"I Do Solemnly Swear . . .": Presidential Inaugurations,
reflects United States history in the first official actions of each
president, and is an excellent resource for making chronological comparisons.
The war of 1812 and the effect of the media on inaugurations can be
studied through analysis of letters, speeches, illustrations, photographs,
and other historical documents. Such primary sources also provide
the opportunity to analyze the artistry and impact of Lincoln's speeches
and to explore how presidents have dealt with controversy in their
elections.
Chronological Thinking
The collection presents inaugural addresses and images in chronological
order in the collection’s Inauguration
Index , providing a starting point for understanding the historical
context of an inauguration. What was “the task of the people” when
the following presidents were first inaugurated?
- Why does the inaugural ceremony typically occur at the Capitol
building?
- What does this location imply about the relationship between the
legislative and executive branches of the federal government?
- What changes in the nation do the changes in the location of inaugurations
reflect?
- Why has the event moved within and around the Capitol itself?
Historical Comprehension: The War of 1812
President
James Madison,
Between 1809 and 1817. |
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The threat of a war with Great Britain
was brewing for the first part of the nineteenth century. In addition
to disputes over U.S. independence and Canadian provinces, war
between the British and the French, from 1792 to 1814, further
strained the relations between Great Britain and the United States.
The British navy attempted to block goods from entering France,
and between 1803 and 1812 attacked over a thousand American ships
and imprisoned many of the captured crews. James Madison discussed
America’s neutrality at sea and the heightened tensions between
the United States and Great Britain in his first
inaugural address: “[I]t has been the true glory of the United
States to cultivate peace by observing justice, and to entitle
themselves to the respect of the nations at war by fulfilling
their neutral obligations with the most scrupulous impartiality."
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After arriving at Monticello, Thomas Jefferson wrote to his successor
in a March
17, 1809 letter, expressing his concerns over a potential war
with Europe: “If peace can be preserved, I hope I trust you will have
a smooth administration. I know no government which would be so embarrassing
in war as ours.”
- What does Madison mean by fulfilling “neutral obligations with
the most scrupulous impartiality”?
- What might have caused Madison to view the United States' position
in the conflict in terms of earning the respect of Great Britain
and France?
- Why might Jefferson have believed that the United States would
be embarrassed in war? What does he mean by this?
In 1810, the United States imposed a trade ban with Great Britain,
but British merchants refused to comply. The problems between the
two nations grew over the next few years and on June 12, 1812, the
U.S. declared war against Great Britain. James Madison discussed the
reasons for the war during his 1813 inaugural
address:
They have refused to consider as prisoners of war, and
threatened to punish as traitors and deserters, persons emigrating
without restraint to the United States . . . . To render the war short
and its success sure, animated and systematic exertions alone are
necessary, and the success of our arms now may long preserve our country
from the necessity of another resort to them. . . .
- Are Madison’s reasons for going to war justified?
- Why was it important to win this war with Great Britain?
Historical Analysis and Interpretation: Lincoln’s Inaugural Addresses
After the Civil War, many southerners defended secession using arguments
about the Constitution and the founding fathers. They reminded America
that at the time of its ratification, the Constitution was thought
to be an experimental agreement from which any state could withdraw
at any time; that the Constitution was only ratified because of the
guarantee of states' rights in the Bill of Rights, which had since
been abused; and that the Constitution was always a tenuous compromise
between the very different North and South. These southerners spoke
of the founding fathers as one-time rebels who, like the Confederates,
had defended their homes against invaders and fought for the rights
of independence and freedom.
In Abraham Lincoln’s 1861
inaugural address, the new Republican president stated:
Inauguration
of Mr. Lincoln,
March 4, 1861. |
I hold, that in contemplation of universal law,
and of the Constitution, the Union of these States is perpetual.
Perpetuity is implied, if not expressed, in the fundamental
law of all national governments. It is safe to assert that no
government proper, ever had a provision in its organic law for
its own termination. Continue to execute all the express provisions
of our national Constitution, and the Union will endure forever—it
being impossible to destroy it, except by some action not provided
for in the instrument itself.
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Lincoln pledged that he had no intention of interfering with slavery
in the southern states and closed his speech by placing the threat
of war in the hands of his audience:
You can have no conflict without being yourselves the
aggressors. . . . Though passion may have strained it must not break
our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from
every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone
all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union,
when again touched as surely they will be, by the better angels of
our nature.
- How does Lincoln’s view of the Constitution and the Union
differ from that of the Confederates?
- Is either viewpoint more accurate than the other? Is either
correct?
- What arguments does Lincoln make to support his viewpoint?
- What arguments might Lincoln be responding to in his inaugural
address?
- What does Lincoln mean by the “mystic chords of memory”
that unite the Union?
- What is Lincoln referring to when he speaks of the “battlefield
and patriot grave”?
- What is the purpose of this rhetoric? How does it compare
to the Confederate view of the founding fathers?
- How does Lincoln propose to save the Union?
