the “frivolities” of Washington and would seldom go anywhere with him. When he spoke of moving “out into the country” he saw her face brighten. He began looking for a place. Marshal Douglass was on hand to welcome President James A. Garfield to the White House. According to long-established usage, the United States Marshal had the honor of escorting both the outgoing and the incoming presidents from the imposing ceremonies in the Senate Chamber to the east front of the Capitol where, on a platform erected for the purpose, the presidential oath was administered to the President-elect. Hopes throughout the country ran high at the time of Garfield’s inauguration. As Senator from Ohio, Garfield had been a reform advocate for several years. There was no question about the serious state of affairs. “Under the guise of meekly accepting the results and decisions of war,” Douglass noted, “Southern states were coming back to Congress with the pride of conquerors rather than with any trace of repentant humility. It was not the South, but loyal Union men, who had been at fault.... The object which through violence and bloodshed they had accomplished in the several states, they were already aiming to accomplish in the United States by address and political strategy.” In Douglass’ mind was lodged a vivid and unpleasant memory which he thought of as “Senator Garfield’s retreat.” In a speech on the floor the Ohio Senator had used the phrase “perjured traitors,” describing men who had been trained by the government, were sworn to support and defend its Constitution, and then had taken to the battlefield and fought to destroy it. One Randolph Tucker rose to resent the phrase. “The only defense Mr. Garfield made to this brazen insolence,” Douglass remembered, “was that he did not make the dictionary. This was perhaps the soft answer that turneth away wrath, but it is not the answer Charles Sumner, Benjamin Wade or Owen Lovejoy would have given. None of these men would have in such a case sheltered himself behind a dictionary.” Yet no one in the country felt the shock of President Garfield’s assassination more deeply than Douglass. Not only had a good man been cruelly slain in the morning of his highest usefulness, but his sudden death came as a killing blow to Douglass’ newly awakened hopes for further recognition of his people.