Illustrating how the more things change, the more they stay the same, we present this brief editorial written 147 years ago today by the Providence Evening Press’ Washington correspondent:

Washington, July 8, 1860.

Washington is fairly deserted, and the place is as dry, dusty and desolate as a civilized location can be. The Congressmen have all gone home, the lobbymen have scattered like jackals after the banquet is ended, the humble petitioners for Congressional relief, and speculators upon Congressional credulity have gone their ways, elated or dispirited according to their various successes or disappointments, and the city is left to the hot sun, the stifling dust, and the unfortunate denizens who can’t get away. The fashionable season went out with a crack, like a Fourth of July pyrotechnic, and now the dullness is as profound as that of a fashionable watering-place in mid-winter. Washington depends upon Congress for its life and gayety, and when the main-spring is withdrawn, of course the works cease to run.

This post first appeared on AHA Today.