Jan 20th, 2009 at 5:11 pm
Inauguration Trivia
Via Robert Farley, it seems John Quincy Adams didn’t get sworn-in on a Bible:
John Quincy Adams, according to his own letters, placed his hand on a constitutional law volume rather than a Bible to indicate where his fealty lay.
Interesting. The symbolism of the oath-on-bible is interesting. In some respects, you can take it as symbolizing the fact that even though in our system “no one is above the law,” including the president, in practice it’s actually extremely difficult to fully hold the chief executive to that standard. We’re putting our faith in the idea that the person occupying that office to be guided by the higher law, God’s law. It makes a certain amount of sense but I can’t help but feel that the faith is often misplaced.
70 Responses to “Inauguration Trivia”
Register
RSSLogin
Advertisement
Visit Our Affiliated Sites
Books By Matthew Yglesias
Topic CloudView topics sorted by popularity
Afghanistan
Basketball
Budget
China
climate
Congress
DC
Denmark
Economics
Economy
education
Energy
Environment
Finance
Gender
Germany
Health Care
History
International Law
International Relations
Iran
Israel
Media
Monetary Policy
National Security
NBA
Pakistan
Palestine
Philosophy
planning
Political Reform
Proliferation
Public Health
Public Opinion
Race
Regulation
Russia
Science
Sports
Stimulus
Sweden
taxes
Technology
Trade
transportation
Featured
Subscribe to the Progress Report
Contact Matthew Yglesias
Use this form to contact blog author Matthew Yglesias.
ArchivesBlog RollAbout Matt YglesiasContact Me
Donate
January 20th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
You should be wondering why it is that no American President today could probably get away with doing that.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
Well, not really.
They’re not swearing to uphold the Bible or God’s Law, they are using the Bible as “proof” of the seriousness of their oath.
The oath is taken to uphold the Constitution, but what makes the oath count is the weight behind it. You could swear on your mother’s grave, your father’s ashes, on the Bible, “cross my heart, hope to die”…if you’re not telling the truth.
That means the pain of breaking the oath comes from something serious, that you’ll dishonor your parents, you would rather die, you will risk something like eternal damnation that you may believe in.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:31 pm
Re “you will risk something like eternal damnation that you may believe in.”
—————
I noticed that Cheney was in a wheelchair and looking poorly.
Amazing what happens when you cut off his supply of infant’s blood and put him out in strong sunlight.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
i think the idea behind the act is that by swearing on a bible to uphold the constitution, you are undertaking to treat the constitution with the same reverence with which you treat the bible. you are saying that, in virtue of this oath, you would view the prospect of violating the constitution as on a par with violating the bible, and you would no more violate the constitution than you would violate the bible.
the universally-accepted inviolability of the bible is sort of the floating presupposition; your attitude towards the bible’s inviolability is then transferred to the constitution by your swearing to uphold the one, on the other.
so it makes a lot of sense in a culture in which people’s reverence for, and unwillingness to violate, the bible can be taken for granted, or is at least treated as though it is something that none of us question.
it’s also why i think that jq adams alternative, which (as a rabid secularist) i rather like, strikes me as incoherent in another sense.
to swear on the constitution to uphold the constitution is to say, in effect, “i hold the constitution in as much honor, i hold it to be as inviolable, as i hold–the constitution! and i would no more violate the constitution than i would violate–the constitution!”
so it becomes a bit tautologous.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:35 pm
Who’s God?
January 20th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
The crazy thing, though, is that the Christian version of the Bible explicitly forbids this kind of oath. So, swearing on that same Bible is hopelessly incoherent.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
I’d like to see someone make and use a bound volume of the Constitution, Dec of Indep, Federalist Papers, Articles of Confederation, Magna Carta, Lincoln’s 2nd inaugural, universal declaration of human rights, something from the Roman Republic and democratic Athens, etc.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:45 pm
There’s a good discussion on the classical history of “the oath” (i.e. oaths in general) in this edition of In Our Time.
it’s also why i think that jq adams alternative, which (as a rabid secularist) i rather like, strikes me as incoherent in another sense.
