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President Obama and a New Birth of Freedom
Obama's and Lincoln's Inaugural Addresses and Much More
By Joseph Cummins HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.
Copyright © 2009 Joseph Cummins
All right reserved. ISBN: 9780061847875
Chapter One
"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."
U.S. Constitution, Article 2, Section 1
When Barack Obama took this oath at noon on January 20, 2009, he became the forty-fourth president of the United States to repeat these exact thirty-five words. The words haven't changed since our first president, George Washington, spoke them in New York City on April 30, 1789. A great deal about presidential inaugurations has changed over the course of two centuries—their date, where they are held, the ceremonies surrounding them, and the number of people who are able to see and hear them, just for starters. This oath of office, however, as written into the U.S. Constitution, has not changed at all.
Think of the often-violent changes of power that go on routinely in other countries. In many cases, power-hungry factions ignore the will of the people and seize the reins of government by force. Now think of the forty-four U.S. presidents over the course of 220 years,standing in front of the American people, raising their hands, and taking this oath.
As Dr. Donald R. Kennon, chief historian of the United States Capitol Historical Society, says: "Our American Revolution was an experiment to see if the people could govern themselves. And the regular and routine nature of a presidential inauguration reassures the people that the experiment is continuing and succeeding."
"A New Birth of Freedom"
The Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies (JCCIC) is a committee made up of six senior members of the House of Representatives and Senate. Since 1901, the JCCIC has helped plan inaugural ceremonies surrounding the actual swearing-in of the president. This is because most presidents-elect take their oaths of office at the Capitol Building, the home of the United States Congress.
Since February 2009 marks the two hundredth anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth, the JCCIC chose a phrase from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address—"a new birth of freedom"—as the inaugural theme. Lincoln made this famous address during the Civil War. In it, he reminded people that because of the sacrifices of the soldiers who had died in the war helping to free the slaves and preserve the Union, America would experience "a new birth of freedom." Lincoln wanted Americans to remember that the country was founded on the principle of "government of the people, by the people, for the people," and that they shared the responsibility of ensuring that it "shall not perish from the earth."
The JCCIC picked this theme before it was known that Barack Obama would win the 2008 election, but it's fitting for Obama, the first African American president, to have "a new birth of freedom" as an inaugural theme. It is an extraordinary, first-in-our-history occurrence to have an African American president and his family—his wife, Michelle, and his daughters Malia, ten, and Sasha, seven, and their grandmother Marian—in the White House. Barack Obama has talked movingly about how wonderful it will be for his children to live and play freely in a place that was built partly by slave labor.
In fact, slaves and servants were the only African Americans allowed in the White House from its completion in 1800 until the African American writer and abolitionist Frederick Douglass visited in 1865, after Abraham Lincoln's second inauguration. At this time it was the custom of presidents to hold a kind of "open house" at the White House after the ceremonies of inauguration day, allowing the public to greet the newly sworn-in president. That day, Abraham Lincoln was said to have shaken hands with six thousand people. But because he was African American, Frederick Douglass was at first turned away by guards. He was finally able to reach the reception, where Lincoln called him over. Lincoln said to those around him: "Here comes my friend Douglass," and then asked Douglass for his opinion of the speech. "There is no man in the country whose opinion I value more than yours," Lincoln told Douglass. "That was a sacred effort," Douglass replied.
Nevertheless, discrimination continued in the White House, as it did across the land. When President Theodore Roosevelt had dinner with the African American educator, writer, and orator Booker T. Washington in the White House in 1901, one Southern newspaper called it "the most damnable outrage which has ever been perpetrated by any citizen of the United States."
While Obama's election will not end racism, his tenure as president may help Americans come to terms with some of the racial issues that continue to trouble our country.
"I Got Some Game"
As a new United States senator in 2005, Barack Obama wrote in a Time magazine essay that he kept a photograph of Lincoln in his office. In the photograph the great president looked very tired, yet he was still smiling. Obama wrote: "On trying days, the portrait . . . soothes me." It made Barack Obama realize that, as Lincoln did, he could "overcome personal loss and remain determined in the face of repeated defeats."
Like Lincoln, Barack Obama got his start in the rough and tumble of Illinois politics and overcame personal hardship in his early life. Also like Lincoln, Obama is known for his speechmaking skills. Obama announced his candidacy for president from the Old State House in the capital of Springfield, Illinois. This was where Lincoln had kept his law offices and worked in the state legislature. Obama was trying to link himself to the beloved sixteenth president of the United States. "In the shadow of the Old State Capitol, where Lincoln once called on a divided house to stand together, where common hopes and common dreams still live," Obama told the crowd, "I stand before you today to announce my candidacy for president of the United States."
Continues...
Excerpted from President Obama and a New Birth of Freedom by Joseph Cummins Copyright © 2009 by Joseph Cummins. Excerpted by permission.
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