The strongest opposition to the assumption bill had come from Virginia, although Maryland, Georgia, and New Hampshire also opposed it, and the Middle States were divided.

Jefferson was able to get enough Southern votes to carry assumption in return for enough votes from Hamilton's adherents to carry the Potomac site.

An agreement was reached at a dinner given by Jefferson to which he invited Hamilton and Madison.

According to this arrangement, the capital was to remain in Philadelphia for ten years and after that to be on the Potomac River in a district ten miles square to be selected by the President.

The residence act was approved July 16, 1790; the funding and assumption measures, now combined in one bill, became law on August 4.
After Jefferson turned against the Administration, his participation in the passage of the assumption bill was such an awkward circumstance that he discredited his own intelligence by professing that he "was most ignorantly and innocently made to hold the candle" to Hamilton's "game." In reality the public service Jefferson then performed was the most useful in all his long and fruitful career.