State of the Union message

Question: Where does the tradition of the president giving State of the Union speeches come from?
From: Ron L. of Independence, MO
Date: January 31, 2005

Gleaves answers: On February 2, 2005, President George W. Bush will give the 216th State of the Union message before a joint session of Congress. It is the 30th wartime State of the Union message.[1]

Where does this long tradition come from? The early modern precedent, well known to America's founders, was the British monarch delivering the Speech from the Throne to open each new session of Parliament. More importantly, the chief executive's report to Congress is required by the Constitution. The president "shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient...." This passage from Article II, Section 3, is not particularly specific. But it is the sole legal basis for what has become the annual State of the Union message that the president delivers to a joint session of Congress after it convenes each January.

William Safire, himself a drafter of State of the Union messages in the Nixon administration, observes that these mandatory annual reports to the president "have inclined to be lengthy statements of legislative intent; they are a method by which a president takes the initiative in shaping a legislative program for his administration. An exception was FDR's 1941 message, which became known as the 'Four Freedoms Speech.'"[2]

WASHINGTON-ADAMS

In earlier times, this act of giving information to Congress was not called the "State of the Union message," but the "Annual Message." Indeed, George Washington called his first report to Congress the Annual Message. Aware of the precedent he was setting, he thought it important to deliver the report personally in the form of a speech. So on the morning of January 8, 1790, he stepped into a fancy yellow carriage drawn by six regal horses through the streets of New York. (As one of my favorite historians, John Willson, likes to point out, the first president was a car guy.) Leaving his residence on Cherry Street, he rode to Federal Hall where a joint session of Congress had assembled.

George Washington delivered his First Annual Message to both houses of Congress on January 8, 1790; that speech was the shortest annual message in U.S. history -- less than 1,100 words and needing barely 10 minutes to deliver. As the White House website notes, "The president's focus ... was on the very concept of union itself. Washington and his administration were concerned with the challenges of establishing a nation and maintaining a union. The experiment of American democracy was in its infancy. Aware of the need to prove the success of the 'union of states,' Washington included a significant detail in his speech. Instead of datelining his message with the name of the nation's capital, New York, Washington emphasized unity by writing 'United States' on the speech's dateline."[3]

Another enduring idea from the address was this: "Among the many interesting objects which will engage your attention, that of providing for the common defense will merit particular regard. To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace."

Washington's subsequent annual messages were delivered each autumn.

As in so much else concerning the American presidency, Washington started the precedent. The "from time to time" became an annual fall event. Indeed, Washington delivered eight annual messages in all; his successor John Adams delivered four annual messages in all, also in the autumn months.

JEFFERSON-TAFT

Most people assume that all annual messages were speeches. In fact, the majority were not. Beginning with Thomas Jefferson in 1801, the annual message was not delivered as a speech but was submitted to Congress in writing. That's because our third president (1) was a superb writer, (2) disliked public speaking, and (3) rationalized the change on the grounds that a presidential speech before Congress was unbecomingly similar to the British monarch's annual Speech from the Throne; such monarchical trappings were unseemly in a republic. Jefferson's habit of submitting a written message to Congress rather than delivering a speech to a joint session became an unbroken tradition in its own right, lasting from 1801 through the end of William Taft's administration in 1912. Several presidents after Taft, especially those favoring a strict construction of the Constitution (Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover, for example), preferred written annual messages.

The timing became routinized as well. From James Monroe's presidency forward, the messages were submitted in December, almost without exception during the first week of the month. Any only oral reading of them was performed by clerks in Congress.

WILSON-BUSH

Not until Woodrow Wilson became president in 1913 was the earlier tradition of giving an annual speech to Congress revived. Although it was somewhat controversial, Wilson revived the oratorical State of the Union message because he was a superb rhetorician who liked to strut his stuff; also, by that point the president did not have to worry about being compared to the British monarch. Wilson, following long-established precedent, delivered his annual addresses during the first week of December.

Which brings up a point about the change in timing, since States of the Union are nowadays delivered in January or February. Recall that for many decades only George Washington had delivered a State of the Union message in January; and that, his first. Remarkably, the second time the message would be delivered in the month of January would not occur until 144 years later, when Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered the annual address in 1934. The reason for the change is that passage of the Twentieth Amendment moved the inauguration date from March to January, so FDR thought a January message would be more timely. Almost every year he was in office he gave the speech during the first week of the new year. FDR is also the president who began referring to the speech as the "State of the Union message,"[4] words that were lifted straight from the Constitution and stuck in popular discourse.

SOME MEMORABLE STATE OF THE UNION MESSAGES

While a number of annual messages read like laundry lists since they are given over to the president's legislative agenda, several have endured in Americans' collective memory because of their eloquence and the power of their ideas.

In 1823, James Monroe used his Seventh Annual Message to spell out his foreign policy, the Monroe Doctrine, warning European powers to cease entertaining designs to colonize the Western hemisphere.

In 1862, Abraham Lincoln used his Second Annual Message to say that the time had come to emancipate the slaves.

In 1941, Franklin D. Roosevelt used his Ninth State of the Union message to proclaim the famous "Four Freedoms."

In 2002, just four months after the deadliest single attack against the U.S. on these shores, George W. Bush used his State of the Union message to declare that an Axis of Evil threatened the nation; the Axis consisted of Iraq, Iran, and North Korea.

SOME FIRSTS

1st Annual Message: George Washington's on January 8, 1790, in New York City, which then served as the provisional capital of the U.S.

1st Annual Message not delivered as a speech: Thomas Jefferson's, in the new capital of Washington, DC, on December 8, 1801.

1st Annual Message broadcast over the radio: Calvin Coolidge's on December 6, 1923.

1st popular use of the term "State of the Union" to refer to the message: with Franklin Roosevelt's message of 1935.

1st State of the Union message broadcast on television: Harry S. Truman's during the day on January 6, 1947.

1st State of the Union message broadcast live during primetime: Lyndon B. Johnson's on the evening of January 4, 1965.

1st State of the Union message streamed live on the world wide web: George W. Bush's in 2002.

1st broadcast rebuttal to the State of the Union message: in 1966, Republicans countered President Lyndon Johnson's speech. Ever since, it has been the tradition of the party out of the White House to give a response on radio and/or television.

1st State of the Union message delivered in February: Dwight D. Eisenhower on February 2, 1953, appeared before Congress to flesh out the vision he had outlined in his inaugural address two weeks earlier. It was a wartime address delivered during the closing months of the Korean War. The State of the Union message has been given in February only five times since (by Nixon in 1973, Reagan in 1985 and 1986, and Clinton in 1993 and 1997). George W. Bush's message on February 2, 2005, will be the seventh such February message.

OTHER NOTABLE FACTS

Virtually every modern president has used the words "state of the Union" in his message, trailed by some such adjective as "good," "better," or "strong." Since you hail from Independence, Missouri, let's turn to Harry S. Truman. In his 1949 State of the Union message, Truman declared, "I am happy to report to this 81st Congress that the state of the Union is good [emphasis added]. Our Nation is better able than ever before to meet the needs of the American people, and to give them their fair chance in the pursuit of happiness. This great Republic is foremost among the nations of the world in the search for peace."

But as William Safire points out, the tendency toward optimism has not been universal. The first president to say outright that "the state of the Union is not good," was Gerald R. Ford on January 15, 1975. He explained, "Millions of Americans are out of work. Recession and inflation are eroding the money of millions more. Prices are too high, and sales are too slow."

Two presidents did not give an Annual Message -- and they both had a good excuse: William Henry Harrison died one month after his inauguration in 1841, and James A. Garfield died 200 days into his administration in 1881 -- the shortest and second shortest administrations in U.S. history.

After 1789, there was only one calendar year -- 1933 -- in which no Annual Message was given; Hoover had given his last written Annual Message to Congress in December of 1932, and FDR would deliver his first State of the Union message in January of 1934; only 13 months separated the two messages.

In three calendar years there have been two State of the Union messages given to Congress. (1) In 1790, Washington gave his First Annual Message in January, and his second in December. (2) In 1953, outgoing President Harry S. Truman and incoming President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave dueling State of the Union messages within a month of each other. (3) In 1961, outgoing President Dwight D. Eisenhower and incoming President John F. Kennedy gave dueling State of the Union messages within three weeks of each other.

In 1986, President Ronald Reagan postponed his State of the Union message because of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.

On January 19, 1999, President Bill Clinton delivered his Seventh State of the Union message in an unusually tense atmosphere. Exactly one month earlier -- on December 19th -- he had been impeached by the House of Representatives. Then on January 7th the Senate had opened the trial and the president found himself in the midst of heated political and constitutional debate. The Senate did not vote to dismiss the articles of impeachment against the president until February 12, 1999.

