The Art Collection

At the old Stadt Huys in Albany, New York, colonial representatives devised a plan for a union of the colonies. The plan was ultimately rejected, but it became a guide for the later federal government.

The Old City Hall in New York was the meeting place for delegates from nine colonies, who drew up a Declaration of Rights.

The first Continental Congress met at Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where they agreed to suspend trade with Great Britain.

On July 4, 1776, delegates to the second Continental Congress issued the Declaration of Independence at Philadelphia's State House, now known as Independence Hall.

The Congress moved to Baltimore, Maryland, a safer haven during the war than Philadelphia, after the Declaration of Independence. It met in this rented building, since known as Old Congress House; the building was destroyed by fire in 1860.

After leaving Baltimore the Congress met briefly in Philadelphia but soon moved to York, Pennsylvania, where it met for nine months in the old Court House.

The next congressional meeting place was the State House in Annapolis, Maryland. It was here that George Washington resigned his commission as commander in chief of the Continental Army.

In the summer of 1783 Congress moved to Princeton, New Jersey, where it met in Nassau Hall of the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University).

In November and December 1784 the Congress met in the French Arms tavern in Trenton, New Jersey.

The Congress returned to New York's old City Hall in 1785, 20 years after the meeting of state delegates in that building. Here, in 1789, George Washington was inaugurated president and the first Congress under the Constitution was convened.

Following passage of the "Residence Act," which required the government to move to a new city on the Potomac River in 1800, Congress moved to Philadelphia for a 10-year stay at Congress Hall.

In August 1814, during the War of 1812, invading British troops burned the U.S. Capitol and other buildings in Washington. That fall, Congress met in the Patent Office building (now the National Portrait Gallery/Smithsonian American Art Museum).