Yeah. The affirmation option was put there for a reason — in contrast to England, which still required an oath of Anglican orthodoxy and the taking of communion in order to serve in public office.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:47 pm
“and unwillingness to violate … the bible”
What??? Jesus Christ, Christians are violating the bible all the goddamn time!
January 20th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
Interesting:
The Presidential oath of office is described in Article II, section 1 of the Constitution:
Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:–”I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
Nothing in this section requires that the oath of office be taken on the Bible. Neither do the words “so help me God” appear in the oath. While Presidents often include this phrase in their inauguration ceremonies, the words are customary; they are not required by the Constitution and have no legal significance. (from http://candst.tripod.com/tnppage/arg11.htm)
As a strict constitutional scholar one might argue that god and bible were excluded by the founding fathers from the oath of office. I would say lets honor their original intents sby omitting them in future federal swearing-ins.
Or else, like in the olden days, we could swear in on a stack of bibles including the Torah and Koran so as to be more inclusive.
mickster
January 20th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
Didn’t know that. My opinion of Adams just went up.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
@kid bitzer -
If one accepts your conclusion (which I do not, but it’s defensible) that swearing on the Constitution is tautologous, I would ask, which is worse? An atheist swearing on a Bible is no promise at all – it’s a farce.
For me to swear on the Bible is no more relevant than swearing on Grimm’s Fairy Tales. The Constitution is far preferable, in my eyes, as it celebrates the constitution.
I’d even submit that it would be disrespectful for an atheist to swear on a holy book – it cheapens those who actually believe. And I don’t mind if a religious official wants to promise God about their commitment to do right as well – anything that helps them try to do the right thing is OK by me. As long as they mean it.
But I dream of the day without TWO prayers, a couple of rounds of “so help me God,” and various religious references sprinkled in by other speakers in a ceremony whose official content is entirely secular, and centers on the new President’s promise to uphold the Constitution, including its defense from official state religion.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:54 pm
You’re right. There’s not far from that to The Divine Right of Presidents. Nixon’s assertion to Frost and the Bush Admins views on the unitary executive came awfully close.
January 20th, 2009 at 5:56 pm
If it were me, I’d swear on a stack of my toddler daughter’s scribblings and hope I’d made it clear where my priorities lay.
.
January 20th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
The purpose of the oath and the bible is just to solemnize the occasion and remind the declarant of his obligation to tell the truth. If a con law treatise served that purpose for JQA, so much for the good.
January 20th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
I hate to sound like Jon Stewart, but what happens if the President REFUSES to take the oath? Kinda awkward with a 1 million + people there , no?
Wonder if Chief Justice Roberts got loose bowels as the constitutional aspects flashed before his eyes when Obama momentarily refused to go along earlier today?
January 20th, 2009 at 6:28 pm
But I dream of the day without TWO prayers, a couple of rounds of “so help me God,” and various religious references sprinkled in by other speakers in a ceremony whose official content is entirely secular…
I dream of a day when virtually every major address by an American high official doesn’t end with the utterly mindless “and may God bless the United States of America.” It’s not the evocation of the deity as such that annoys me, it’s my aversion to the cliché, to the mindlessness of it all. It’s quite apparent now that American politicians dare not remove this particular phrase from the end of their speeches, lest they be accused of hating God.
January 20th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Re “since Article 2 of the Constitution requires an oath, he would not become President. ”
———-
I wonder if Roberts gave con law prof Obama an impromptu pop quiz –by screwing up the wording of the oath deliberately so that he could giggle about it at the Federalist Society and argue that Obama was not legitimately the President since he hadn’t sworn the correct oath.
Start the Obama Presidency off right with an embarrassing blunder and a question of legitimacy. Like that stuff re the birth certificate.
Actually, I’m not sure that agreeing to the oath is required. Interesting constitutional question. Suppose we put it to those guys with rifles.
