The Nation’s Capital looked like a ghost town last week, with national museums, many lawmakers’ offices, and the Capitol building closed. At Union Station, a hub for visitors entering and departing Washington, D.C., the restaurants and stores were sparsely populated, and a waiter at Uno’s Chicago Grill said business was down 30 to 40 percent.

On the lawn outside the Capitol, federal employees held a rally urging Congress to put them back to work.

One of those workers, Lisa Corathers of Haymarket, Va., said she appreciated the efforts of Virginia senators Mark Warner and Tim Kaine to get a clean continuing resolution (CR), praising them for their pragmatism and their support of furloughed federal employees.

Amidst it all, the Virginia senators and the representative for Virginia’s 1st District, Congressman Rob Wittman, were hard at work trying to negotiate a deal not only to keep the United States from defaulting on its debt, but also to ensure that gover...