On February 2nd, when President George W. Bush enters the House of Representatives to deliver his 2005 State of the Union Message, he will be applauded by members of both parties. Even Democrats will applaud because they are acknowledging the office, not (necessarily) the person who occupies it. Indeed, following long-established tradition, the president will not be introduced by name.

__________________________

[1]Wartime here includes the five declared wars the U.S. has waged -- War of 1812, Mexican War, Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II -- and seven additional significant conflicts -- Quasi-War against France, Tripolitan War against the Barbary Pirates, Civil War, Korean War, Vietnam War, Desert Storm, and the Iraq War.

[2]William Safire, Safire's New Political Dictionary (New York: Random House, 1993), s.v. "State of the Union," p. 755.

[3]Visit the White House website: http://www.whitehouse.gov/stateoftheunion/history.html.

[4]Word maven William Safire prefers the word "message" to "speech," "address," or "report" when referring to the State of the Union message. [Safire, Political Dictionary, s.v. "State of the Union," p. 755.]

Bible passages at inaugurations

Question: Is it customary for presidents to swear the oath of office on a Bible? Which passages do they use?
From: Barbara C. of Colorado Springs, CO
Date: January 25, 2005

Gleaves answers: Yes, it is customary. At the beginning of a president's term in office, there are two situations in which Bibles are ceremonially used: (1) at a private swearing in, which several presidents have taken part in, among them Woodrow Wilson, Calvin Coolidge, and Dwight Eisenhower; and (2) at the public swearing in that is integral to the inaugural ceremony. Nothing in the U.S. Constitution requires that presidents swear on the Bible or otherwise use the book as part of their inauguration, but our first president, George Washington, started the precedent. At his first inauguration in 1789, he used a Masonic Bible that had been printed in 1767. It was opened to an Old Testament passage. At least three later presidents used Washington's Masonic Bible at their own inaugurations, all of them Republicans: Warren Harding (1921), Dwight Eisenhower (1953), and George H. W. Bush (1989). George W. Bush wanted to use Washington's Bible in 2001, but bad weather kept him from doing so.

Following George Washington's precedent, our nation's chief executives have used the Bible in most if not all inaugurations, as well as in several private swearing in ceremonies. On at least 30 formal occasions, we know that the Bible was opened to Old Testament passages. On at least 10 formal occasions, we know that the Bible was opened to New Testament passages. Following is the breakdown.

OLD TESTAMENT PASSAGES

The following presidents had the book opened to a specific Old Testament passage:
- Van Buren's inauguration (1837): Proverbs 3:17.
- Andrew Johnson's swearing in (1865): Proverbs 21.
- Grant's second inaugural (1873): Isaiah 11:1-3.
- Hayes's inauguration (1877): Psalm 118:11-13.
- Garfield's inaugural (1881): Proverbs 21:1.
- Arthur's swearing in (1881): Psalm 31:1-3.
- Harrison's inaugural (1889): Psalm 121: 1-6.
- Cleveland's second inaugural (1893): Psalm 91:12-16.
- McKinley's Bible during the first inaugural (1897) was opened to II Chronicles 1:10, and in his second inaugural (1901) it was opened to Proverbs 16.
- Taft (1909): I Kings 3:9-11.
- Wilson's first inaugural (1913): Psalm 119; Wilson's second inaugural (1917): Psalm 46.
- Harding (1921) used Washington's Masonic Bible, opened to Micah 6:8.
- Hoover's Bible at the inauguration (1929) was open to Proverbs 29:18.
- Truman's Bible at his inauguration (1949) was open to Exodus 20:3-17 (the Bible was also opened to a New Testament passage).
- Eisenhower's first inauguration (1953) incorporated George Washington's Masonic Bible opened to Psalm 127:1, plus a West Point Bible opened to II Chronicles 7:14; his second inauguration (1957) had the West Point Bible opened to Psalm 33:12.
- Nixon used two family Bibles, both opened to the same passage during both the first (1969) and second (1973) inaugurals: Isaiah 2:4
- Ford's swearing in (1974): Proverbs 3:5-6
- Carter (1977) used a family Bible opened to Micah 6:8.
- Reagan used the Bible given to him by his mother at both the first (1981) and second (1985) inaugurals, as well as in the private swearing in in 1985. On all these occasions the Bible was opened to II Chronicles 7:14.
- Clinton's second inaugural (1997) featured the King James Bible given to him by his grandmother, opened to Isaiah 58:12
- George W. Bush's second inaugural

The following presidents had the Bible opened at random, and because the Old Testament is so much larger than the New Testament, the book would inevitably be opened to an Old Testament passage:
- The Masonic Bible used in Washington's first inaugural was opened to the page containing Genesis 49:13.
- Lincoln's first inaugural.
- At Cleveland's first inaugural the chief justice who presided over the swearing in opened the Bible at random to Psalm 112:4-10.
- George H. W. Bush had Washington's Masonic Bible opened at random in the middle; also had the family Bible opened to a New Testament passage.

The passage from II Chronicles 7:14 was used in three swearing-in ceremonies. It is a verse of repentence: "If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land."

NEW TESTAMENT PASSAGES

The following presidents had the Bible opened to a New Testament passage:
- Lincoln's second inaugural (1865) incorporated three passages: Matthew 7:1 and 18:7, and Revelation 16:7.
- Theodore Roosevelt's inaugural (1905): James 1:22-23
- Coolidge: John 1
- Franklin Roosevelt's four inaugurals (1933, 1937, 1941, 1945): I Corinthians 13
- Truman's inaugural: Matthew 5:3-11 (the Bible was also opened to an OT passage)
- George H. W. Bush featured the family Bible opened to Matthew 5. He also had Washington's Masonic Bible opened at random in the middle;
- Clinton's first inaugural (1993) featured the King James Bible given to him by his grandmother, opened to Galatians 6:8.

CLOSED BIBLES

The following presidents had a Bible with them to mark the beginning of their term but kept it closed, in George W. Bush's case due to bad weather:
- Truman's 1945 swearing in.
- Kennedy's 1961 inaugural.
- Johnson's 1965 inaugural.
- George W. Bush's family Bible was kept closed during the 2001 inaugural, due to bad weather; he had wanted to use Washington's Masonic Bible.

Two additional pieces of information. Pierce had a Bible at the inauguration, but we do not have enough historical information to know whether it was closed or open to a particular passage. We do know that he did not "solemnly swear," but "solemnly affirmed" the oath of office.

And Lyndon Johnson used not a Bible but a missal when he was privately sworn in aboard Air Force I on November 22, 1963, shortly after Kennedy was assassinated.

NO BIBLE USED

The three cases in which historians know that no Bible was used (in all three instances Republicans):
- Hayes's private swearing in (1877);
- Arthur's private swearing in (1881);
- Theodore Roosevelt's swearing in at Buffalo, New York, (1901) upon McKinley's death.

NOT ENOUGH INFORMATION

While there are eye-witness accounts of every presidential swearing-in and inauguration, we do not have all the details about the use of a Bible at these events. According to the Office of the Curator and Architect of the Capitol, there is not enough information for the following events:
- Washington's second inaugural
- Adams's inaugural
- Jefferson's first and second inaugurals
- Madison's first and second inaugurals
- Monroe's first and second inaugurals
- Quincy Adams's inaugural
- Harrison's inaugural
- Tyler's swearing in (upon Harrison's death)
- Polk's inaugural
- Taylor's inaugural
- Fillmore's swearing in (upon Taylor's death)
- Buchanan's inaugural
- Grant's first inaugural
- Wilson's private swearing in before his second inaugural
- Coolidge's private swearing in by his father at his boyhood home (upon Harding's death)
- Eisenhower's private swearing in before his second inaugural.

Regarding the above, historians cannot say that no Bible was used; they do not know if or which edition was used, or to which passage it may have been opened.

OTHER RELIGIOUS WORDS AND GESTURES AT INAUGURATIONS

Finally, George Washington not only began the precedent of using a Bible at his inauguration; he also began two related precedents -- (1) adding the words "so help me God" to the constitutionally mandated oath of office, and (2) kissing the Bible after taking the oath. Not all presidents have kissed the Bible as Washington did, but many have.

___________________________________

Source: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/pihtml/pibible.html

Numbers of presidents, inaugurations, etc.

Question: Can you explain why there have been 55 inaugurations but only 43 presidents?
From: Susie O. (hometown unknown)
Date: January 24, 2005

Gleaves answers: I do not know your age, but you ask a question that is a favorite among school children and history buffs.

Let's first tackle the number of presidents. George W. Bush is our nation's 43rd president, as your question notes. But -- he is only the 42nd person to serve as president. That is because Grover Cleveland’s two terms (1885-1889 and 1893-1897) were not consecutive, but interrupted by Benjamin Harrison's term (1889-1893), so Cleveland is referred to as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States.