January 20th, 2009 at 6:55 pm
It’s awkward and also, since Article 2 of the Constitution requires an oath, he would not become President.
Wrong again.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:04 pm
For me to swear on the Bible is no more relevant than swearing on Grimm’s Fairy Tales.
And that’s the point…for YOU it is no more relevant, but for the person taking the oath who believes in the Bible, it IS relevant.
It’s relevant to me as an atheist to see someone swear to uphold the constitution by comparing it to something they also believe in. It matters not if it’s the Bible, the Koran, or someone’s mother’s ashes. If that’s what they believe, great. I may not agree with what they believe, but I’m sure they don’t share my belief that the New York football Giants are the best team to root for in the NFL.
If they want to swear on the Bible, let them go ahead.
It neither infringes upon my right to believe or not believe, and doesn’t affect my ability to take oaths either. A complete non-issue, and if you’re somehow offended by this, then there’s a corner bar somewhere where people have the same sob story about the world not understanding them. I think it’s on the corner of Life and Experience.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:17 pm
228 years and 44? some Presidents and the Republicans decide to pull this shit with the first black President.
I was wrong. If Roberts had tricked Obama into swearing a faulty oath, he would not just have giggled about it at the Federalist Society. It would have been the lead story on Fox News tomorrow– with the usual right wing assholes gravely raising questions of “competence”.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:20 pm
“Wrong again.”
Umm, the 20th Amendment doesn’t supersede the requirement of taking an oath. I hate to say it, but Al’s right here. That said, The Constitution says a lot of silly things about warrants being required for searches and that foreign treaties hold the power of law. We’ve already dumped those portions of The Constitution, so it would be silly to hold onto that one arcane portion of Article Two. I’m willing to be a stickler on The Constitution, but then let’s take all of it seriously. Where Al is wrong is that he believes that any portion of the Constitution can be eliminated at the whim of any Republican Party member, but not by member of any other party. Which is strange, The Constitution doesn’t even mention that Holiest of Holies, the Republican Party.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:28 pm
Especially since no one has ever come close to offering an iota of proof that this “God” actually exists.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:31 pm
The 20th amendment supercedes Article 2, as does the 25th. Not sure what the confusion is, here. Similarly, the 14th amendment supercedes article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3. Amendments amend the constitution, hence their name.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:32 pm
Um, it’s absolute monarchs who are bound by God’s law — Presidents (and constitutional monarchs) are bound by man’s laws. What do they teach in Poly Sci. at Harvard these days? Politics as interpreted by Kaiser Wilhelm?
January 20th, 2009 at 7:36 pm
Since Jesus forbade swearing oaths (”But live your life by ‘Yea, yea’ or ‘Nay, nay’”), swearing on the Bible is a little blasphemous. I assume that is why you can “affirm” rather than “swear”.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:39 pm
“but I’m sure they don’t share my belief that the New York football Giants are the best team to root for in the NFL.”
I don’t share that belief, and I’m a Giants fan. I love the Giants, but they are not the best team to root for, they are a team that wants to torment me. They’ll sometimes have a great season, build up my hopes, and then crush me in the playoffs. Or they’ll have a crappy season, somehow make the playoffs anyway, and then have no chance. Except that maybe they do have a chance. But then, even if they win the Super Bowl, they’ll make it look so scary that you need a bowlful of heart pills to watch it. Yet they win the Super Bowl just enough that you can’t ever give up on them. I honestly think they are responsible for causing more heart attacks that any other team. But probably with a better survival rate. A Giants fan won’t die before the game is over.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:48 pm
No, if an elected president refused to take the oath, he couldn’t become prez. 20 and 25 don’t address the oath.
However we don’t know he didn’t already do the swearing in–many presidents elect have done a private one before the ‘inauguration.’
January 20th, 2009 at 7:54 pm
Re: Um, it’s absolute monarchs who are bound by God’s law — Presidents (and constitutional monarchs) are bound by man’s laws.
