-
Inauguration
The 72nd inauguration of a United States president took place under unique circumstances, a mostly virtual ceremony brought on by the global pandemic and what officials have described as an attempted coup that had taken place two weeks to the day before on those grounds. The crowd was light as President-Elect Joe Biden faced Supreme Court Justice Roberts and, using an heirloom family Bible, took the oath that made him the 46th President, and Kamala Harris made history by being the first woman and person of color to be sworn in as Vice-President of the United States. The first Latino Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor administered her oath of office. Harris chose to use the Bible of the first Black Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and the Bible of a childhood caretaker.
The day started with mass at Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle with the President and Vice-President-Elect and House and Senate leaders attending. The group then proceeded to the Inaugural Celebration for Young Americans
The ceremony saw highlights beyond the new leadership. Former presidential hopeful Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota hosted the inauguration, introducing the Supreme Court Justices and the President and Vice-President Elect as well as the celebrities who took part in the ceremony.
Lady Gaga belted a classy rendition of the National Anthem, a reprise of her Super Bowl 50 performance that sent chills across the nation in 2016. She did the same on January 20, 2021. Jennifer Lopez was called upon to sing “America the Beautiful,” and Garth Brooks closed out the musical portions of the ceremony with “Amazing Grace”; however, arguably the most surprising and remarkable performance came from 22-year-old poet laureate and activist Amanda Gorman. Gorman, a multiple award-winning poet and the first to be named National Youth Poet Laureate (2017) stunned the country with her poem, “The Hill We Climb.” Quotes such as, “We lift our gazes not to what stands between us but what stands before us,” and “There is always light, if only we’re brave enough to see it. If only we’re brave enough to be it,” spoke to the need to unify and to see our commonalities.
President Biden also addressed the need to unify as a country. He said, “Democracy is fragile,” and he referred to the violence that had recently occurred. He was clear that the cause of the democracy had triumphed and that democracy is precious as he spoke of the problems we currently face. “Few periods in our nation’s history have been more challenging or difficult than the one we’re in now….It requires that most elusive of things in a democracy: Unity. Unity.”
He acknowledged the former Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama who sat at his inauguration and President Carter who was unable to attend. “I thank my predecessors of both parties for their presence here….You know the resilience of our Constitution and the strength of our nation.” He continued, “I have just taken the sacred oath each of these patriots took—an oath first sworn by George Washington. But the American story depends not on any one of us, not on some of us, but on all of us. On ‘We the People’ who seek a more perfect union.”
The ceremony concluded with a benediction by Rev. Silvester Beaman, a pastor from Delaware, and then President Biden, First Lady Dr. Jill Biden, Vice-President Harris, and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff continued on to review readiness of the military and to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier along with the former presidents and their spouses.