So there have been 43 presidents but 55 inaugurations. Why?
- Exactly 21 presidents have been inaugurated once (Adams, Quincy Adams, Van Buren, Harrison, Polk, Taylor, Pierce, Buchanan, Hayes, Garfield, B. Harrison, Theodore Roosevelt, Taft, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Truman, Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Carter, and Bush).
- Exactly 16 presidents have been inaugurated twice (Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Lincoln, Grant, Cleveland, McKinley,Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, Clinton, and George W. Bush). That adds up to 32 inaugurations.
- Franklin Roosevelt was inaugurated a third and fourth time.

That's how you get to 55 inaugurations in U.S. history.

Not to complicate the picture, but five presidents (Tyler, Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Arthur, and Ford) were not formally inaugurated. That is because they were vice presidents who finished the term of a president who died or resigned. Even though these five did not go through an inauguration, they were, in accordance with Article II, Section 1, of the U.S. Constitution, sworn in.

Cost of Inaugurations

Question: Can we get a comparison of presidential inauguration costs for the last 6 to 10 presidents?
From: Bob S. of Albuquerqui, New Mexico
Date: January 21, 2005

Gleaves answers: Many visitors to http://www.allpresidents.org/ have been asking this question or some variation of it. There are two primary costs of inaugurations. One is the cost of the swearing-in ceremony, which is paid for by taxpayers; the funds are appropriated by Congress; in 2001, George W. Bush's swearing-in ceremony cost $1 million. Second is the cost of the balls, the candlelight dinners, the parties, the concerts -- all the festivities that surround the swearing-in ceremony, which are paid for by private donations.

If there is criticism of how much a modern inaugural costs, it is usually directed at this latter cost, the parties and festivities, even though the burden is not borne by taxpayers. Going backward in time, from the most recent to the most distant inaugurals, here are the private-sector costs of the festivities surrounding some inaugurations:

George W. Bush's 2nd inaugural will cost in the neighborhood of $40 million. That's what the Presidential Inaugural Committee is trying to raise through private donations and ticket sales to the nine balls and three candlelight dinners.

George W. Bush's 1st inaugural in 2001 also cost nearly $40 million.

Bill Clinton's 2nd inaugural in 1997 was comparatively lean by the inaugural standards of the times, $23.6 million.

Bill Clinton's 1st inaugural in 1993 cost approximately $33 million.

George H. W. Bush's inaugural in 1989 cost approximately $30 million.

Ronald Reagan's 2nd inaugural in 1985 cost in the neighborhood of the 1981 inaugural, around $20 million.

Ronald Reagan's 1st inaugural in 1981 cost $19.4 million, significantly more than his predecessors. One reason is that inflation had been sky-high between Carter's and Reagan's inaugurations. A second reason is that several balls were added to the festivities. A third is that the swearing-in ceremony was moved to the west front of the Capitol. Because of topography, that aspect of the building is much more dramatic than the east front; it was also symbolic of Ronald Reagan's western roots.

Jimmy Carter's inaugural in 1977 cost $3.5 million. Elected in the wake of the Watergate scandal, he deliberately downplayed anything that appeared to aggrandize the presidency.

Richard Nixon's 2nd inaugural in 1973 cost $4 million. Bob Hope, a Nixon supporter, joked that the three-day extravaganza commemorated "the time when Richard I becomes Richard II."

Lyndon Johnson's inaugural in 1965 cost $1.5 million.

Woodrow Wilson's inaugural was relatively lean since on his orders there would be no ball. He disliked dances. Congress appropriated $30,000 for the event.

James Madison's inaugural ceremony in 1809 cost more than previous inaugurals in part because it was the first to include a ball. Dolley Madison, the federalist era's social maven, had also served as hostess for President Jefferson.

Second inaugurations

Question: Later this week George W. Bush will be inaugurated for the second time. How many presidents have had the opportunity to be inaugurated twice? What about second Inaugurations when our nation has been at war?
From: Charles M. of Grand Blanc, MI
Date: January 18, 2005

Gleaves answers: Socially the second inauguration of George W. Bush starts today, January 18. Constitutionally his second term begins at midday Thursday, January 20th. This, in accordance with the 20th Amendment: "The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January...." (It's easy to remember that the 20th Amendment puts Inauguration Day on the 20th of January.)

The week's festivities include nine balls, three candle-light dinners, two church services, a concert, and a parade, not to mention the inauguration itself on the west front of the Capitol. The events are not just the last hurrah of a successful campaign for re-election; they're not just about who is on the "A" lists to attend the balls. While there is celebration aplenty in presidential inaugurations, they are more than victory parties. They are among the key events in America's civil religion, anticipated like a coronation or a feast day in the liturgical calendar. These quadrennial benchmarks of the American experience give citizens the opportunity to unify by reaffirming their faith in our nation's promise, as well as their faith in the wisdom of the founders who created our constitutional republic.

That is why it is important for the president to be gracious during his Inaugural Address, whether his first or second. It is why the Democratic-Republican Thomas Jefferson, after the bitter campaign of 1800 against the Federalist John Adams, tried to bury the hatchet on Inauguration Day, saying, "We are all Republicans; we are all Federalists."

The theme for this week's inauguration of President George W. Bush is "Celebrating Freedom and Honoring Service." While January 20 is the constitutionally mandated day for swearing in the president, various inaugural events will stretch from Tuesday, January 18, till Friday, January 21. Because of 9/11, security will be tighter for this inauguration than for any previous one. It is also estimated that all the music, parades, balls, and services will cost more than any previous inauguration in U.S. history, between $30 million to $40 million. The money to pay for the extravaganza is being raised through private donations and ticket sales by a specially appointed inaugural committee.

THE SWEET 16

Forty-two men have served as president of the United States. Only 37 of them gave one or more inaugural addresses. George W. Bush's inauguration on January 20th will be the 55th inauguration in U.S. history. Bush will be the sixteenth president who will have been inaugurated twice. The pattern at this moment in history is symmetrical. The initial second inauguration was in the eighteenth century:
- George Washington.

Seven second inaugurals occurred in the nineteenth century:
- Jefferson
- Madison
- Monroe
- Jackson
- Lincoln
- Grant
- Cleveland (the only president whose second term was not continuous with the first).

Seven second inaugurals took place in the twentieth century:
- McKinley
- Wilson
- Franklin Roosevelt (who would have two additional inaugurations)
- Eisenhower
- Nixon
- Reagan
- Clinton

One second inaugural occurred in the twenty-first century:
- George W. Bush.

Reinforcing the symmetry is the fact that presidents with the first name "George" form bookends to the 16 second inaugurations that have taken place.

SIX SECOND INAUGURATIONS DURING WARTIME

To the question of war, six presidents who were kept for another term went through their Inauguration when the nation was in a significant struggle:
- Jefferson's second Inauguration was in March of 1805, when the U.S. naval blockade in the Mediterranean Sea was winding down the Tripolitan War against the Barbary pirates. (The peace treaty would be signed on June 4, 1805.)
- Madison's second Inaugural Address was devoted to the topic of war. This was a first. No previous inaugural address was so dominated by war talk. Because his second inauguration took place in March of 1813, several months after the outbreak of the War of 1812, he was preoccupied with a conflict that was going badly for the Americans. If fact, his language almost grew strident as he listed the depradations of the British and their Indian allies in the conduct of the war.
- Lincoln's second Inauguration took place in March of 1865, five weeks before the end of the Civil War. His speech is arguably the greatest Inaugural Address, first or second, ever given.
- Franklin Roosevelt's fourth Inauguration was in January of 1945, when the Allies could see light at the end of a totalitarian tunnel.
- Nixon's second Inauguration took place in January of 1973, as the Vietnam War was wrapping up for U.S. sailors, flyers, and troops.
- George W. Bush's second Inauguration is happening as the U.S. is desperate to quell the relentless pounding of terrorist attacks before upcoming elections in Iraq.

Two other inaugurations are worth noting. Dwight Eisenhower's first inauguration took place during the Korean War. And while John Adams did not deliver his Inaugural Address during wartime (March 4, 1797), his oration has thoughtful passages about the meaning of George Washington and the Revolutionary War to American history.

Some people critical of fancy inaugurations assert (especially if their side lost) that wartime inaugurations should be relatively subdued affairs. They cite Franklin D. Roosevelt's example in 1945. It is true that FDR's fourth inauguration limited celebration to a cold luncheon at the White House. In part this was due to all the sacrifices that were required of the American people after four years of total war -- the rationing, the limited consumer items, the limited hotel space; in part, it was because FDR was in no shape for an extravaganza; at death's doorstep, he would pass from this earth within five weeks.