Er, no. What happens if the people decide to vote for genocide, or slavery, or Jim Crow? One has an obligation, in that case, to obey God’s law rather than man’s. Segregation was wrong, for example, because it violated natural law- the laws of the state notwithstanding.
January 20th, 2009 at 8:02 pm
“Segregation was wrong, for example, because it violated natural law- the laws of the state notwithstanding.”
No, segregation was wrong because it violated the Constitution of the United States of America. I would agree that the great religions of the world would agree on most of each’s basic ethical principles. But it is simply wrong to say that an opinion was derived from the Bible rather than the Constitution. They may swear allegiance on a Bible, but their allegiance is to the Constitution.
January 20th, 2009 at 9:00 pm
One has an obligation, in that case, to obey God’s law rather than man’s.
Er…which God? The White Jesus? The Flying Spaghetti Monster? Satan? Pan? Thor? You need to be more specific so’s I can make sure I do the right thing. I wouldn’t want to accidentally support, for example, gay marriage if it turns out that that God (the correct God) hates fags.
January 20th, 2009 at 9:06 pm
This one, Ed.
“One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that ‘an unjust law is no law at all.’ Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law…..All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority.”
-MLK, ‘Letter from Brimingham Jail’
January 20th, 2009 at 9:07 pm
God’s Law? Does that include various rather unambiguous Biblical edicts that homosexuality is a graven sin? Hope not. Actually, proclaiming fealty to the Christian God and his/her “laws” is an extremely disturbing commitment on the part of a President.
January 20th, 2009 at 9:09 pm
Then how the fuck did we end up with the Iraq Invasion, torture as official U.S. policy, illegal wiretaps, the DOJ scandal, and all the other shit? Was Commander Bunnypants invoking the wrong Jesus or something?
January 20th, 2009 at 9:13 pm
“I would agree that the great religions of the world would agree on most of each’s basic ethical principles.”
I would also point out that the great religions of the world are also very good at denying the right of other great religions to even exist. History overflows with such examples. There are few examples of conquering where the conquering leader allowed the practice of the local religion. But there are much fewer examples of attempts to simply make a multi-religious society. Strangely, Islam has most of them as the conqueror. Ahhh, the old days of Islam. Most religions would reject such an approach. And most have done so violently. It can change, but it won’t soon.
January 20th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
“Er, no. What happens if the people decide to vote for genocide, or slavery, or Jim Crow? One has an obligation, in that case, to obey God’s law rather than man’s. Segregation was wrong, for example, because it violated natural law- the laws of the state notwithstanding.”
According to many Christians of the time, God’s law permitted slavery.
They were right: http://godisimaginary.com/i13.htm
January 20th, 2009 at 9:25 pm
According to many Christians of the time, God’s law permitted slavery.
The Hectors of the time did too. Just how it is.
January 20th, 2009 at 10:06 pm
That’s my second cousin. I hope to someday be worthy of his drunken brothers.
January 20th, 2009 at 10:30 pm
“According to many Christians of the time, God’s law permitted slavery. ”
Well, they permitted genocide, too. I’m not really sure which is worse. Strangely, Christians defend this stuff buy saying that those people that opposed it weren’t really Christians. Aside from Jesus, is anyone? But I really don’t like Christianity being defined as “whatever we want to do to the infidels is okay.” But that’s traditionally been the nature of American Christianity. We took some concepts from the Hebrew Bible, like the Book of Joshua. And we used that to justify the large scale slaughter of many peoples. We did that because we did not believe that those people were really people. That is the true evil of racism: you look at a human being and somehow come to the conclusion that that it is no sin to kill them. Strangely, the only two modern religions to commit genocide are Christianity and Buddhism, which are very different religions, but with their similarities. The only multiple offender is Christianity. Jesus didn’t do that, his followers did. And that includes Popes. But there is a problem here: Christianity has a strong history of genocide, torture, and colonialism. And they have a strong record of forcing governments into their submission for their desires. Maybe me should be worrying about or desire to advance Christianity as a government goal.
