On Monday, January 21, if you are wondering what happened to your favorite daytime dramas (“The Bold and the Beautiful,” “Days of our Lives,” “General Hospital,” and “The Young and the Restless”) or looking for someone to blame for their not airing, you can thank none other than President Barack H. Obama. On this day, President Obama will be publicly inaugurated for the second and final time after winning against former Governor Mitt Romney in last November’s hotly debated presidential election.
As part of the inaugural festivities, the President, who won the race with 332 electoral votes compared to Romney’s 206, will pledge the Presidential Oath of Office as administered to him by the Honorable John G. Roberts Jr., Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court. Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., will pledge the Vice Presidential Oath of Office as administered to him by the Honorable Sonia Sotomayor, Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Musical Selections will be provided by The United States Marine Band, PS 22, Staten Island, New York and Lee University Festival Choir, Cleveland, Tennessee. Additional selections will be provided by the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir, singer-songwriter James Taylor and singer Kelly Clarkson. The National Anthem (“The Star-Spangled Banner”) will be sung by pop music sensation and actress/entrepreneur Beyoncé. New York Senator Charles E. Schumer will provide the Call to Order and Welcoming Remarks.
For more on all the festivities and events surrounding the big day, head on over to http://www.inaugural.senate.gov.
Note: While inauguration day is traditionally highlighted by the swearing in ceremony that takes place in Washington, D.C. on the steps of Capitol Hill on the 20th of January every four years, the first swearing in ceremony actually occurred on April 30, 1789 with President George Washington taking his oath on the balcony of Federal Hall, located in New York, NY. When the ceremony takes place on Monday, January 21, it will have been only the seventh time in the nation’s history in which the constitutionally-mandated Presidential Inauguration day of January 20th will have fallen on a Sunday. It is understood that the White House will arrange a private swearing in before noon on that day with the public ceremony being held on the 21st in order to follow tradition.