FDR's austerity on that occasion has hardly been the rule historically. For instance, James Madison was a wartime president, and his wife Dolley a social maven. They began the custom of holding balls at the president's inauguration; their first -- the nation's first, too -- was held in peacetime in March of 1809. It was such a hit that he and the first lady were not about to let the War of 1812 stop future celebration. For Madison's second inauguration the lead couple put on a lively ball.

Second-term mandates

Question: How is a mandate for an elected or re-elected president determined, and how much claim does President Bush have to govern with a mandate in his second term?
From: Michelle W., of Cambridge, MA
Date: January 6, 2005

Gleaves answers: Your question is apt considering what is happening in Washington, DC, today: Congress has gathered to certify the votes of the Electoral College. (And you thought the election was over?)

"MANDATE" DEFINED

Does President George W. Bush enjoy a mandate, as he and his supporters claim? First, let's look at the definition: "mandate" comes from the Latin words mandatum or mandare, literally "to put hands on" as if to send someone on a mission, or "to order" someone who has been dubbed to do something.[1] The way you are using the word refers to the strong measure of approval or support that voters give to their representatives when elected by a sizeable majority. Political scientist Thomas Dye defines a mandate even more specifically, as the "perception of popular support for a program or policy based on the [large] margin of electoral victory won by a candidate who proposed it during a campaign." Frequently the winner in even close elections will claim the voters' overwhelming support -- i.e., a mandate -- for their policies and programs. "But," as Dye notes, "for elections to serve as policy mandates, four conditions have to be met:

1. Competing candidates have to offer clear policy alternatives.

2. The voters have to cast their ballots on the basis of these policy alternatives alone.

3. The election results have to clearly indicate the voters' policy preferences.

4. Elected officials have to be bound by their campaign promises."[2]

PRESIDENT BUSH'S RE-ELECTION IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

Using Thomas Dye's criteria, we see that true mandates rarely exist. To the question of whether President Bush's re-election represents a mandate in some meaningful sense of the word, it might be argued that being re-elected is almost by definition a mandate, since the voters are confirming what they already know and sending the signal that they want more of that person's leadership. In addition, there are two other facts that encourage Bush and his followers. First, he got the largest percentage of the popular vote in decades. Second, his coattails helped GOP candidates build leads in both houses of Congress.

And yet, President Bush's re-election was by the smallest margin since 1824, when the popular vote began to be counted. The following analysis, written by Dr. Sheldon Stern (who was the historian at the JFK Library from 1977-1999), appeared in the Boston Globe after the election:

"In their victory statements on November 3, President Bush and Vice
President Cheney tried to spin the election outcome as a 'historic' and
'broad' mandate for their administration. The media largely swallowed this
interpretation. Television, newspaper and Internet commentary proliferated
declaring that the GOP had triumphed on a red tide of votes.

"In fact, the historical record proves precisely the opposite.
President Bush won the popular vote by 2.7% -- the smallest winning
percentage by a second term president since popular vote statistics were
first recorded in 1824:
- Jackson won by 16.8% in 1832;
- Lincoln by 10.1% in 1864;
- Grant by 11.8% in 1872;
- Cleveland by 3.1% in 1892;
- McKinley by 6.2% in 1900;
- TR by 18.8% in 1904;
- Wilson by 3.1% in 1916;
- Coolidge by 25.2% in 1924;
- FDR by 24.3% in 1936;
- Truman by 4.4% in 1948;
- Eisenhower by 15.4% in 1956;
- LBJ by 22.6% in 1964;
- Nixon by 23.2% in 1972;
- Reagan by 18.2% in 1984;
- Clinton by 8.5% in 1996.

"Similarly, Bush won by only 34 electoral votes, with 53.2% of the
total electoral vote. Wilson is the only president to win a second
term with a smaller electoral vote margin (23 votes) and percentage (52.2%).
Second term presidents between 1804 and 1996 have, on average, won 78.7%
of the electoral vote. History would clearly trump spin if media commentators
knew more history."[3]

Although President George W. Bush was re-elected, which in itself reflects a kind of mandate, he does not enjoy the overwhelming support many of his predecessors have, especially with regard to domestic issues. This is not to say that he cannot govern effectively or increase the approval ratings for his policies and programs. But it is to urge caution before waxing enthusiastic about a mandate from the voters.
____________________

[1]American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th ed. (2000) and Merriam-Webster Dictionary of Law (1996), s.v. "mandate."

[2]Thomas R. Dye, Politics in America, 4th ed. (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2001), pp. 229-30.

[3]Sheldon M. Stern, letter to the Boston Globe, December 21, 2004.

Person of the Year

Question: President George W. Bush was just selected by Time magazine as the Person of the Year in 2003. How often have presidents been awarded this distinction?
From: Diane N. of Charleston, SC
Date: December 31, 2004

Gleaves answers: Time magazine began naming a Man or Person of the Year 77 years ago, in 1927. In 19 of those years, the sitting president or president-elect was dubbed. Another way of looking at it: Of the 14 presidents since 1927, 11 were selected Person of the Year when they were either the sitting president or president-elect. An interesting assemblage of chief executives they make: one was assassinated; one had a physical disability; one felt totally unprepared for the job; one was impeached; one would be driven from the White House in disgrace. (Remember, the Person of the Year is not always a saint. Time's list, after all, includes Hitler, Stalin, and the Ayatolluh Khomeini.)

These are the 11 U.S. presidents whom Time has named Person of the Year.
1932 -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1934 -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1941 -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1945 -- Harry S. Truman
1948 -- Harry S. Truman
1959 -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
1961 -- John F. Kennedy
1964 -- Lyndon B. Johnson
1967 -- Lyndon B. Johnson
1971 -- Richard M. Nixon
1972 -- Richard M. Nixon and Henry Kissinger
1976 -- Jimmy Carter
1980 -- Ronald Reagan
1983 -- Ronald Reagan and Yuri Andropov
1990 -- George H. W. Bush
1992 -- Bill Clinton
1998 -- Bill Clinton and Kenneth Starr
2000 -- George W. Bush
2004 -- George W. Bush

As the above list shows, one president earned the distinction of being named Man of the Year three times: Franklin D. Roosevelt, in fact, holds the all-time record.

Six presidents have been named Person of the Year a total of two times. (But note this caveat: while Dwight Eisenhower received the distinction twice, the first time was in 1944, when he was supreme commander of the Allied Forces in Europe, eight years before he was elected president.)

Four presidents have been named Person of the Year once.

Timing is important. Of the 11 presidents who achieved Person-of-the-Year status, 8 did so in their first year in office.

The only president named Man of the Year two years in a row was Richard Nixon, in 1971 and 1972; he shared the second time around with his national security advisor, Henry Kissinger. The only administration that received the nomination three years in a row was FDR's, from 1932-1934; in 1933 the administrator of the National Recovery Administration, Hugh Johnson, got the nod.

All four presidents with a Texas connection -- Eisenhower, LBJ, and the two Bushes -- have been named Person of the Year.

Since 1927 three presidents never made it onto Time magazine's cover as Man of the Year: Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, and Gerald R. Ford.

Yet ten additional individuals who were never themselves president were named Man of the Year because of their close association to the White House:
1929 -- Owen Young was a famous financier associated with the Hoover administration.
1933 -- Hugh Johnson was head of FDR's National Recovery Administration.
1943 -- General George Marshall oversaw the commander in chief's war effort.
1944 -- General Dwight D. Eisenhower took the offensive against Hitler's Third Reich.
1946 -- Secretary of State James F. Byrnes served under Truman.
1947 -- Secretary of State George C. Marshall also served under Truman.
1954 -- Secretary of State John Foster Dulles served under Eisenhower.
1965 -- General William Westmoreland served under Lyndon Johnson.
1972 -- Henry Kissinger was Richard Nixon's national security advisor.
1973 -- Judge John Sirica presided over the Watergate scandal proceedings.
1998 -- Kenneth Starr led the investigations against Bill Clinton.

Adding these names to the presidents, you see that our chief executives or individuals closely associated with them made Time's list on 30 occasions during the past 77 years.

For the complete list of Time magazine's Man or Person of the Year from 1927-2003, see
http://www.time.com/time/personoftheyear/archive/stories/index.html

Jefferson Bible and the Christmas story

Question: Does the Jefferson Bible include the Christmas story?
From: P. Roberts of Lexington, KY
Date: December 16, 2004

Gleaves answers: Thomas Jefferson's Bible -- which more strictly speaking is our third president's redaction of the four Gospels -- begins with the birth of Jesus, to be sure, but it is considerably abbreviated compared to the New Testament. Only the "natural life" of Jesus is presented -- in the world of Thomas Jefferson, there are no angels, miracles, or voices from Heaven.