January 20th, 2009 at 10:34 pm
the UC and CSU systems are where the real action in oaths is these days. the whole bible thing was played out after Keith Elison. there might be some discussion if you want to ponder what it meas if one uses the Jefferson bible or if a Catholic is sworn in using the King James or a Protestant with the Douay-Reims.
January 20th, 2009 at 11:01 pm
Washington, as a good deist, often attended church, but made it a point to to leave before communion was offered. Jefferson while making significant contributions to the Catholic and Presbyterian churches, forbade prayer in the Whitehouse. One might also consult the JEFFERSON BIBLE, his personal translation
of the New Testament. The Founders were religion-friendly; so long as the divide was clear
January 20th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
kid blitzer nailed this one.
January 21st, 2009 at 3:17 am
Good on JQA, even if that was, like, 300 years ago.
Fostert, Islam hasn’t committed genocide if you believe that either 1) what’s going on in Sudan isn’t genocide, or 2) the government in Khartoum is genocidal, and it’s Islamic, but its genocide is largely secular in motivation, and thus does not count as an “Islamic genocide.” One must also apply similar logic to the Ottoman genocide of the Armenians.
Also, I’m not quite sure what you’re referring to by a Buddhist genocide. The closest thing I could come up with was genocide against the Tamils of Sri Lanka, but I think that calling that a genocide seems like fairly wholesale acceptance of LTTE propaganda. I don’t think that’s what you mean, so I suppose I must be missing something here. (I can’t imagine you mean Imperial Japan, which wasn’t particularly Buddhist, and, for all its atrocities, wasn’t particularly genocidal either.)
If one called what’s happened in Sudan and the Ottoman Empire genocides-perpetrated-by-Muslims but not “Islamic genocides” per se, one might also have difficulty saying exactly what would count as a “Christian genocide.” I think that a fairly clear case might be the Albigensian Crusade and the burning of the Cathars, but I can’t really think of other clearcut cases of “Christian genocide,” and not mere genocide-perpetrated-by-Christians.
So, I guess I just don’t get the “Christianity and Buddhism are the only modern genocidal religions” viewpoint, because I’m not sure what you’re talking about by Buddhist genocide, and Christianity and Islam seem to have similar records on the genocide issue, whether one concludes that both or neither religions are genocidal.
January 21st, 2009 at 5:02 am
It was a historic day indeed with the inauguration of Barack Obama and now Obama will have to sit down and to tackle the problems facing the United States of America. The economy, oil, jobs and two wars will all be Obama’s focal points during his historic first 90 days in office. The changing of the guard will hopefully equal an end to the crisis.
January 21st, 2009 at 8:05 am
“what’s going on in Sudan isn’t genocide”
Okay, I’m willing to accept Sudan as a genocide. It’s more ethnic than religious, but Islam surely hasn’t stopped them.
“Also, I’m not quite sure what you’re referring to by a Buddhist genocide.’
How about Cambodia in the 1970s? Again, not a religious genocide, but Buddhists certainly committed it.
“Christianity and Islam seem to have similar records on the genocide issue”
Far from it. Ten million in America, Six million in Germany. Islam can’t even come close to those numbers. And I haven’t even started to count the appalling numbers from other Christian colonial enterprises. Want to talk about Southeast Asia? Or Africa? Or South America? Or India? Islam has certainly had it’s bad periods, but Christianity has only had but a few good periods. We happen to be in one now, but it won’t last long. The norm in Christianity is genocide, colonialism, and forced conversion. Between 325 AD and now, we’ve had about 50 good years from Christianity. The rest have been nothing but rampant killing. And even in Christianity’s good years, it supports the genocide committed by others. It is a truly evil religion. Any religion that seeks to exterminate it’s rivals should be abolished. You’d think we’d have learned something from the Hitler experience, but all we learned is that we must exterminate Muslims to give Jews a safe haven from Christians.
January 21st, 2009 at 9:05 am
thanks, mike, but the name is bitzer. kid bitzer.