- To what extent might Lincoln’s speech and his attitude toward
the Union throughout the war have influenced the way in which
history was written, both about the Civil War and the meaning
of the Constitution and the Union?
- How might Lincoln’s second inaugural
address have influenced the way that we remember the Civil
War?
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President
Lincoln Delivering his Second Inaugural Address on the East Portico
of the U.S. Capitol,
March 4, 1865. |
Historical Issue-Analysis and Decision-Making: Controversial Elections
In Benjamin Harrison’s 1889
inaugural address, the public oath of the president is defined
as a mutual covenant between the person being sworn in and the public:
The officer covenants to serve the whole body of the
people by a faithful execution of the laws . . . nor the power of
combinations shall be able to evade their just penalties or to wrest
them from a beneficent public purpose to serve the ends of cruelty
or selfishness.
President
John Quincy Adams, ca. 1825. |
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When a president takes the oath of
office under a cloud of controversy, the public may have difficulty
taking part in this covenant. The House of Representatives awarded
the presidency to John Quincy Adams in 1824 after no single candidate
had enough electoral votes to win outright (including Andrew Jackson
who earned fifteen more electoral votes than Adams). Adams addressed
this conflict in his 1825
inaugural address: “Less possessed of your confidence in advance
than any of my predecessors, I am deeply conscious of the prospect
that I shall stand more and oftener in need of your indulgence.”
- Who is Adams appealing to?
- How does Adams portray himself through this statement?
- Why does he frame his inauguration and presidency in terms
of “indulgences”?
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Although Democrat Samuel Tilden won the popular vote (4,300,000
to 4,036,000) in the 1876 election, a Congressional Electoral
Commission awarded Republican Rutherford Hayes the presidency
after the validity of electoral votes in a few southern states
was called into question. In his 1877 inaugural
address, Hayes called for unity:
The President . . . owes his election to office to the
suffrage and zealous labors of a political party . . . but
he should strive to be always mindful of the fact that he
serves his party best who serves the country best.
The fact that two great political parties have in this
way settled a dispute in regard to which good men differ as
to the facts and the law no less than as to the proper course
to be pursued . . . is an occasion for general rejoicing.
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Rutherford
B. Hayes Taking the Oath of Office,
the East Portico of the U.S. Capitol, 1877. |
A search on Hayes results
in accounts of the inauguration such as a March
6, 1877 letter from John Cochrane to Carl Schurz and James Garfield’s
March
5, 1877 diary entry detailing the transition of power from President
Grant to Hayes. Garfield's diary notes, “There were many indications
of relief and joy that no accident had occurred on the route for there
were apprehensions of assassination.”
- How does Hayes attempt to disarm the tensions and animosity caused
by his controversial election?
- Why does Hayes consider the settling of this dispute to be “an
occasion for general rejoicing”?
During the 2000 presidential election, Democrat Al Gore won the
popular vote but the winner of the electoral vote was not declared
for weeks because the vote count in Florida was contested. Eventually,
the Supreme Court ended the dispute, and George W. Bush won the electoral
vote in Florida and thus the presidency. In his 2001 inaugural address,
Bush thanked Gore “for a contest conducted with spirit and ended with
grace.” He later called for an end to political and personal differences:
“Our unity, our union, is the serious work of leaders and citizens
in every generation. And this is my solemn pledge: I will work to
build a single nation of justice and opportunity.”
- How did Bush and Hayes each attempt to handle the controversy
surrounding his election? Compare the tone of each speech and compare
Bush’s pledge with Hayes’s discussion of political parties.
- Does the public view a president differently when an election
is decided in opposition to the mandate of the popular vote?
- What measures can a president take to counteract any negative
attitudes toward his presidency?
- Are Bush, Hayes, and Adams effective in addressing potential doubts
and concerns?
- Should they have said or done more? Why or why not?
- Did their policies grow from the conciliatory statements made
in their inaugural addresses?
Historical Research Capability
The Special Presentation, “Precedents
and Notable Events” provides details about each inauguration and
offers a starting point for investigating how changes in the media
affected inaugurations. A search on newspaper
provides a number of nineteenth-century accounts of different inaugurals
starting with the 1845 Illustrated London News article, “Inauguration
of the American President”, describing James Polk’s inauguration
and including the account of how “Professor Morse brought out the
Magnetic Telegraph to the platform . . . communicating results to
Baltimore as fast as they transpired.”
- How did technological advances change the way that inaugurations
were depicted?
- Did this change the way presidents are perceived by the
American public?
- Did it change the public’s attitude toward inaugurations?
- Did it change the meaning of the inauguration, itself? If
so, how?
- Another way to investigate the role of the media is to review
images of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s four inaugurations in
the Menu
of Presidents. How is Roosevelt positioned in the photographs?
Is it apparent that he had polio?
- Why would the media have refrained from showing Roosevelt’s
use of a wheelchair? Would you expect the media to show such
restraint today?
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U.S.
District Judge, Northern District of Texas, Administering the
Oath of Office to Lyndon B. Johnson Aboard Air Force One,
Love Field, Dallas, Texas,
November 22, 1963. |
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