The Jefferson Bible begins by extracting exclusively from Chapter Two of the Gospel of Luke:

And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.
(And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.)
And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.
And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem (because he was of the house and lineage of David),
To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.
And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered.
And she brought forth her first-born son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.
And when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the child, his name was called JESUS.
And when they had performed all things according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own city Nazareth.
And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom.[1]

In Jefferson's account, the first 120 verses in the Gospel of Luke are pared to 10.

Jefferson probably worked most intensively on his Bible in 1819-1820, when he was 76 or 77 years old and living in retirement at Montecello.[2] There was nothing mysterious about his method: he laid out the New Testament in four different languages -- Greek, Latin, French, and English -- and literally cut corresponding passages out of those volumes and pasted them into his own edition. Jefferson wrote that his life and morals of Jesus were "extracted textually from the Gospels."[3]

Jefferson had long been laying the groundwork for such a project. We know from the copious paper trail he left behind that he was studying Jesus' philosophy at one of the most stressful times of his life -- during his first term in the White House. Jefferson was ordering different editions of the Bible and annotating them. He later wrote to John Adams that this early project, which he titled The Philosophy of Jesus of Nazareth, aimed to gather "diamonds in a dunghill." As he explained, "There will be found remaining the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man."[4]

(Does this idea of the philosophy of Jesus remind us of something more recent? During the 2000 presidential campaign, then-Governor George W. Bush was asked by a reporter who his favorite philosopher was. Bush answered, "Jesus Christ.")

Precisely what was Jefferson's attitude toward Christ? In an 1820 letter to his good friend William Short, he wrote of his belief that Jesus was "a great Reformer of the Hebrew code of religion," and that "It is the innocence of His character, the purity and sublimity of His moral precepts, the eloquence of His inculcations, the beauty of the apologues in which He conveys them, that I so much admire." But, Jefferson hastened to add, "it is not to be understood that I am with Him in all His doctrines. I am a Materialist; he takes the side of Spiritualism; he preaches the efficacy of repentance towards forgiveness of sin; I require counterpoise of good works to redeem it...."[5]

So what prompted Jefferson to edit the Gospel accounts of Jesus? In the same letter to Short, he said: "Among the sayings and discourses imputed to Him by His biographers, I find many passages ... of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so much untruth, charlatanism and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that such contradictions should have proceeded from the same Being. I separate, therefore, the gold from the dross; restore to Him the former, and leave the latter to the stupidity of some, and roguery of others of His disciples. Of this band of dupes and impostors, Paul was the great Coryphaeus, and first corruptor of the doctrines of Jesus. These palpable interpolations and falsifications of His doctrines, led me to try to sift them apart."[6]

This explains why Jefferson purged the New Testament of all supernatural words, actions, and events. His Jesus was strictly a man, not God. Good man of the Enlightenment that he was, Jefferson aimed to distill the teachings of Jesus to a universal moral code to which all reasonable human beings could assent.

Since 1904, it has been the custom of the U.S. Senate to present a copy of The Jefferson Bible to each freshman senator at the swearing in ceremony.

______________________________

[1]Thomas Jefferson, The Jefferson Bible: The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, Introduction by Forrest Church, Afterword by Jaroslav Pelikan (Boston: Beacon Press, 1989), pp. 37-38.

[2]Forrest Church, "The Gospel According to Thomas Jefferson," in Jefferson, Bible, pp. 25-30.

[3]Facsimile of Jefferson's original, handwritten title page, in Jefferson, Bible, after p. 32.

[4]TJ to John Adams, October 13, 1813; quoted in Church, "Gospel," in Jefferson, Bible, p. 17.

[3]TJ to William Short, April 13, 1820; at http://www.angelfire.com/co/JeffersonBible/jeffbsyl.html

[4]TJ to Short; at http://www.angelfire.com/co/JeffersonBible/jeffbsyl.html

Thanksgiving

Question: Who made Thanksgiving a national holiday?
From: Brian B. of Wheeling, West Virginia
Date: November 24, 2004 [revised December 18, 2004]

Gleaves answers: It was a president -- or rather two presidents -- who made Thanksgiving a national holiday. But as most schoolchildren learn, the Thanksgiving story on which the holiday is based goes back further than any president. The so-called first Thanksgiving of 1621 recalls Governor William Bradford and fellow Pilgrims gathering in gratitude with Squanto, Massasoit, and other Native Americans whose harvest would provide enough food for the coming winter.

This hallowed tale has many grains of truth, to be sure, but the English harvest feast that came to be known as Thanksgiving actually has a more complex history. In the first place, the Virginia colonists at Jamestown were setting aside days of Thanksgiving and Praise more than a decade before the Pilgrims in Massachusetts Bay Colony were. Second, the Thanksgiving of children's books bears little resemblance to the harvest celebration that actually took place among Wampanoag Indians and English colonists. For a better understanding of the real deal, tour Plimoth Plantation outside Plymouth, Massachusetts, or visit the website at http://www.plimoth.org/visit/what/exhibit.asp.

Carolyn Freeman Travers of Plimoth Plantation summarizes the early history of American thanksgivings: "Over the 17th century, Plymouth Colony held many of these special [Thanksgiving] observances as circumstances required. Beginning in the 1680s, officials called for public thanksgiving and fast days 'for the mercies of the yeare' on an annual basis. In the 1700s, they settled into a cycle of spring Fast Days and autumn Thanksgivings."[1]

Colonial Massachusetts was hardly unique in setting aside a day of gratitude after the fall harvest. Each of the thirteen colonies periodically proclaimed its own thanksgiving days. But for more than 150 years, the celebration was not uniformly observed in British North America. The first attempt to celebrate an all-American Thanksgiving in the 13 states came in October 1777 during the War for Independence, when the Continental Congress asked that Patriots observe a day to give thanks to a higher power.

The first president to proclaim a day of national thanksgiving was -- who else would it be? -- George Washington. His eloquent proclamation set aside Thursday, November 26, 1789, "to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country...."[2] For the full proclamation, see the text appended to the end of this answer.

President Washington's proclamation was technically the first national thanksgiving, but three-quarters of a century would pass before the idea of an annual national holiday took hold. During the first decades of our nation's existence, the day was regarded not as a national but as a state event. Finally, during the Civil War, President Lincoln was prevailed upon by the editor Godey's Lady's Book, Sarah Josepha Hale, to proclaim a national day of thanksgiving for the last Thursday in November.[3] He issued the proclamation on the same day that George Washington had -- October 3. It was a doubly symbolic gesture for reunifying the war-torn nation. For the full proclamation, see the text appended to the end of this answer.

Since Lincoln, each president has issued a Thanksgiving Day proclamation, usually designating the fourth Thursday of each November as a national holiday. In 1939 President Franklin D. Roosevelt tinkered with the custom, moving Thanksgiving from the fourth to the third Thursday of November. The historical context for the move is important: it was during the Great Depression, and FDR had been lobbied to extend the holiday shopping season by a week. The tinkering proved unpopular, however, and two years later Congress passed a joint resolution stating that Thanksgiving should be observed on the fourth Thursday of November. The sentiment behind the 1941 act has stuck.

Later in the 1940s, a light-hearted tradition began with President Harry S. Truman: the pardoning of a Thanksgiving turkey. For 57 years now, this tradition "has been compassionately enforced" by our presidents in a White House ceremony. The lucky turkey is spared the indignity of ending up on a dining room table and is instead given to a petting zoo (Kidwell Farm) in Herndon, Virginia.[4]

DOCUMENTS


President George Washington's Thanksgiving Proclamation (1789)

PROCLAMATION

A NATIONAL THANKSGIVING

Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His Will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor; and

Whereas both Houses of Congress have, by their joint committee, requested me "to recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness:"

Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold mercies and the favorable interpositions of His providence in the course and conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty which we have since enjoyed; for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted; for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and, in general, for all the great and various favors which He has been pleased to confer upon us.

And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations, and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions; to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually; to render our National Government a blessing to all the people by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed; to protect and guide all sovereigns and nations (especially such as have shown kindness to us), and to bless them with good governments, peace, and concord; to promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us; and, generally, to grant unto all mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as He alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand, at the city of New York, the 3d day of October, A. D. 1789.
Go. WASHINGTON

President Abraham Lincoln's Thanksgiving Proclamation (1863)

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

The year that is drawing toward its close has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added which are of so extraordinary a nature that they can not fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God.

In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign states to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere, except in the theater of military conflict, while that theater has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union.

Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defense have not arrested the plow, the shuttle, or the ship; the ax has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well as the iron and coal as of our precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege, and the battlefield, and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.

No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice, by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the imposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the divine purpose, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity, and union.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. Done at the city of Washington, this 3d day of October, A.D. 1863, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-eighth.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln

William H. Seward, Secretary of State.