January 21st, 2009 at 9:14 am
@21 -
Would you please go back and read my entire comment and retract your rant? You completely misconstrued my point. I explicitly said I was OK with someone swearing an oath on the bible. My point was that I preferred, and therefore approved of, John Quincy Adams’ use of the Constitution.
January 21st, 2009 at 9:20 am
The oath is no longer necessary.
The amendment does mention that the president must meet the “qualificatoins” for the ofice by the time of inauguration, but the oath is not a qualification:
At noon, Obama was president, regardless of oaths.
January 21st, 2009 at 12:55 pm
The Khmer Rouge? Okay; some footsoldiers doing the killing may have been Buddhists, but given that the regime itself was an explicitly anti-religious Maoist state, and regarded Buddhist monks as enemies of the state to be killed along with intellectuals, Vietnamese, Christians, urbanites, Thais, Muslims… and, well, the list goes on and on, I think it’s completely ridiculous to claim that Buddhism is responsible for it.
To a lesser extent, I’d say this also applies to blaming Nazi atrocities on Christianity, or Ba’ath atrocities on Islam, although not as strongly as in the case of the Khmer rouge, since Nazis and Ba’athists are merely secular, and not explicitly anti-religious like Khmer Rouge.
Of course, where one draws the line is difficult to say. The Romanovs took the whole Orthodox Christianity thing pretty seriously. The British have Anglicanism as an explicit state religion, but I’d say that it wasn’t as significant a motivator for policy. So I’d say that it makes more sense to blame Christianity for Romanov-inspired pogroms than it does to blame it for the Amritsar massacre. Some might draw the line elsewhere.
January 21st, 2009 at 3:10 pm
The difference between Christianity and Islam committing crimes is that Christianity forbids it and Islam encourages. Read the various doctrinal manuals. When a Christian engages in genocide I can say that this action is against the tenets of Christianity. When a Muslim does I am not so sure it is against the tenets of Islam as it is spelled out in the Koran.
January 21st, 2009 at 7:38 pm
Julian Elson,
I’m going to take a breather for a few wks from commenting on this blog, since things are going to get busy at work this spring. feel free to come and comment on my blog though.
As regards the British in India, I’m not sure what Fostert is smoking. The British did a lot of bad things (and a lot of great things) in India. On balance I would have probably been for the British staying in 1857, and for them leaving in 1947. But you simply cannot compare the record of the British vs. the Muslim rulers of India- in terms of economic oppression, religious oppression, bloodshed, atrocities, anything. Ask a bunch of Indian Hindus whether their people suffered more under the British or under the Muslims. I’d bet that a heavy majority of them would prefer the British.
January 21st, 2009 at 7:41 pm
As regards the Romanovs, I agree with Julian Elson: you can fairly lay the pogroms to the fault of Christianity, and a very grievous fault it is. Same with the persecution of the Cathars and other Christian heretics, the same with medieval persecution of the Jews (to some extent- killing Jews was always condemned by the papacy, although supported by many provincial clerics) and to a slight extent the same with the colonization of the Americas (although the Christian Spanish and Portuguese were much less cruel to the Amerindians than the largely secular English and Dutch.) Blaming Christianity for slavery or the Holocaust on the other hand, is to put it charitably, facetious.
January 21st, 2009 at 9:06 pm
DTM:
For no good reason, I missed that when I was reading the constitution. Thanks for setting me right.
February 15th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
new york refinance louisville mortgage refinance automobile bad credit refinance
March 1st, 2009 at 6:01 am
viagra
It is the coolest site,keep so!
March 11th, 2009 at 4:53 am
Incredible site!
March 12th, 2009 at 11:49 pm
Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!
March 22nd, 2009 at 6:25 am
tramadol
Incredible site!
March 22nd, 2009 at 10:33 am
buy viagra online
Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!
April 2nd, 2009 at 5:31 am
I want to say – thank you for this!
buy cheap viagra
April 3rd, 2009 at 4:21 am
I want to say – thank you for this!
cheap brand pfizer viagra
April 9th, 2009 at 6:58 am
It is the coolest site,keep so! viagra