George W. Bush's 2004 Thanksgiving Proclamation

For Immediate Release

Office of the Press Secretary

November 23, 2004

President's Thanksgiving Day 2004 Proclamation

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation

All across America, we gather this week with the people we love to give thanks to God for the blessings in our lives. We are grateful for our freedom, grateful for our families and friends, and grateful for the many gifts of America. On Thanksgiving Day, we acknowledge that all of these things, and life itself, come from the Almighty God.

Almost four centuries ago, the Pilgrims celebrated a harvest feast to thank God after suffering through a brutal winter. President George Washington proclaimed the first National Day of Thanksgiving in 1789, and President Lincoln revived the tradition during the Civil War, asking Americans to give thanks with "one heart and one voice." Since then, in times of war and in times of peace, Americans have gathered with family and friends and given thanks to God for our blessings.

Thanksgiving is also a time to share our blessings with those who are less fortunate. Americans this week will gather food and clothing for neighbors in need. Many young people will give part of their holiday to volunteer at homeless shelters and food pantries. On Thanksgiving, we remember that the true strength of America lies in the hearts and souls of the American people. By seeking out those who are hurting and by lending a hand, Americans touch the lives of their fellow citizens and help make our Nation and the world a better place.

This Thanksgiving, we express our gratitude to our dedicated firefighters and police officers who help keep our homeland safe. We are grateful to the homeland security and intelligence personnel who spend long hours on faithful watch. And we give thanks for the Americans in our Armed Forces who are serving around the world to secure our country and advance the cause of freedom. These brave men and women make our entire Nation proud, and we thank them and their families for their sacrifice.

On this Thanksgiving Day, we thank God for His blessings and ask Him to continue to guide and watch over our Nation.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim Thursday, November 25, 2004, as a National Day of Thanksgiving. I encourage all Americans to gather together in their homes and places of worship to reinforce the ties of family and community and to express gratitude for the many blessings we enjoy.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-third day of November, in the year of our Lord two thousand four, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and twenty-ninth.

GEORGE W. BUSH[5]

# # #

**************************************************
[1]George Washington, "Proclamation: A National Thanksgiving," in Messages and Papers of the Presidents, ed. James D. Richardson, vol. 1 (New York: Bureau of National Literature, 1897), p. 56.

[2]Carolyn Freeman Travers, "Fast and Thanksgiving Days of Plymouth Colony," at http://www.plimoth.org/learn/history/thanksgiving/fastandthanks.asp.

[3]David Herbert Donald, Lincoln (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995), p. 471; for the full text of the proclamation, see Abraham Lincoln, "A Proclamation," in Messages and Papers of the Presidents, ed. James D. Richardson, vol. 8 (New York: Bureau of National Literature, 1897), pp. 3373-74.

[4]Erin Martin, "Presidential Pardon: The Turkey that Lives to See Another Day," Infoplease at http://www.infoplease.com/spot/tgturkey2.html.

[5]http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/11/20041123-4.html.

Presidents and Supreme Court nominees

Question: There has been a lot of discussion lately about President Bush's opportunity to appoint three or more Supreme Court justices over the next four years. What is the current composition of the Court? Do most presidents have the opportunity to nominate Supreme Court justices? Who has nominated the most?
From: Pat T. of Orange County, CA
Date: November 13, 2004

Gleaves answers: Abortion, gay marriage, stem-cell research, school prayer -- there are enough contentious issues to keep any court in the headlines. The U.S. Supreme Court will certainly have its hands full during its next term. But will it be the court as it is currently composed?

One of the most important duties of the president, as set out in Article II of the U.S. Constitution, is to nominate judges to the federal bench. Congress sets the number of justices that will serve at any given time, and currently it is nine: eight associate justices plus the chief justice.

Many justices served for an extremely long time. Hugo Black was on the bench for 34 years and one month; Stephen Field, for 34 years and six months; William O. Douglas, for 36 years and six months.[1] Yet, given the ages of several justices on the current Supreme Court, and given Chief Justice William Rehnquist's fight with cancer, it is possible that President George W. Bush will have the opportunity to nominate two or more justices during his second term. Below are (1) the current composition of the highest court in the land, (2) the nominating president, and (3) the date the judicial oath was taken [2]:

Chief jusice:
William Rehnquist was nominated by President Richard Nixon and took the judicial oath on January 7, 1972.
He was elevated from associate justice to chief justice by President Reagan on September 26, 1986.

The associate justices, who by custom are seated in seniority on the Bench, are:
John Paul Stevens, nominated by President Gerald R. Ford, took the judicial oath on December 19, 1975.
Sandra Day O'Connor (President Ronald Reagan) -- September 25, 1981.
Antonin Scalia (Reagan) -- September 26, 1986.
Anthony M. Kennedy (Reagan) -- February 18, 1988.
David Souter (President George H. W. Bush) -- October 9, 1990.
Clarence Thomas (Bush) -- October 23, 1991.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg (President Bill Clinton) -- August 10, 1993.
Stephen Breyer (Clinton) -- August 3, 1994.

Note that Republican presidents have nominated seven of the nine members serving on the current Supreme Court.

Since the founding of our nation, there have been 16 chief justices. Only 14 of our 42 presidents have had the opportunity to nominate or elevate a chief justice. George Washington got to pick three; John Adams got to choose one. Since then, Republican presidents have nominated eight; Democratic presidents have nominated four.

William Howard Taft is unusual among the chief justices. After serving as president himself (1909-1913), Taft was nominated by President Warren G. Harding to be chief justice of the Supreme Court, a position he held through the 1920s.

Since 1789 there have been 97 associate justices, including those who currently serve. History has not evenly distributed their death or retirement from the bench. Just one-fifth of our presidents have nominated more than half of our associate justices. George Washington holds the record for nominating justices who would sit on the Supreme Court -- ten in all. Franklin D. Roosevelt comes in a strong second with eight justices. Jackson, Lincoln, Taft, and Eisenhower each got five of their justices on the bench. Next come Grant, Benjamin Harrison, and Grover Cleveland, with four apiece.

It is useful to recall that, although the Constitution vests the president with the power to nominate justices to the Supreme Court, he does so with the advice and consent of the Senate. Not all presidential nominees have been rubber stamped by the Senate. Robert Bork was nominated by President Reagan in the fall of 1987, only to be rejected by the Senate after particularly nasty confirmation hearings. So ugly was the confirmation process that a new verb entered the language: "to bork" (reminiscent of "to burke"), which means to assail a judicial nominee under heavy questioning that is politically motivated until the nominee voluntarily withdraws his name from consideration or is rejected by a vote on the floor of the Senate.
_______________________________________
[1]For historical information about the chief justices and associate justices of the U.S. Supreme Court, see the official site at http://www.supremecourtus.gov/about/traditions.pdf.

[2]See http://www.supremecourtus.gov/about/members.pdf.

Cabinet members from the opposing party

Question: With all the talk about Bush's cabinet leaving or changing posts, I was wondering how often a president reaches out to the other party to fill vacancies.
From: Rachel R. of Salt Lake City, UT
Date: November 9, 2004 [revised January 20, 2005]

Gleaves answers: As a nation we will probably never again achieve the balance that George Washington did when there were just three cabinet members. He hired the nation's brilliant Federalist, Alexander Hamilton, to serve as secretary of the Treasury at the same time that he had the nation's stellar Democratic-Republican, Thomas Jefferson, come on board as secretary of state. That was an era -- brief in duration -- when a lid was kept on openly partisan politics because Washington willed it so.

Washington's precedent of trying to bridge factional differences has held up symbolically. It is not unusual for a president to nominate a cabinet secretary from the opposing party, even in the harsh climate of modern politics. For example, Republican Dwight Eisenhower had Democrat James P. Mitchell serve as secretary of labor. Because of his efforts on behalf of migrant laborers and other working people, Mitchell was called "the social conscience of the Republican party."

Democrat John F. Kennedy had Republican C. Douglas Dillon serve as secretary of the Treasury. Dillon had previously been in the Eisenhower administration and was known as a strong advocate of tax cuts. Kennedy's successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, kept Dillon on.

Democrat Bill Clinton had Republican William Cohen serve as secretary of defense during his second term.

Republican George W. Bush has had Democrat Norm Mineta serving in the top spot at the U.S. Department of Transportation. Prior to that post, Mineta served as secretary of Commerce in the Clinton administration.

As you suggest, the question at the beginning of the second term is whether President Bush is inclined to expand the Democratic roster among his cabinet. David Frum puts the matter in historical perspective: "The only president to have derived political benefit from naming members of the opposing party to his cabinet was Franklin Roosevelt in 1940, when he named Henry Stimson secretary of war and Frank Knox secretary of the Navy. But Roosevelt was accepting a tough bargain: Bidding for an unprecedented and shocking third presidential term, he tried to allay Republican fears by handing operational control over the pending war in Europe to the leading GOP foreign-policy figure of the day and over the pending war in the Pacific to the most recent Republican nominee for vice president. It would be as if George W. Bush made Richard Holbrooke secretary of state and John Edwards secretary of defense."[1]

Much of the post-election discussion over the composition of the cabinet is symbolic, in any case. As Thomas Patterson points out, "Although the cabinet once served as the president's main advisory group, it has not played this role since Herbert Hoover's administration. As national issues have become increasingly complex, the cabinet has become outmoded as a policymaking forum: department heads are likely to understand issues only in their respective policy areas. Cabinet meetings have been larely reduced to gatherings at which only the most general matters are discussed."[2]

Looking further back in American history, we see that there was an attempt to elevate the status of the cabinet in the nineteenth century. Bret Stephens briskly observes in the Wall Street Journal: "Although the administration of William Henry Harrison isn't the most acclaimed in American history, it did contribute one intriguing idea to the theory of executive government. According to historian John Baker of Louisiana State University, 'Harrison had agreed that executive decisions would be based on a majority vote among members of the cabinet, with the president having one vote.' As fate would have it, Old Tippecanoe died within a month of taking office and his successor, John Tyler, promptly did away with the cabinet government concept. Good thing, too: Had Abraham Lincoln allowed his cabinet to govern with him (or for him) the Union would probably have gone to war against Great Britain, per the suggestion of his Secretary of State William Seward, instead of the Confederacy."[3]

In the end, having cabinet members from the opposing political party or contrary viewpoints must not mask a chief requirement of the presidency -- that "the executive office must be single -- that is, occupied by only one person -- to guarantee the necessary executive power and responsibility." This follows from Alexander Hamilton's defense of the presidency in Federalist 70, where he called for "energy in the executive."[4]

CABINET TURNOVER

According to presidential historian Richard Shenkman, 60 percent of George W. Bush's cabinet had changed over by Inauguration Day -- the highest over the past century. The average is about 50 percent.

___________________

[1]David Frum, "A New Style for a New Mandate," Wall Street Journal, November 9, 2004, p. A18.

[2]Thomas E. Patterson, We the People: A Concise Introduction to American Politics, 5th ed. (Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2004), p. 386.

[3]Bret Stephens, "What Is a Cabinet For?" Wall Street Journal, November 29, 2004, p. A15. It should be noted that William Seward had not been thinking of threatening war just with Great Britain. Between the Inauguration and the Sumter crisis, the secretary of state wrote a letter to the new president headed, "Some Thoughts for the President's Consideration." Geoffrey Perret records that Seward "wanted Lincoln to unite the country by waging war -- or at least threatening war -- against France and Spain. The Spanish had recently seized Santo Domingo and, with French connivance, were poised to grab Haiti. This violation of the Monroe Doctrine could not be allowed to stand. Tell them to get out of our hemisphere, or else, he urged." [Geoffrey Perret, Lincoln's War: The Untold Story of America's Greatest President and Commander in Chief (New York: Random House, 2004), p. 23.

[4]Peter Woll, ed., American Government: Readings and Cases, 15th ed. (New York: Pearson Longman, 2004), p. xv.

All the presidents' roles

Question: What are the different roles that a modern president has?
From: Walter A. of Portland, ME
Date: November 8, 2004

Gleaves answers: "My God, this is a hell of a job!" exclaimed President Warren G. Harding, who died during his first term, perhaps in part due to the mounting stress of his work. Harry S. Truman described the job using a vivid comparison: "Being a president is like riding a tiger. A man has to keep riding or be swallowed."[1]

"The American presidency," observes the splendid Smithsonian exhibit on the subject, "has the brutal power to line a face with age, and to do so more swiftly than ever in an age of instant communication and nuclear arsenals. It is a position for which no training can be adequate, no preparation complete, no counsel sufficient -- an office that outstrips anyone's capacity to negotiate the ever-widening circle of its responsibilities."[2]

No doubt about it, the president has the toughest job in the world. Citizens expect their man in the White House to be a miracle worker; to do everything from ginning up jobs to winning wars to congratulating people on making it to a hundred years old. True, the presidency has changed with the times and with the men who have served in the office, but throughout U.S. history the office has been "a glorious burden."[3]

CONSTITUTIONALLY STIPULATED DUTIES

Nowadays we speak of an "imperial presidency," and it is true that the office looks and feels a lot like an elected monarchy. Already at the dawn of the new republic, John Adams tried to convince George Washington that he should act like a king. Adams suggested that the indispensable man should wear robes instead of plain clothes and be addressed as "Your Excellency" instead of "Mr. President." Washington demurred; his one monarchical tendency was that he loved big cars. His canary-colored coach, pulled by six white horses and attended by a bevy of black slaves, must have made quite an impression in New York City, site of the nation's first capital.

Despite some monarchical vestiges that persisted at the creation of the presidency, the U.S. Constitutional is really rather modest about what a president is charged to do. Article II specifies only a half-dozen duties for the chief executive must perform:

(1) As a citizen like the rest of us who himself must live under the law, "he shall take [an] Oath or Affirmation" to uphold the Constitution.
(2) As our chief executive, "he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed," and "shall commission all the Officers of the United States."

(3) As the head of the nation's armed forces, he "shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States."

(4) As head of state, "He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties...."
(5) He shall nominate, with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, "Judges of the Supreme Court." Additionally, "he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls ... and all other Officers of the United States." On a related note, "he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers."
(6) As a kind of legislator in chief, "He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient."[4]

Look at the verbs that express the chief executive's power. A president can ... take, take care, commission, be, have, make, nominate, appoint, receive, give, recommend, and judge. Not a cipher of an office, to be sure, but executive action is bounded by constitutional, legal, bureaucratic, and political restraints, as well as by custom, media influence, and popular opinion. You would hardly know from the foregoing that the president of the United States is the most powerful man in the world.

THE GROWTH OF PRESIDENTIAL POWER

It is in the framework of restraints and responsibilities that we can begin to understand the "glorious burden" of the presidency. By looking at a president's roles in greater depth, we will see how the office has evolved since George Washington was sworn in some 215 years ago. Following are some of the roles the modern president is expected to fill:

Chief Executive. At the top of the president's job description is making sure the laws passed by Congress are faithfully executed. No small task, given how busy Congress is. That's why the president has a staff of 3,400 people who not only work in the Old Executive Mansion and West Wing, but also out in the bureaucracies.

One of the most important tasks of any president is to nominate outstanding jurists to the federal bench and Supreme Court. That may be the most important legacy presidents leave the nation. If they are in power long enough to shape the judiciary, they can also contribute significantly to the culture of the nation.

Chief Diplomat. In his Farewell Address, George Washington advised future presidents to maintain good relations with other nations. A state of peace would allow the United States to grow and prosper and build up the armed forces necessary to defend herself. We were the world's first large republic -- an experiment in ordered liberty -- and maintaining good relations with other nations would require exceptional diplomatic skills.

One of the greatest diplomatic coups in human history was the Louisiana Purchase. Never in human history had a large republic doubled its territory by diplomacy rather than by war. That in itself was a magnificent legacy bequeathed by Thomas Jefferson.

Since Jefferson's time, the president of the U.S. has acquired disproportionate burdens in the global arena. In the first place, we are the world's lone hyperpower, capable of projecting more power and influencing more people than any other nation in history. Second, we have the world's greatest arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, capable of destroying more people than any other nation in history. Third, in contrast to most ancient and modern empires, we do not think it enough merely to exert our will abroad in the national interest -- we put a premium on using power morally. This has made some of our presidents not just chief diplomats, but chief crusaders or chief missionaries.

The Smithsonian exhibit on the presidency puts it this way: "To the outside world, the United States president is both a national spokesman and a world leader. As a representative of a nation of immigrants with cultural and economic ties around the globe, the president is not only expected to defend the country's national security and economic interests but also to promote democratic principles and human rights around the world."[5]

Commander in Chief. The Preamble to the Constitution observes that one purpose of government is to "provide for the common defence." The framers of the Constitution believed that civilian control of the military is a cornerstone to liberty in times of war and peace. General George Washington demonstrated this commitment at Newburgh, New York, when he had to bring to heel insubordinate officers who wanted to march on Congress.

The nation was still in its youth when a series of crises forced our first four presidents to act in the role of commander in chief. Washington had to put down the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania. John Adams had to wage the Quasi War against the French in the Caribbean. Thomas Jefferson had to go after the Barbary Pirates in the Mediterranean. And James Madison had to finish the War for Independence from Great Britain by waging the War of 1812 (America's first congressionally declared war). Our first presidents sported swords on ceremonial occasions; now they go to rallies with the "football," the briefcase that contains nuclear codes and other information needed in a military crisis.

No other duty has caused our presidents more anguish than being commander in chief in time of war. Every president has said the most wrenching decisions he faced, by far, involved sending men into battle knowing that somebody's son, brother, or father wouldn't make it home. A stark photograph of Lyndon Johnson captures the agony of being a wartime commander in chief. LBJ is slumped over in a chair in the Cabinet Room, his head down; a reel-to-reel tape recorder is in front of him. The photo captured LBJ listening to a recording by his son-in-law, Charles Robb, who was a captain in the U.S. Marines serving in Vietnam. "When I left for Vietnam," Captain Robb explained, "the president gave me a small battery-operated tape recorder ... so that I could send Lynda occasional recordings. I think [those tapes] gave him some of the texture of the war at company levels."[6] And that photograph gives Americans some of the texture of being a wartime commander in chief.

There is often an idealism to which presidents appeal to justify American war-making. While Jefferson, a passivist, spoke of expanding the Empire of Liberty, it was Abraham Lincoln who truly infused war with transcendent aims. To Lincoln it was not enough to preserve the Union; by 1863 he also meant to emancipate all black slaves on American soil. To Woodrow Wilson it was not enough to go to war to defend United States interests against German aggression; we had to "make the world safe for democracy." To Ronald Reagan it was not enough to maintain detente with the Soviet Union; communism was an evil system destined for the dustbin of history; we had to help liberate the people in its shackles. To George W. Bush it is not enough to defend the U.S. against jihadists; we have to establish democratic governance in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere in the Middle East.

Imagine if the president were Ghengis Khan, a law unto himself. His ability to make war would be infintely easier than a U.S. president's ability, hemmed in as he is by constitutional, institutional, legal, and democratic restraints. Indeed, the commander in chief cannot appropriate the funds to wage war; for that he must work with Congress. The commander in chief cannot be indifferent to the law when he wages war; he has federal courts with which to contend and ultimately the threat of impeachment and removal from office. The commander in chief cannot have a tin ear when it comes to public opinion in times of war; as the people exercise their sovereignty every four years, he must respect the public and the media who help shape their opinion, assuming he or his party wants to stay in power. (See the Ask Gleaves column, "Wartime presidents," for historical trends regarding wartime presidents running for re-election.)

The following story illustrates the limits on a president's power, even during wartime. Since 9/11, President George W. Bush has been leading the fight against Al Qaeda. He wanted terrorist detainees at Guantanamo to be tried as war criminals. But shortly after Bush's re-election, a "federal judge ruled ... that President Bush had both overstepped his constitutional bounds and improperly brushed aside the Geneva Conventions in establishing military commissions to try detainees at the United States naval base here [at Guantanomo Bay] as war criminals."

It was a blow to the president, who is trying to win a war. A spokesman at the U.S. Department of Justice explained the administration's position: "The process struck down by the district court today [November 8, 2004] was carefully crafted to protect America from terrorists while affording those charged with violations of the laws of war with fair process, and the department will make every effort to have this process restored through appeal.... By conferring protected legal status under the Geneva Conventions on members of Al Qaeda, the judge has put terrorism on the same legal footing as legitimate methods of waging war."[7] (See the Ask Gleaves column, "Bush Doctrine and Roosevelt Corollary," for pre-emptive wars in U.S. history.)

Manager of the Economy. Among the reasons the founders called delegates to Philadelphia in May of 1787 were that a number of economic problems had arisen under the very imperfect Articles of Confederation."[8] The framers knew that a leadership position had to be created that gave more power to execute the laws of the land. There were enormous economic consequences to that decision back in 1787.

The Preamble to the Constitution observes that one purpose of government is to "promote the general welfare." What that means in a free-market system is that the president does not create jobs; rather, he fosters the conditions in which jobs are created. Despite limitations on presidential power, citizens have high expectations of what the CEO of America can do in the economic arena. He must endeavor to keep the country prosperous and make sure markets are functioning well by pursuing a responsible fiscal policy, negotiating treaties that are fair to American workers, resolving disruptive strikes, and appointing judges whose jurisprudence is sound and predictable and not unsettling to markets.

"Even though they have very limited power to control the economy, woe to the president who governs during an economic downturn and is perceived as not doing enough."[9] Herbert Hoover will forever be remembered in an unfavorable light because of Hoovervilles, the shantytowns built on the outskirts of cities in the early years of the Great Depression. (See the Ask Gleaves columns on the presidency and jobs.)

Party Leader. This is an example of a modern-day presidential role that is nowhere prescribed in the Constitution. In fact, George Washington in his Farewell Address urged fellow citizens not to succumb to faction or party. As a fallback position, if parties developed, he wanted presidents to remain above the fray -- to no avail. No sooner had George Washington retired than presidents became the leaders of their parties. And that fact has made them much more effective executives.

Some might quip that the development of political parties has led to the opposite of domestic tranquility -- one of the purposes of government in the Preamble of the Constitution -- but in historical perspective, our parties have served America well. As I've said in another Ask Gleaves column, parties "are the way Americans have long organized and channeled political disputes. They certainly beat the alternatives seen elsewhere around the globe -- little things like tribal wars, putsches, revolutions, assassinations, and mobs at the barricades. We should be grateful that our politics are so relatively genteel."

The men who have been ambitious for their parties have also, on occasion, been ambitious and effective presidents. As the Smithsonian puts it, "Several presidents rose to the office by building political parties or reshaping those that already existed. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison organized the Democratic-Republican party in the 1790s to counter the Federalist party of John Adams and Alexander Hamilton. Andrew Jackson created the new Democratic party in the 1820s and won the presidency in 1828 by consolidating the remnants of the Democratic-Republican party and attracting newly enfranchised voters. Others such as Franklin D. Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan reshaped their party structures, establishing new coalitions and bringing in new supporters."[10]

Ceremonial Head of State. At his Inauguration, the president takes an oath before fellow citizens and before the divine that he will uphold the laws of the land. This is appropriate, considering that the Preamble states that a purpose of government is to "secure the blessings of liberty." The operative word is "blessings." Americans expect presidents to govern, to be sure. But they also want them to inspire, console, comfort, and even lead the nation in prayer when the situation warrants -- in other words, to be their high priest. Think about it: no other individual in America can effectively call the entire nation to prayer when there is a D-Day Invasion, a Challenger tragedy, or a September 11th. And not just in crises -- the president also leads Americans when laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and at the annual National Prayer Breakfast. Moreover, through the years many of our presidents have called for days of "fasting and prayer." We have even had a preacher become president: James A. Garfield.

These symbolic events provide occasions when a president can connect with the American people. They are a vital source of presidential power.[11]

CONCLUSION

From the above, we see that there is a correspondence between the six presidential roles set out in Article II of the Constitution, and the six general purposes of government set out in the Preamble:

(1) The president is to take care that the laws passed by Congress are faithfully executed; this is necessary to "insure domestic tranquility."

(2) The president is to nominate judges; this is necessary to "establish justice."

(3) The president is to serve as commander in chief and make treaties; this is necessary to "provide for the common defence."

(4) and (5) The president is to give Congress information about the state of the Union and recommend measures to improve it; this is necessary to "promote the general welfare" and "to form a more perfect union."

(6) The president is to take an oath at his Inauguration; this is necessary to confirm that ours is a system of laws over men, which in turn is necessary to "secure the blessings of liberty."
_______________________________________

[1]Harding quoted in Lonnie G. Bunch, Spencer R. Crew, Mark G. Hirsch, adn Harry R. Rubenstein, The American Presidency: A Glorious Burden, Introduction by Richard Norton Smith (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2000), pp. 67, 70.

[2]Bunch, et al., American Presidency, p. xii. The Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies and Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum teamed up to host the Smithsonian Institution's exhibit, "The American Presidency: A Glorious Burden," on October 2, 2003.

[3]Bunch, et al., American Presidency.

[4]For a good overview of Article II, see Linda R. Monk, The Words We Live By (New York: Hyperion, 2003), pp. 62-88.

[5]Bunch, et al., American Presidency, p. 76.

[6]Photograph and caption in Robert Dallek, "Lyndon B. Johnson," in To the Best of My Ability: The American Presidents, ed. James M. McPherson (New York: DK, 2001), pp. 264-65.

[7]Neil A. Lewis, "U.S. Judge Halts War-Crime Trial at Guantanamo," New York Times, November 9, 2004, p. A1.

[8]Bunch, et al., American Presidency, p. 83.

[9]Bunch, et al., American Presidency, p. 83.

[10]Bunch, et al., American Presidency, p. 85.

[11]Bunch, et al., American Presidency, p. 81.